Bridal Veil Bike Ride

When the fourth of July falls on a Sunday in Utah, it means three things: 3 days of fireworks, inconvenient store hours, and 3 days of heat and crowds. (Have I mentioned this is my LEAST favorite holiday, ever. Not being a fan of fireworks, crowds or heat?) Most cities in our fair Mormon state celebrated on Saturday, so as not to disrupt the sabbath on Sunday, the actual 4th. However many businesses decided the 5th was the day to celebrate and closed their doors to traveler's from the north just wanting to purchase their groceries. (Not bitter or anything, am I?) After celebrating the 4th with our Shumway friends down the hill with fireworks for the boys, Bill had Monday off, and we decided to drive south to Provo (still missing Angela I guess) with our bikes to ride the Provo River trail up Provo Canyon to Bridal Veil Falls. The trail was smooth, but crowded (I suppose Bill was not the only person with the day off.) The kids were hot and tired, since the trail was surrounded by trees, but had no shade (go figure) at noon. We coerced them to keep going to the falls and arrived warm and tired an hour up the trail.
When I was living in Provo, Bridal Veil was different. It makes me feel like a senior citizen commenting on how the world was better when they were young, saying that. But it is true. The falls were hit by a land slide that took out the tram, the restaurant at the top as well as changing the flow of the falls, which look a bit less dramatic than I remembered. That being said, the falls were still a fun stop. We posed for pictures, somehow managing to find spot that we could get the falls, and not just the 300 hundred other people staring up at them in the background.
In order to muster up the energy to bike back down the canyon, the boys suckered us into buying snow cones to eat in the shade. They enjoyed every bite and felt refreshed enough to head back down. It wasn't until we were heading back that it became clear why we were all so worn out and hot, the trail had more of an uphill incline than it appeared. We FLEW back down to our car in less than half the time it had taken us to climb up to the falls. At the time, it hadn't felt too strenuous, and I couldn't figure out why the kids were so worn out. But, boy was that down hill fun at the end!