Hike up Spring City Canyon

[wildmanh]

Yesterday 05/31/11 I went hiking up Spring City canyon. Parked my mom's car at the turn off to Mud Hole (Spring City camp ground) hiked the quarter mile to Mud hole checked it out then hiked up the main canyon road. There is so much water coming off the mountain right now, it's incredible!

I did a lot of exploring on my hike. Anytime I would see a side trail, I had to go check it out. Sometimes I'd go in a few feet and other times I'd go in a few hundred yards. It was pretty cool. One place I stopped at was about 3/4 of a mile to 1 mile from Mud Hole. A nice area with a parking lot/turn around area, a meadow, trees and bushes. Camped off a side road that starts there back in the summer of 2000 with some friends.

There's lots of new growth up Spring City Canyon since I was last above Mud hole in 2000. Some areas have lots more Quaking Aspen and others Scrub Oak. Guess all the snow we have gotten in the last 4 winters has really helped. Can't hardly wait for the snow to melt more so I can check more of the canyon out.

I hiked a few hundred yards above the snow line. Found a good spot and had dinner. Gluten Free rice noodles in a mildly spicy veggy sauce with veggies. It was pretty good. Last time I hiked up the canyon I saw lots of squirrels and birds, but this time I saw mainly birds. Some of them were big enough they would have made a good meal.

It was a fun trip and well worth the time. On the trip I decided that I would like to have an ATV, SUV or Truck. Would give me more time to explore side trails because I could drive between them instead of walking. Of course I might not see as many that way.

Here are pics from the trip: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150276294508132.383673.579568131&l=994305109c Thanks for looking!

 

[Gorog]

I LOVE QUAKING ASPEN! I would marry quaking aspen if I could...I'm totally kidding, though I do like quaking aspen quite a bit. I envy you SO much for having seen some of the heaviest living things on the planet, though the largest goes to the honey mushrooms, which grow underground interconnectedly for hectares upon hectares. If no one knows what I'm talking about, Pando, a quaking aspen grove, is the heaviest singular growing organism so far, reaching an estimated weight of 6600 tons! It is an immense singular organism that sends up 'trees' which are actually stems of a single enormous plant. Now that...that my friends, would be some serious bonfire material. I'm kidding, once again, I think you would be Natures Most Wanted Fugitive if you so much as burned one stem of the Pando. I wonder how old it is.........anyway, thank you for sharing Heber. You are, without a doubt, a true wildman. No one else I 'know' eyes birds as hungrily as you apparently do! That is nothing to be ashamed of though, we are the top predators on the planet, after all. Well, most humans are. Some, like me, would be less efficacious as predators, and more efficacious as Coward-in-Chief or Commander-of-Fleeing-from-prey, or my favorite, Scourge-of-Scraps. But, I did not come here to rage against myself, rather, to congratulate you on another awesome job hiking and sharing photographs, Heber. Good job, well done, glad to 'see' you made it back whole and sound. People have died in less forbidding woods than what I saw, so I consider you either very lucky or very skilled, I prefer to think very skilled. So yay for skillness, yay for Heber, and yay for QUAKING ASPEN!?! Haha, see you, dude. Peace.

 

[wildmanh]

Quaking Aspen sure are amazing trees! Not only are they the largest living organism on the planet, but they are also self pruning, pretty and easy to work with. Back in the 90's I didn't see near as much new growth of Aspens as I'm seeing now. It's pretty impressive! There was snow on the ground around most of the Aspen groves I walked past, So I didn't check them out very well. Thinking I should make another trip up there when there is less snow so that I can investigate the groves better.

Trying to get the neighbors to go camping with me up the canyon this weekend. I think the place where I spotted that large bird would be a good spot.

 

[Gorog]

Hm, did not know that, the self pruning thing. You sure are an active dude, always camping, eh? That's real cool...I wish I was going...oh well! Have fun, and remember this somewhat useful, yet almost useless fact of the day: Bamboo plated cables are pound for pound as strong as and/or stronger than steel cables of the same size. So have fun, man, and watch out, or Big Bird might get you. If he does, take your trusty knife and give 'im heck from me! Sometimes, I loathe birds, like in the morning, when their ungrateful little throats are warbling out their nasty little tunes as they excrete waste all over creation, eat my earthworms, peck at my glass sliding door, (sometimes they fly into it... BBS, Birdbrain Syndrome.) and swoop on my window with their nasty little wings, tweeting like a sonic smartbomb bent on destroying my precious sleep! MY PRECIOUS SLEEP!! MY PRECIOUS, ALL MINE!!!... Anyway, I'll see you all later. Peace.