Lake Blanche Hike, Big Cottonwood Canyon, Utah

Back in Utah now and happy to be home for a while!   We are still exploring our local area, and discovered this little gem of a trail not too far up the mouth of Big Cottonwood Canyon.  Officially this trail has the name of Mill B South Fork Trail, but that's a mouthful and everyone calls it Lake Blanche instead.  Which is the biggest of the three lakes at the end of the trail, I would guess.

Either way, it's a nice 2500 foot climb from the trailhead up to the lakes.  We weren't quite acclimated to the elevation yet, and when the gradient steepened I admit to sucking some wind.   Luckily the trail is really shady most of the time, wandering through some nice stands of Aspen and along a rushing stream.   It's just over 3 miles to the lakes, making it about 7 round trip depending on how much you might wander around at the top.    I choose to lay down on some smooth boulders and almost took a nap instead!

A curious chipmunk along the trail

The trip down was understandably a lot easier, and we both felt good enough to run the last couple of miles down the trail at full speed.   It was a perfect gradient, not too steep yet a lot of fun to hurtle down around the s-curves of the trail.   It took about 3 hours round-trip, a nice day out yet not too long.