Wall lake

Two rather disparate topics tonight. I'll start with the more familiar. I went fishing in the Uintas today. I saw a moose family. Papa moose, mama moose, and baby moose. They were clearly republicans! Otherwise it would have been two lesbian mooose raising their child to only eat meat. Naturally, I left the movie camera at home. I did get them on my cell phone, but even at just fifty feet away they looked quite distant.

My rant is a simple one. While USGS terrain maps are highly accurate for the most part, they fall down hard on hiking trails. Sometimes they show trails that haven't existed for decades (White Pine canyon). Other times the trails never existed but are at least within a one or two hundred yards of each other (Silver Lake above Tibble Fork) and sometimes they are just plain wrong. I take the USGS maps whenever I go into the back country, but I get instructions from people that have been there before..........preferably old-timers like myself.

The fishing was fair. I caught four and lost a few more on the way in. The fish were not plump like the ones at Notch Lake. I caught a Brookie with the elongated jaws (for the spawn I suppose) and he was barely 12 inhces long and skinny. He was also about the brightest Brookie I've seen in a few years. I also caught a Lake trout. Yes, I know they are not indigenous to the area. I know they are not planted in that drainage. I know they prefer deep water in big lakes. I also know what I caught. I know that tiger trout are put into some Uinta lakes. Perhaps this one didn't get crossed with a brookie and somehow snuck in. He was perhaps 10 or 11 inches and pretty lethargic.

The Sand Dunes

I took my daughter to Little Sahara. A few things struck me. The obvious one being the amount of sunflowers that have taken root in the sand. The desert can be reclaimed with sufficient water after all. And of couse the inexorable shifting of the sands towards the Northeast sure didn't hurt.

We have this practice of digging trenches and watching the sand collapse. Little rivulets form and improbable structures too. These structures eerily resemble things that you would see in Canyonlands or Bryce. A little bit of sand is removed from a trench and little happens. A bit more is removed and nothing. But every so often the next 'scoop' is enough to cause great changes.....some of it cataclysmic with entire structure collapsing.

It got me thinking if geologic changes in places such as the aforementioned or Grand Canyon aren't cataclysmic every few thousand years. I also started wondering if global warming might not also make up much drier or perhaps wetter. We have seen it already in Australia. Perhaps my beloved West Desert might again be a fertile grassland. Maybe I should by a boatload of land?

Back to Notch Lake

Much cooler temperatures than last week. Much cooler. There were some clouds that were swirling and threatening and a fair amount of breeze. The fishing suffered as a result. So.......if I am going to get the calm late evening and early morning fishing, I've no good hike in/out options. I will have to overnight. And backpacking in the cold is something I've done only rarely. If I am going to do it this year, it will be Meadow Lake.

I've never been to Meadow Lake. I've heard the fishing is good. It's five miles from the Crystal Lake TH (and a relatively level five miles at that). I've also been able to confirm that there is on old cabin and some old mining activity. That will have to wait for nest summer.

I didn't see the goats at all. But about 2 miles in I came across some blue grouse that were working over some grass. I got withing ten feet of one of them and just stood there for two minutes speaking to them in soft tones. I seriously wonder if I haven't got some kind of special ability with certain wild animals now. I used to hunt grouse you see. Now, I don't. Perhaps they can sense this?

Simpson Springs

I went there this weekend........
It started out with my son and one of his friends. They invited me. Then another. Then a dad.....another dad.....a kid brother. So the seven of us went out. I arrived early to set up the tents and such. I got a flat tire on the way out. By the time I got the tents and the gear done, the unseasonably hot temps had about killed me. But a lot of shade and Powerade brought me back.

We did some shooting, had an OK meal (the fettucine didn't boil properly), and sat around the fire and told ghost stories. My ghost story happened to take place at Simpson Springs over 20 years ago. So I took the boys to the cave in the dark. On the way there, one of them commented on all the stars and asked what the 'strange cloud' was. I asked if he knew what the name of our galaxy was. He answered correctly and looked at me for a few seconds. It dawned on him.

I feel saddened that he had to wait until he was 17 to see the milky way. It makes me wonder what else he hasn't done. He came over today and I mentioned to him that I had gone up to the Diamond Fork Hot Springs yesterday (DFHS hereafter.....or Fifth Water). He said that sounded fun. He had never seen an actual hot spring.

