#2862 leaf peeping in the Wasatch

Last Sunday, I was working in my home office when my husband came into the room. He said, "I think you should take a break and we will go for a drive in the mountains to look at the colors." I came up with a bunch of reasons why it wasn't a good idea, and he shrugged and said, "Well, it sounds like you're busy," and walked away, looking a little dejected.

I turned back to the double screens and the work I was doing. I thought about the photos I'd been seeing online of the beautiful autumn colors in the mountains. Would it be so bad to take a couple of hours and go for a drive?  No, it wouldn't be bad at all, so I told MT I'd changed my mind and we set off on our adventure. We decided to go up Big Cottonwood Canyon to Brighton, then take Guardsman Pass down into Park City, then home on I-80. We talked about stopping at Silver Fork for some lunch, too. 

looks promising already

As it turned out, we were not the only folks who thought going leaf peeping on a Sunday afternoon was a good idea. The road in the photo above is down in the valley, but when we turned on to 6200 S, and got in the left turn lane to go up the canyon toward the ski areas, there were at least eleventy-hundred cars in the turn lane with us. The good news is that the road was so packed and we were going so slow, it was easy to lower the window and take a bunch of photos.

Silver Fork was packed, and we doubted we'd be able to get a table, so we continued on to Guardsman Pass and figured we'd get a late lunch in Park City. There were gobs of cars coming down the Pass, going the opposite direction we'd come from, but there were still plenty of cars in front of and behind us. At one point we passed an electronic sign with our speed on it. We were going a whopping NINE MILES PER HOUR.  Again, the slow speed made it easy to take photos.  These pics are from Guardsman Pass:

It was really, really beautiful. Breathtaking, even. Both MT and I were oohing and aahing the whole way. You know what else it was? A bit cold! The thermometer in the truck said the outside temperature as we were going through this stand of quaking aspen was 48 degrees. Of course, the elevation is high, just over 9,700 feet, so you expect it to be chilly up there.

There are many trailheads and scenic view pull-outs along this road, but every parking lot was full. In Big Cottonwood Canyon, there were cars parked right off the road, making some of the tight turns even tighter. We didn't stop anywhere, unless traffic was stopped, which did happen a couple of times.

As we got closer to the the final drop down into Park City, we had a wonderful view of the Heber Valley:

By the time we got to Park City, it was nearly 4:00. We'd left Salt Lake at 2:00. The drive doesn't usually take that long; it's usually about an hour. The clouds had rolled in and it was gray and kinda gloomy. We had a burger and a beer at The Spur. I was really hungry. Nearly the whole drive, my stomach had been growling and rumbling, so I gobbled my burger. We didn't order dessert because  I was hoping to get MT to stop at Starbucks before we headed home, but we passed right by it. Bummer.

I'm glad we took the time to go for the drive. We had a good time, and appreciated the beauty of the place we call home. I am hoping that we can go on another leaf peeping adventure this weekend. Stay tuned!