Ellen and I talked about bagging Carr today several weeks ago. It was a free weekend day for her. I made this a Meet-Up hike and Janet and Travis signed up. We were a group of four that started promptly at 6am/6:25am.
The frontal storm of Hurricane Hilary had blown through at 1:40am for about 12 minutes. We got high winds and heavy rain that kept me awake. The storm clouds provided for a dramatic sun rise. The road up the trail head was damp but not flooded. It was 57F at the start with an overcast sky.
We were a group that stayed together for the entire hike, stopping a lot to take photographs. So many more wildflowers had popped open since my last hike three weeks ago. The higher we got, the more colors we saw. Fleabane among the manzanitas greeted us near the trailhead, switching to verbana, sunflowers, Perry's penstemons near the peak.
This was Travis' first time up the peak and he stopped a lot in awe. I remember when I first hiked up Carr in the early 1990s! The views still inspire me every single time.
Gretel behaved nicely. She chased something 3-4 times but always came back.
There were few butterflies this time, but many more flowers. And there was no wind on the peak.
It took us two hours to reach the peak. We took our photos, ate snacks, and were back at the cars in 4:13 hours. The sun came out briefly on our way down through the aspen grove, but quickly went back behind clouds.
Meanwhile, southern California is under extreme watch for Hurricane Hilary, which is forecasted to travel north toward Palm Springs and then into Nevada tomorrow morning. Southern California hasn't seen a Hurricane in 84 years.
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