Splendid Days @ Albion Basin

"Heaven is overrated." ~ Coldplay

This week's Friday Afternoon (hiking) Club took place on Monday morning... because that's just how wildly unpredictable we are.

We set our sites on the Cecret Lake. No... I didn't spell 'secret' wrong. Some other weirdo spelled it wrong ages ago and it's been driving people crazy ever since.

Especially me since, at one point, I had strongly considered becoming a high school teacher. Then I did my student teaching where I was forced to interact with real, live, high school kids.. and... well... say no more.

I'm NOT thinking about high school kids because I have an ounce of fondness for them. Quite the opposite! Oh, they're cute and all ~ if you happen to be the parent of one of them ~ but I'm a Mom who survived those teenage years.

May I just say? 'Lock 'em up, throw away the key' is not always a bad idea.

To get to Secret Lake you hike up and up and up a little bit more. You don't really notice all the walking uphill because you're traipsing through expansive fields of wildflowers every step of the way.

When we reached the actual 'Cecret Lake,' [Argh! That name drives me nuts!] we were confronted with hordes of teenagers.

On a Monday? How fair is that? When will we see the shift to 12 months, every year, kids in school? Because that would be good for the nation as a whole and especially me!

We walked to an out of the way giant rock where we could eat our lunch and observe the teens as we do monkeys in a zoo. (It's really not all that different.)

Then, I looked down to see one enterprising teen rock-climbing his way to the top of our own personal boulder! As teenagers go, the kid was fairly well-trained. (Good job, Mom!) He said, "Thanks! I just wanted to see if I could do that!"

I was dying to be all sarcastic and demand: Do what? Spoil my lunch? But, I couldn't. Because, you see, I'm only allowed to be a bitch once a day.

And, I'd already hollered at some poor Latvian tourist for picking the wildflowers...

Reason #9 for not picking those wildflowers: They are COVERED with bugs. Vicious, nasty, carnivorous, creepy crawlies that will eat you up from the inside out.

Okay, fine, maybe that's stretching things a bit but I still wish you would just lay off picking the wildflowers. It doesn't do me, or you, any good.

* Wildflower identification! Are you dying to know? Me, too!

From top photo to bottom photo:

1. Damned if I know!
2. Damned if I know.
3. Damned if I know :(
4. I just take the pictures. Perhaps you're smart enough to identify them.

*Albion Basin is renowned for having a broader variety of wildflowers than any area of similar size in the USA. At 10,000 foot elevation, with plentiful snowfall, this basin is a unique experience of alpine and sub-alpine wildflowers that bloom in a compressed, 3 - 4 week, period of time.