I digress........did I mention that I got a SECOND flat tire on the way back from Simpson Springs. FUN!!! I got the metal detector out. I mostly found junk in four inches of dirt i.e. old bullets, horseshoe pieces etc. I found a large quartz-looking rock with a large reading about 10 inches down., with a VDI that would correspond with gold. Of course the rock was under a large amount of soil and was quite large. I ain't gonna dig it out for the size of whatever gold might be under there.

Notch Lake

I had heard a while back that the fiashing was good here. I made the hike DOWN to the lake off of Bald Mountain pass. It was a gentle decline with 2.5 miles of relatively good trail and prototypical mountain terrain. Best of all, nobody else was fishing any of the lakes. I met nobody going down and just one person coming back.

There were two other lakes on the way there one was named Clegg and I forgot the other. The time of evening was still before the good fishing and I've found that the early morning fishing is usually best anyway. I fished all of them, but only caught fish at Notch Lake. Four brookies of which three were nice fish........all of them are happily still swimming since I am a catch and release guy.

While I was reeling in and unhooking my last fish, I felt as if I was being watched. I turned to my right and there were ten mountain goats staring at me. They were foraging of some kind of plant that grows on the shore and completely aware of and unfazed by my presence. I waved, said 'hello goats' etc. They just sat and watched me fish and after a few minutes started working the shoreline for more food. As I left I walked withing fifty feet of some of the goats.

I spent 5 years hiking the Wasatch looking for goats. I saw my first ones near the top of Box Elder peak and they were at a half mile distant and running. (Interestingly enough, my oldest son climbed the same peak last week with a buddy of his. They got to see a cute little baby goat). And until today, I have sited goats on only three occasions. The closest being about 200 yards.

This leaves me with just one burning question. Why can't I remember to bring the damn camera?!

When I recconected with the trail out I saw a guy about 150 feet ahead of me. Quite a coincidence since he was the only person I was going to see all day long. He was 74 years onld and had been trying to find his way to a lake that was further down the drainage. He didn't make it and according to his GPS had already walked over 10 miles that day.

He was lugging around a metal detector! I bought one last week that I am still getting good at, so I asked him what he was looking for. At his intended lake (which be nameless for now) there is an old cabin and some abandoned gold mines. Since they are all on the west side of the Mirror Lake Highway that means they ain't wilderness. I guess, I've got a backpacking trip in store for me and my metal detector.

Seafood and Electronics

Red Lobster is something that everyone has heard of. And as such, it takes a lot of heat from gourmets (and mere wanabees that wish to sound cool). I like Red Lobster.....a lot

I had some kind of combo platter for about 25 bucks. I got a small lobster tail, some scallops, four shrimp, a snow crab cluster. It included some steamed broccoli and a two red potatoes.

Everything was cooked well. The potatoes, which were extraordinary, were perfectly soft after boiling and then rebaked and seasoned. Absolutely delicious and quite affordable.

I've had a GPS for a while now. I am going to take it out for a spin tomorrow along with some USGS maps. We'll see just how accurate it is in the mountains. I've always used (and will continue to use) a lensatic compass to calculate my position. But it doesn't work on moonless nights, bad weather with no visibility, in areas with magnetism, or when I have no maps and not the slightest damn clue where I am.......which is never. But hey, it COULD happen in theory.

GPS can calculate my position and plot a way back if I've kept it on.

GPS doesn't work when there is to view to the southern horizon, like in tight canyons or faces of peaks. Or if the batteries fail, or the machine is damaged....wet....etc.

I am very much old school, but I will need GPS I suspect with my new hobby, gold prospecting. I am not going to dredge up trout streams in an effort to find gold dust. Instead I am going to explore areas of the west deserts and work some areas of interest. This will doubtless be the subject of multiple future postings.

I got a new metal detector that does all sorts of cool stuff today to aid my prospecting. I'll probably search parks, beaches, etc. for some practice. I'll probably find a few bucks in change and some crappy jewelry. But practice is what I am needing.

My wife got a new video camera. This one doesn't have tape (digital or otherwise), or a DVD. It has a hard drive in the camera. It seemed like a good idea, so we got it.

Mirror lake

I've fished it twice in 3 days. The first day was with son number two, the second time with son number one. Both boys caught fish and had a good time...........me too.

I've read before that Arctic Grayling inhabit the lake. I've met nobody who has so much as seen one. I shall have to investigate further. Until it cools down, I'll not be fishing the 'berry or visiting any hot springs.