Brighton Lakes Trail
Summer up Utah’s canyons may not offer the greatest snow on earth, but where downhillers skied and boarded in the winter you’ll find wildflowers lining hiking trails to magnificent vistas among alpine lakes and grand rocky peaks of the Wasatch Mountains.
One of these trails begins right at the bottom of Brighton Ski Resort’s slopes. The Brighton Lakes Trail leads to three alpine lakes: Mary, Catherine, and Martha. Mary is a reservoir; the other two are natural and drain into one another and then Mary.
The Trail is steep at times but not too strenuous. There were lots of families with young kids making it to Lake Mary. It passes through meadows and forests, and each lake provides a nice resting place or picnic spot.
Payson Canyon Grotto Trail
This short hike winds over a mountain stream and ends at a lovely waterfall grotto. It can be very crowded on weekends. However, this shouldn’t discourage this quick hike. Kids love playing in the grotto and quiet little spots can be found off the trail for picnicking.
If you’re a little more adventurous, you can climb a steep trail up and around the grotto to look down from above. Word of warning though, the rocks are very slippery just above the falls.
Temple Quarry Trail
A couple days after arriving in the Salt Lake Valley, Brigham Young designated the spot where Utah’s most famous building would be erected. Ten years later they began the 40-year construction project of the Salt Lake Temple.
Building a building to last the ages, they turned to the surrounding mountains for stone. They began quarrying stone from giant boulders at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon. Although it looks like granite the stone is actually quartz monzonite. Lateer, stone from this site was used for the Utah State Capitol Building, This is the Place Monument, and the LDS Conference Center.
The Temple Quarry Trail is .3 miles long and fully paved with interpretive signs. If you step off the trail a little you’ll find a beautiful river bed strewn with boulders. Along the trail, if you look close you may even find some stones with tool marks.
The trailhead and parking lot are found right where the two roads entering the canyon join. There was no sign marking the entrance, so look for the open gates on the south side of the fork.
Utah’s mountains are full of wonder and beauty and enough trails to experience it all to last a lifetime. I haven’t even scratched the surface. To find other Utah trails visit http://www.utahoutdooractivities.com/ and http://www.exploreutah.com/.
