Mt. Sniktau

On Sunday Travis and I decided to tackle Mt. Sniktau (no, I still don't know how to pronounce it!) - we decided we weren't quite motivated enough to get up at 4:30 a.m. and climb a 14er, so we settled for a mere 13er. The hike reviews I was reading said it was a relatively easy Class 1 hike with just a bit of Class 2 thrown in... we can handle that, right?!

The mountain was right at the continental divide - pretty views from the road! Is there really any need to hike up further? View of A-Basin ski runs during the off-season. Soon enough these will be snow-covered. Ugh.

The reviews I read warned of "false peaks", meaning, you hike to the top of the horizon, and then as soon as you reach the top you see another peak. Alas, you are not at the top! There were 2 or three of these, like the picture below. Just when we thought we might have reached the top we looked over... and saw the REAL summit.

As is now tradition, a 360 view from the top. Only 13,200-ish feet high. Notice Travis's shoulder as he ducks out of the way once he realizes I'm taking a video. He's camera-shy. We were the only ones on the summit for quite a while - it was nice!

We made it! Much nicer weather for this hike than we had for the 14er.

Taking a nap on a rock. Travis actually fell asleep. I did not. We were, after all, laying on a rock.

Heading back down to one of the false peaks we passed. See the trail along the saddle back of the mountain? You don't want to lose your balance - pretty steep on both sides!

We saw mountain goats! They're at the very bottom of the picture, and they blend in pretty well. I guess nature is pretty good at that :)

It is always better to look up once you have finally made it back down! Less intimidating that way. Here you can see the many false peaks - we hiked to the top of the pointy peak that you can barely see, in the center of the photo.

Another great hike! May be my last long hike for the season. My knees would probably be more than fine with that :)