It was still quite early in the day by the time we returned to the car, so we decided to head up to Lake 22 - I'd done some trail maintenance there last year, and wanted to show off my wonderfully resituated culvert to Maren! The trail was in excellent shape, and showed signs of a work party already having been out on it this year. I never was able to spot my culvert, but Maren was still appreciative of the clear drainage ditches I'd helped to clean!
Once we continued past where I'd done the trail work, we both came to realize that the true draw of this trail isn't the lake at the end (although that was nice), but the spectacular waterfalls running full force this time of the year. There are short unofficial side trails running down to vantage points at several spots along the trail that give fabulous views of stunning waterfalls - some of the prettiest I've seen. We continued up the trail to the lake at trail's end where we sat down on the snow and ice for a bite of lunch. Bryden was all bundled up, and received many comments about how wonderful it was to be bringing a young child like him into an area like this. Many people were admiring of Maren's strength for carrying him all the way up here also. After nibbling on a little lunch, I picked up Bryden and walked a short ways out onto the lake ice for Maren to get a picture. Unfortunately, I walked just a tad too far, and before I could fully react I could feel icy water filling my hiking boot as my foot headed for the bottom of the lake - it was only a couple of feet deep here, but still an unpleasant shock! My feet were warm from hiking, so I was able to warm the ice water up fairly quickly, and we stayed on the shores of the lake a little longer to finish lunch, and gaze out into the fog and mist shrouding the lake. We could hear snow slides and rockfall crashing and splashing down the other side of the lake, but the views were hidden from us by the damp air. On the way down we stopped at each of the viewpoints to gaze at the waterfalls again, then headed for home - happy to have been out on such a beautiful day, but sad to have missed having our friends along.