Red Pine Lake reflections
Those are Broads Fork Twin Peaks behind the larger tree and just to the right of the center of the image…they are the highest peaks in the portion of the Wasatch Mountains that form the eastern geographic boundary of Salt Lake City, Utah, USA.
the preaching of pine trees
“Few are altogether deaf to the preaching of pine trees. Their sermons on the mountains go to our hearts; and if people in general could be got into the woods, even for once, to hear the trees speak for themselves, all difficulties in the way of forest preservation would vanish.”
– John Muir
Cardiff Fork…end….
Hmm…I suppose I should have gotten around to this one a while ago, as we’re approaching the end of the year and I made these images close to four months ago….the snow you see in some of the images is actually from last winter and we’re quickly approaching the snows from this coming winter. In fact, if I were to head back to Cardiff Fork today, I believe I’d encounter some new snow to share with you.
I don’t know how many of you have had the opportunity to hike into the mountains at the end of June, get all hot and sweaty, soaked shirt and everything, and then reach into a pile of snow and make a nice snow-ball to eat and cool yourselves down with, but it’s a wonderful treat! My son and I each had a large, grapefruit-sized snowball and it was fantastic…so refreshing!
The above photo was taken while we were sitting at the furthest end of the fork…about four miles into the mountains, inside of the cirque that was full of broken basalt-looking rock that has tumbled down from the ridges above over the years.
I don’t really have much more to tell you about the canyon/fork and its associated mining history, but I thought you might enjoy seeing a few more photos of the geography and beautiful landscape of the area. If we were to climb to the top of the ridge in the below photo, we would be looking west and into Mineral Fork….
If you can find the little finger of trees that is way down and to the left of the peak that is in the upper right corner (of the below photo), actually located between the center and right large pine/fir trees, that is where we were sitting while eating the snow-balls…where my son and I were sitting when I made the first and second photos above…we were just to the left of that little finger of trees….
Also in the above photo, if you were on the ridge just below the clouds in the upper left corner, you could look south and down into Little Cottonwood Canyon…the little ski town of Alta would be off toward the left…and the metropolitan area of the Salt Lake Valley would be way off to the right…..
The below photo is from the other side of the fork, looking across the valley area and onto the old Cardiff Mine area. If you’ll recall the photos from the first post in this series, Cardiff Fork…beginning…, photo #8, that’s the same mine area that you can see in this below photo, but from a distance now, and with the ore sorter in the foreground.
My son is providing a bit of perspective for us…he’s about 6’3″…so the ore sorter is rather large…..
While my son’s not in the below photo, he was standing near the lower right edge/corner of the sorter and his head came to right about the center of that large beam that is right above the tree….
…and this last photo is looking back up into Cardiff Fork as my son and I were nearing the end of the return hike out of the canyon……
That’s all folks…I hope you’ve enjoyed the hike through Cardiff Fork. If you’d like to view all three posts from the series in one continuous stream, you can go to the bottom of the page and click on “Cardiff Fork” under the Category widget…that will bring you all three posts together. Thank you again for visiting and for spending a bit of your time with me….
Upper Red Pine Lake under Clouds
If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you might remember a few posts from last year that highlighted the same lake…and if you do remember those images, you might also recall that they sky was bright in its blueness and reflected wonderfully in the surface of the lake. It is amazing how different a place can appear when the clouds and lighting are so strikingly different. Coincidentally, these images below were made exactly one year later than the ones in the earlier posts…to the day.
If you’d like to visit those earlier images, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the Red Pine Lake category to be taken to a continuous roll of the earlier posts and photographs.
And for those of you who are interested, Upper Red Pine Lake is at about 10,000 feet in elevation…400 feet higher than Red Pine Lake. The lakes are situated in Red Pine Canyon, one of the tributary canyons or forks that extend south from Little Cottonwood Canyon…just south and east of Salt Lake City, Utah, USA…in the Lone Peak Wilderness Area of the Wasatch National Forest. The hike from the trail-head to the upper lake is approximately four miles in length, has an elevation gain of about 2,500 feet, and may take you from 2.5 to 3.5 hours to accomplish…depending on your fitness level……….and how often you stop to make photographs….
Lake Florence in the Morning
You might remember the lake from last year when I did the posts on the Sister Lakes of the Wasatch Mountains. You can click on “Sister Lakes – Lake Florence” to learn more about this lake. The earlier post also has links to the other Sister Lakes if you’re interested in the more complete history of the area.
Lake Desolation from above….
You saw the mountainside flower garden just below the other side of the ridge here…and the image below is what you can see when you look down the ridge in the opposite direction. From approximately 9,600 feet in elevation, you can see out through Millcreek Canyon, clear across the Salt Lake Valley, and visualize the open pit mine on the eastern face of the Oquirrh Mountains…the western geographical boundary of the Valley….
Dromedary Peak…twice…..
This is an early-June, 2013 photograph of one of the iconic mountains that provide a backdrop to the Sister Lakes in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah. Found at the terminus of the drainage or tributary canyon, Mill B South, it is a frequent site and common reference when trying to orient one’s self while hiking in this area of Big Cottonwood Canyon. If you’d like to see other images of Dromedary Peak, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and type its name in the search widget to be provided with a list of other posts that contain photos from other seasons.
