Weather:  Cool and partly cloudy.
Present were:  Mike, K7DOU and friend Nancy;  Ron, K7RJ;  Dale, WJ7L;  Gordon, K7HFV;  Clint, KA7OEI
Destination:  The beaver pond at Willow Heights in Willow Fork of Big Cottonwood Canyon.
Question of the day:  "Is this the last hike of the season?"  The answer:  Yes, it is.  Traditionally, the last hike is the one on or just after equinox.
Total distance:  Approx. 1.79 miles, including a circumnavigation of the pond.
Times:  Depart Vehicle:  1845;  Arrive at pond:  1912;  Arrive at hunting blind:  1943;  Completed circumnativation of lake:  1947;  Return to vehicle:  2011
Altitudes in feet ASL (approx):  Parking:  7905;  Beaver dam:  8500;  Top (inlet) end of pond:  8525;  Hunting blind:  8515;  Meadow below pond:  8460
Elevation gain/loss (approx):  620 feet
Local sunset on this date:  7:24 pm (12 minutes lost over the past week.)

Images (158-1000k each, .JPG):

• IMG01500 - Gordon, Ron and Dale conversing at the trailhead
• IMG01503 - Mt. Raymond (or is it Gobbler's Knob?)
• IMG01505 - Ron, in the meadow below the beaver pond.  Similar is #1504.
• IMG01509 - A view across the meadow and canyon.
• IMG01510 - Toward the sunset (from the meadow.)
• IMG01511 - Looking across the sunlit meadow, across the canyon, toward Flagstaff Mountain.  The peak and surroundings are illuminated by reflection from the clouds above it.  See also #1513.
• IMG01514 - Changing leaves on the ridge above Willow Heights.
• IMG01516 - Reflection of fall colors in the Willow Creek beaver pond.  Similar are #'s 1518 and 1522.
• IMG01530h - The arrival of the fleet!  One fixture of this pond is the presence of ducks that will happily follow you around, hoping for some food.
• IMG01536 - The entire crew of this last Wednesday night hike of the 2004 season.
• IMG01537 - Cloud-glow after sunset.
• IMG01538 - Nancy and Mike, pausing to wave at the camera as they traverse the beaver dam.
• IMG01539 - After sunset, across the pond and looking up the canyon.

• WILLPAN2a - A very wide-angle shot showing the entire pond (a composite of 4 images.)

• GPS track of the hike - The recorded GPS track of the hike.
• Elevation profile of the hike - The elevation profile of the hike.
• A more detailed GPS track - A more-detailed map with the GPS track of the hike plus the surrounding landmarks.

Notes:

Being the last hike of the Wednesday Night Hike season, one of the shortest (but nicely picturesque, nonetheless) hikes was chosen.  Near the top of Willow Fork, on Willow Creek, at a place called Willow Heights is a fairly large, active, beaver pond surrounded, at this time of year, by golden fall color, highlighted by remnants of snow from a storm earlier in the week.

One of the seeming constants at this pond are the ducks.  If one simply stands next the shore for a few minutes, a small flock of ducks (we counted at least six of them on this trip) will soon arrive and insist on being fed.  Another constant would seem to be the presence of (a) Moose(s).  In previous years, they have been noted in either the meadow just below the pond, or in the stand of trees to the east.  This year, we had thought that we'd missed them altogether, but on the way down, one appeared just off the trail, requiring the descent to halt until it had moved on.

• If you want one (or more) of these images and wish some sort of adjustment (color, brightness, exposure, etc.) please let me know:  All of these image have been processed in some way.
• The judicious use of a tripod allowed longer exposures and sharper images in the dimming light.
• These images are 158-1000k in size, .JPG and are in chronological order.
• No-one ever said that all of these images (or any of them) were good.  Some of them may have definite focus/exposure "issues."
• EXIF data is present for most of the images, showing time, date, and precise exposure conditions.  Recent versions of Irfanview will show this in the "View->Image Information->EXIF" tab.  Note that cropping/noise reduction required the use of another program which may have removed some/most of this EXIF data.
• Images suffixed with "h" are half-size.  This was done for images that were somewhat out of focus (due to misfocus or camera/subject movement associated with long shutter times) or those that required some extra noise reduction and had lost some detail anyway.
• All images taken using a Sigma SD-10 camera using the 18-50mm zoom lens.

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