Hiking the Wellsvilles

On Friday, July 31, 2009, Brad, Abby and I hiked to the very top of the Wellsville Mountains! This is something that Brad and I have been saying that we wanted to do for a few years, but have just never actually done it. We got up, and with camelbacks on our backs began our hike at 7:30 am. In the pictures below you can see that the trail starts out... as a trail, but the further we got the more overgrown the trail was and there were several random rocks and tree trunks/roots sticking out, so we really had to watch our footing as we hiked. For about the first 1 and 1/2 hours we were in the trees, then we broke out of the trees and the trail at this point was extremely overgrown and narrow, but there was a trail, nevertheless!

As we were hiking and hiking, we got to a point where the trail went down in a ravine and then looked like it kind of wrapped around toward the back of the mountain. At this point we had been hiking 2 1/2 hours or so, so Brad pointed to the top of the mountain and said "Well, that is where we want to go, I say we just head straight up this mountainside." Abby and I totally agreed. (LITTLE did we know what we were getting ourselves into!!) Note: the pic of Brad and Abby standing almost vertically with the mountainside. Yes! That is where we went. Oh, how I learned to appreciate that little "overgrown" trail. We were blazing our way through sagebrush and bushes that were brutal! ... And we were going straight up the mountain. Along the way we found some perfectly formed seashells, which was kind of cool. I guess left over from years ago when Lake Bonneville once covered the area. We made it to the top! Hurray!

It was beautiful. You could see the whole Cache Valley and down into Brigham City. We sat at the top and ate our lunch, rested our weary feet and enjoyed the view for about an hour. Then ounce again our journey began. As we tried to find the trail that we left to take back down.....

We couldn't find the trail, so we had to make our way down the mountainside, once again, blazing our own trail. :) About 1/2 way down, we could see the trail, but the trick was to find it. Which eventually we did. But first we had to go through our sagebrush, down rock slides, and through a jungle of plants as tall as we were, which we realized partway through was 3/4 stinging nettle. Ha, ha. Something to laugh about now! But what an adventure. We had a great family adventure. It ended up taking us 8 1/2 hours. If we ever do it again, we will definitely not leave the trail. I bet we could do it in less than 7 hours! Other than a few bruises and blisters on the feet, we came through like Champs! And just a little bit of trivia info: The Wellsville Mountains are the steepest mountains in the US from base to top - due to how narrow and tall they are. (Google it!)

And we climbed those mountains, baby!