Backpacking in the Uintas 2019

While the younger Bankheads were having a ball at Grand Camp, Amy and Paul executed their biannual backpacking trip (aka wilderness marriage therapy). Since last time was beautifully brutal, we purposely made this trip a bit more relaxing by alternating big days (15 miles) and easy days (8 miles) and doing a whole lot less up and down overall.

Although Amy and Paul both grew up in Utah, neither of us had spent any significant time in the Uintas, so the whole area was new to us. After doing most of our backpacking in California, this particular route felt especially remote. In the Sierras, we see at least one hiker every hour or two, but in the Uintas we went a whole day without seeing anyone at all, enjoying the glorious meadows and pristine lakes all by ourselves. There's something primal and freeing about trekking through the wild with everything we need on our backs.

Cool to see rivers creating canyons

Paul is in this photo, for scale

First camp site

In lots of places the "trail" was really just a river

When there was no discernible trail, we followed cairns like this

The children did not miss us