The lower portion of the trail follows along Kautz Creek for about a mile. There was a devastating flood about 50 years ago and the resulting damage is still quite obvious. There are very few large trees and the remaing ones are either shattered and dead or stripped of their bark.

There is some awesome old growth forest after crossing the creek.

After doing a hike every weekend for the past month, the two miles of switchbacks were pretty easy. The trail is very steep along the flanks of Mt. Ararat and could be potentially treacherous.

We saw a lot of bear signs around Mt. Ararat, but no bears.

According to the ranger at Indian Henrys cabin, the meadows had less flowers than usual this year, but we found them very pretty none the less.

What the meadows did have was a multitude of bugs. We passed woman on the way in who was wearing long sleeves, long pants and a mosquito net hat. She was sitting at the side of the trail applying bug repellent to her face inside the mosquito netting. Not a good sign.

We tried to find a spot with some breeze blowing on the trail to Pyramid Peak so we could eat lunch in peace, but gave up and decided we'd have to eat on the move. The mosquitoes were so numerous, your clothes started to change colors as soon as you stopped moving.

When we returned to the car, we were the only car in the lot, yet we only saw 5-6 people all day. Where was everyone and how did they get back to their cars?