Alive, Alive-O

I'm pretty sure that's from a nursery rhyme/song...something about : selling cockles, and mussles..
OK, just looked it up. . . .

In Dublin's Fair City, Where the girls are so pretty, I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone. As she wheeled her wheelbarrow, Through streets broad and narrow, Crying "Cockles and Mussels, Alive Alive O! Alive Alive O! Alive Alive O! Crying "Cockles and Mussels, Alive Alive O!"

Alrighty - back to business....

I am not only ALIVE, ALIVE O, after completing the annual death march-
I'm doing very well, thank you very much!

I am happy to say that not only did I not die, I completed a 6 mile hike all above 9500 feet altitude with no apparent ill side effects. For those of you who know me - that IS something!
Initially we were planning to hike into Alice lake in the Sawtooth range, which is about a 6 mile hike in - packs on back :0(
But, decided that as we would only have 3 days we would go to 4th of July lake, which is a 1 1/2 mile hike in...Much better right?!?

4th of July lake

We got to the lake well before noon, made camp, ate lunch and set out to see Washington lake which was another mile up the trail.

This little guy swam alone for two days. He was joined by another male the end of the second day. Apparently that lake is not a hot spot to pick up the ladies.

This doe came down at dusk and wandered around camp about 20 feet from us for about 10 minutes. I took a gazillion photos - but the light was so low that most turned out blurry... It was pretty cool to see her though.

There was a full moon the first night and this is "sort of" what it looked like coming up...once again light issues.

This is the view from the top of the ridge looking to the Born lake region...
We were right at 10,000 feet. We had to go down,down,down and then up, up, up. The Lakes were right at the base of those rocky peaks.
Yeah....It ended up being about 6 miles round trip and I did NOT get sick! I got into the lake to cool off, drank TONS of liquids, and ate one of those energy gel pack thingys and we cruised.
Can you tell I am just amazed with myself?
Cause - I am.

So other than being out of control praising myself - can I just say that there were some phenomenal flowers ALL over the place! Acres of them.
It was crazy beautiful. And yes, I took lots of pictures....

I had never seen either of these two before. They have the same leaf, so I'm wondering if the yellow one is early stage and the burgundy is late stage???

I can never seem to get enough Indian paintbrush and as you may have noted on the very first photo of this post there was the neon fuschia color and then this neon orange version.
All over the place!

Little pastel daisiness.

Close up of the burgundy dealio.

I think this may have just been some kind of clover thing?

Doris said these are called "shooting stars" - Aren't they cool?

I called these white coral bells - though I know they aren't - the song kept running through my head though every time I saw them.
Such delicate off-white with the base of lavender all facing only one way.

These were the punk rock purple flowers.
Very distinctive.

Here's the yellow one close up.
And a couple more purple beauties...

I have more but I'll give y'all a break.

The only drawback to all the lovely flowers was that the water that made them possible also made HORDES of mosquitoes possible as well.

This was my gear for standing around the campfire and even then I was going crazy with the buzzing and diving bombing.