Wind River Range - Christina Lake Trail

Today is Sunday, August 13, 2017, and we're back in Lander, Wyoming, with a chance to get out into the Wind River Range again!

We were here before in 2013, and we posted a blog entry about our hike to Upper Silas Lake.  That was in June, so it was colder and there was more snow on the ground.  It was warmer today and, while we started our hike with jackets --

-- we quickly shed them.  The first 1.5 miles of our hike was the same as in 2013.  We passed the southern end of Fiddler's Lake --

-- and we crossed one or two small streams:

However, our trail to Christina lake split from the trail to Upper Silas Lake, and we soon trekked across numerous meadows with open views and mountains in the background:

The meadows, wetlands and ponds were so pristine, we expected to spot a moose at any time.  We found signs of moose and elk, but never saw any.

Kathy remembered that the fir trees in this area had suffered from a blight that caused them to fester and grow large burls on their trunks.  We found one that represents the many burls we saw.  No, Laird, we did not spot Burl Ives.

After 1.5 miles, we came to our trail junction:

Soon after we had two or three tricky stream crossings.  Here, Dave demonstrates how to cross a log bridge:

Most of our trail was rocky, and in places, it traversed large boulder fields.  Kathy gloried in her rocky friends, and recalled that she had made a snowman at one of these boulder fields four years ago:

Each meadow was prettier than the last, and they gave us great views of the peaks to the west:.  This was beautiful little Gustav Lake:

Another mile and we reached Christina Lake.  David boulder-hopped across the dam at the bottom of the lake to get a photo of the mountains that circled Christina Lake:

The far shore has beautiful sandy beaches:

Hopping back across the dam, Dave heard Kathy yelling, looked up, and spotted her waving from the far shore:

We ate our lunch, gazed at the beauties of Christina Lake, then returned along the rocky trail by which we had come:

Working our way back along the trail, we caught a beautiful view of the peaks of the Wind River Range behind this bucolic stream:

Our hike was 10.5 miles, which is relatively long for us.  We drove back to Lander across the top of the plateau in the mountains, along Louis Lake Road, enjoyed driving down the steep switchbacks of the road to Sinks Canyon, and then worked our way through the state park, back to Lander and our campground.

This only whetted our appetite for this beautiful country!  Tomorrow we plan to try our hand at kayaking and fishing Louis Lake.