Rain was the story of this hike.  I woke up early and it was raining, met everyone at the courthouse and it was raining, drove for several hours and it was raining. 

There were eight true Friends of the Umpqua on this hike and we hiked in the rain too.  I had been here 3 weekends ago and I had a heavy drizzle but this was heavier, it was actual rain.  We ate lunch two miles into the hike at Frog Lake.  It was a short lunch as the wind picked up at the small lake and that, combined with the moisture, made hikers cold.  It was better to keep moving and stay warm with the exertion. 

The cloud cover was a little bit higher than 3 weekends ago and we had views into the Rogue Valley and we could see the actual summit of Venus above Frog Lake.  At the ridge crest, we made a left turn onto the Alta Lake Trail and arrived at the namesake lake.  Long and narrow, the lake stretched ahead of us with Violet Hill flanking the lake on the right.  We climbed up to the backpack campsite and enjoyed the view down into the Seven Lakes Basin.  Only 4 lakes were visible:  Grass, Middle, South, and Cliff Lakes.  I had entertained a notion of backpacking in and staying at Alta Lake but a large tree had fallen directly into the campsite.  With the wind the way it was, I think I wouldn't have gotten much sleep if I would have camped there.

On the way down the heavens opened up and the rain became much more serious; despite having an interesting hike,  we were all glad to get this one over with.  It was so wet that I took very few pictures, didn't want to be accused of camera abuse.  What few pictures I took can be seen at:

http://outdoors.webshots.com/album/578607697ZMQOnk?vhost=outdoors