An 11 mile hike

Okay

We were talking to the homeowner of the current sit and asked, "What is a good hike for sea-level folks who have O.L.D.?"  - "Well Prairie Creek Lake or Miner Lake would be nice - and if you are up for it you can do the loop" (basically do both). The trail was rated intermediate to difficult.  SURE, what the heck, let's do it!

So we set off and the first part, just over 2 miles, was relatively flat, and took about an hour. We then headed up to Miner Lake, a bit steep in sections, but in another hour+ we were there, just under 2 miles.  Nice.....  and after 4 miles+ we were feeling comfortable. We decided to do the loop, it would be mostly level or down!. Another 2 miles, in an hour to Prairie Lake, then 2 miles back to the intersection and another 2+ miles back to the car. We completed the loop in 6 hours with all the "stop and enjoy time". It was considered difficult, but we thought is was just about intermediate, even given the length.

Now rather than sticking 30+ photos in this post, we tried to create a slideshow in iPhoto and save it as small as possible (mobile size on the selection panel), and make the whole thing easier to view.

But making a slideshow proved  a bit more work that anticipated -- mostly trying to get it to play nicely on a PC. Here it is (see instructions for playing below)

11 miles; Miner and Prairie


Quick Summary

• Streams and crossings
• At the beach
• Lots of flowers
• Arrival at Miner Lake, with many pix of the lake in the cirque
• A funky sofa that someone assembled at the campsite
• Clear water pictures 
• Walk over to Prairie Lake
• Pictures of trout, and 
• Bugs that trout eat. 
• More streams
• Odd leaf coloring
• Monkeyflowers (mimulus)
• The way out. 

After showers, we set off for what proved to be an excellent dinner at CK's in Hailey ID: dinner

Rating for the day: between Excellent and Outstanding (maybe verging on Exceptional)



Not even sure if this thing works. But, If you know how to make these things work better, or at all,  let me know.

Instructions:

For Windows users: if it asks to save or open, try to open in Windows Media Player. It may take several minutes (up to 5, depending upon your internet speed) to download and start playing. If that doesn’t work, try again with “save”. Once the file is downloaded (it’s a .mp4 file), double-click to play. If that doesn’t work, I don’t know what to tell you!

For Mac uses: it should just play (of course!)

For iPads: you’re on your own!

If you are trying to play it without downloading, and it keeps stopping and starting it could mean that your internet connection isn’t fast enough to “stream” it. In that case, download the file and save it on your computer, then play it from your computer.

Good luck!