Spring run-off in the Wasatch
This particular location is found just down from the drainage at the lower and west end of Lake Lillian, one of the Sister Lakes in Big Cottonwood Canyon, just south and east of Salt Lake City, Utah.
green umbrella
The “winter gate” is still closed in Millcreek Canyon…allowing pedestrian and bicycle traffic clear passage to the end of the road without the interference of motor vehicles, excepting the occasional motorist who actually lives or stays at one of the cabins further into the greenwood. The road is closed from the first of November until the first of July…or I could say that it’s only open from the first of July to the first of November…at any rate, here’s another glimpse into the marvelousness of full Spring in Millcreek Canyon…the snow is gone and the Green has returned…and it’s a beautiful place to take a walk….. If you’d like another look at the green explosion that is MillCreek Canyon in season, you can visit my post from last July for another saturated view of the place, Millcreek Canyon in Green.
Dwarf Waterleaf in Millcreek Canyon
As I was going through my back-log of blog posts this morning, I came across John M. Smith’s post, Bluebells and Beech, and remembered that I was going to do a similar post on some Utah wildflowers that I had noticed after viewing Andy Hooker’s post, Bluebells 2013.
My older son and I were on the way to one of our Sunday morning hiking destinations, walking the Pipeline Trail in Millcreek Canyon, just east of Salt Lake City proper. While I have walked this trail more than a dozen times over the past few years, I have never noticed the profusion of a single type of wildflower like I did on this particular morning….and it was too good to resist…taking a break in the early part of the hike to kneel in the wild grass and flowers for a few minutes to take a few (?) pictures…..
USWildflowers.com identifies these little beauties as being Dwarf Waterleaf, Bullhead Waterleaf…or Cat’s Breeches…with the scientific name of Hydrophyllum capitatum, for those of you interested in such things. I’m sorry I can’t name the trees…but here you are anyway with the blanket of spring wildflowers on a beautiful Spring morning….as my son and I were heading to our own version of Sunday services……
Hiking toward Grandeur Peak…on a snowy Sunday in March….
I have been up here six or seven times over the last couple of years, but never under conditions such as these. The mountains had received somewhere between one and two and a half feet of new snow over the last four days…and while, yes, I am ready for true spring like the rest of us, I couldn’t believe the beauty of the snowy mountains and trees while I was out there. So here you are, more snowy pictures from Salt Lake City, Utah, USA…I hope you enjoy them as much as I do…..
“…the view from up there…”
If you remember this post, living anyway, you might remember reading in the comments that Allen mentioned that he’d like to see the view from up there. Well, these photos are not from exactly up there, but they’re from a location that’s pretty close to being up there….
You’ll notice that the pictures in first to fourth order go from left to right in the landscape…and you’ll notice that it’s a little brown and bleak…but the photos were taken in November after an earlier light winter and dry summer….
The photos were taken on the ridge between Days Fork and Cardiff Fork, looking west and down into Cardiff Fork. The road was used for mining efforts over the years…which have been finished for about four decades.
I have photos of the mining artifacts from earlier in the summer…just haven’t gotten around to making a post yet…. If you’ll look closely (or click on the photo to magnify it) in the second photo, at the largest patch of snow closest to the bottom right-hand corner of the image, you can see a small rectangle…that’s the foundation remaining from the miners’ bunk house…you can also see it in the third photograph…but you might have to hunt for it a little bit…in the lower quarter of the image and toward the left side….
Twin Peaks from afar…in September
A few months ago, I hiked up Porter Fork from its trail-head in Millcreek Canyon, essentially did the loop or horseshoe-shaped trail around Mt. Raymond, and then went down Bowman Fork back to its trail-head in Millcreek Canyon. Near the base of Mt. Raymond, which is technically on the north side of Big Cottonwood Canyon and faces south, you can see into the other drainages or tributary canyons that lie perpendicular and head in a southerly direction from Big Cottonwood Canyon, which runs east and west; I hope all of that makes sense. At any rate, you can see Twin Peaks (11,330/11,328 ft) near the top center of this image…the drainage that is down and slightly to the left of the peaks is Broads Fork…and if you take the ridge-line to the left, you might notice Dromedary Peak (11,107 ft) as the last prominence…which you might remember is just above and to the right/west of Lake Blanche and the other Sister Lakes…and lie in the drainage called, Mill B South. When I’m out hiking, I always find it fascinating to encounter new views or perspectives of the places I’ve visited in the mountains and canyons…such wonderful and beautiful places…..
To see more images of Twin Peaks, Broads Fork, Dromedary Peak, and Lake Blanche, you can scroll down and utilize the “Search” feature near the end of the page to locate several posts about those subjects.
Big Cottonwood Canyon in the Fall
This photo is from roughly two months ago, looking toward the east from the south side of Mount Raymond…. This peak is on the ridge between Millcreek Canyon to the north and Big Cottonwood Canyon to the south. On this particular Sunday, I climbed the trail in Porter Fork, rounded the back/south side of Mount Raymond, and then went through Baker’s Pass and down into Bowman Fork…which took me to about 1/4 of a mile from my starting point at the Porter Fork trail-head in Millcreek Canyon. This route around the mountain, up one fork, around the mountain, and down the other fork, is somewhere between eight and nine miles in length and has an elevation change of approximately 2,400 feet. I had been up Porter Fork a couple of times in the past, and in Bowman Fork only once, but had never taken the trail all the way around Mount Raymond…so this view was entirely new to me…and a wonderful surprise.
Scott's Place...Images and Words 