Given Chris’ questionable performance at Tyee Lakes the previous weekend, it wasn’t at all surprising that his personal trainer and life coach (one might hazard a guess as to who that is) immediately put him on a strenuous program of diet and exercise. Since it was Jane’s birthday, Chris humored her with a repeat of our last visit to Throop Peak in 2017 – our first idea here was to just walk up the ridge to where we could watch the sunset while Jane enjoyed a celebratory glass of wine, but we decided we could grab sandwiches at Jensen’s in Wrightwood and head first to the peak before returning to our sunset spot. Although really quite moderate, the trail up from Dawson Saddle always surprises with how much it seems to gain – Chris huffed and puffed his way up the ridgeline, but the pace was comfortable enough and we reached the summit 2 miles and 1,200 vertical feet later in a little over an hour. The evening weather was wonderful, sunny but with enough of a breeze to make Chris reach for his puffy once on top. Jane had brought a couple of mini-bottles of wine (in plastic bottles, no less), and she enjoyed her (first) birthday glass of chardonnay at 9,117′ of elevation. We still had about 90 minutes until sunset and Jane didn’t want to return to our watch spot and just sit, so she determined we should continue on down the crest to Mt. Hawkins – before Chris could comment, she was off, heading southwest down the use trail off the summit. We quickly reached the PCT and, following it southward, we reached a large and very dead ponderosa pine that had fallen lopsidedly across the trail – again, Jane was up and over the thing before Chris could protest that this obstacle might slow us down enough to miss the sunset. Once over the dead tree, we covered the remaining half-mile to Mt. Hawkins in about 10 minutes and, once there, spent about 30 seconds on the summit before Jane decided we had better hurry if we wanted to get back to watch the sunset (hmm). So, up the PCT we rushed, re-crossing over the deadfall and following the familiar trail east and north around Throop, rejoining the Dawson Saddle trail and continuing northward down the ridge. Now the choice became where to stop for the best sunset views – the highest spot on the ridge Chris had suggested would be great in the fall when the sun is further south in the sky, but now, while the sun would be setting over Mt. Williamson to the west, the view wasn’t so great from here. We picked up the pace again, hurrying down the trail another 1/4-mile to a rocky outcrop – arriving just at the golden hour, we got to see alpenglow catch all along the ridge followed by a clear, cloudless sunset. Afterward, we still had over a mile to get back to the car, and we actually used headlamps over the last few hundred yards back to the trailhead. Given the heat of the day this time of year, even in this area that’s relatively high elevation, the evening has gotten our attention as being an ideal time to hike.