So we had planned to hike Timpanogos Peak (elev. 11,750 ft) last weekend. We planned to backpack up 3-4 miles and set up camp for the night. Then the next morning we would leave the tents and backpacks and just take day packs to hike to the summit and back, then pack up and hike back down to the trail head.
You'll notice I said "planned". We didn't get as far as we had hoped due to weather (it was raining cats and dogs), and lack of preparation - but it was a good learning experience for us.
We had boys with sleeping bags rolled up and strapped to packs without any waterproof bag covering them (which got soaked in about 90 seconds). We had boys with packs that were open on the top that allowed rain to go right in, soaking everything inside the packs. We had boys that didn't have any rain gear even though they were told that the forecast was for rain and to be prepared.
We quickly took black garbage bags and covered everything we could, but it was too late really, too much was soaked. We backpacked up the 1.3 miles to Scout Falls on the Timpooneke Trail, then had a little learning discussion. We talked about how unprepared we were to spend the night - knowing that it was going to get down to the low 30's and we had all wet stuff. We still had approximately 2 miles to hike and only 45 minutes before dark. We talked about what we would do if we were on a 50 miler, and 25 miles from our vehicles and had to spend the night. Then we hiked back down to the vehicles and drove home.
It was a bummer that we didn't "succeed" in our attempt to climb the peak. But I found out the next day that there was 3 inches of snow at Emerald Lake, and temperatures at the peak were 30 degrees, with a 20 degree wind chill factor. It was good we weren't up there for all of that. And it was a great learning experience for the boys, and us leaders as to what we need to do to prepare better next time.
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