Weather:  Cool and rainy with thunder and lightning earlier on the day, cool and clearing at the time of the hike.
Present were:  Mike, K7DOU;   Ron, K7RJ;  Dale, WJ7L and his wife Shauna, WB7OQY;  Bryan, W7CBM;   Gordon, K7HFV;  Clint, KA7OEI.
Destination:  The beaver pond in Willow Fork
Question of the day:  "Where are the ducks?"
Total distance:   1.99 miles, round trip
Times:  Depart vehicle: 1838;  Arrived at junction with loop trail that circumnavigates the lake:  1903;  Crossed the beaver dam:  1907;  Finished loitering around on the northwest bank of the pond, after feeding the ducks:  1935;  Arrived at the hunting blind:  1945;  Departed hunting blind:  1954;  Rejoined main trail at junction:  1955;  Returned to vehicle:  2011
Altitudes in feet ASL (approx) from GPS:  Vehicle:  7812;  Junction of loop trail:  8488;  Trail around lake:  8500;  Hunting blind:  8517
Altitude gain/loss (approx.): 718 Ft.
Local sunset on this date:  7:26 PM - (We've lost about 12 minutes of daylight since last week - about 107 minutes since the solstice.)

We went to this same place last year - go here to see pictures from that trip.

Images (139-1292k each, .JPG):
 

• IMG03148 - From the trailhead:  Looking into Cardiff Fork.  Similar is #3147.
• IMG03150r - Information sign at the trailhead.  (Sorry for the slight blur.)
• IMG03152 - Sun-dappled stand of quakies.
• IMG03153 - A view into the meadow below the beaver pond.  See also #'s 3154 and 3155.
• IMG03159 - From the meadow:  Looking down-canyon into the sunset, with whisps of clouds along the ridgeline.  See also #3160.
• IMG03161 - From the meadow:  Crepuscular rays near sunset.
• IMG03163 - From the meadow:  Catching the last glimpse of the sun before it disappears behind the ridge.
• IMG03164 - From the meadow:  Shauna and Dale making their way across the meadow.  The  top edge of the Reed and Benson ridge figures prominently in the center of the picture.  Similar are #'s 3165 and 3166.
• IMG03167 - From the meadow:  A view up into Willow Fork toward the pond.
• IMG03190 - Across the beaver pond at sunset.
• IMG03196r - The entire group (l to r):  Mike, Shauna, Dale, Bryan, Ron, Gordon and Clint
• IMG03198hr - A view across the pond from the woods.  (It was getting dark, hence the somewhat grainy image.)

These picture are composites of several smaller pictures.  Please note that due to the size of the bitmap, they may not display properly on some browsers and you may need to use an image viewer like Irfanview to view them properly and zoom in on some of the details.  Note that details of these images (exposure, time, location, etc.) are noted in their EXIF "Comments" fields.

• A wide angle view of the beaver pond and surroundings.  (2846 kB) This view consisting of 12 image encompassing about 180 degrees and shows the beaver pond and its surroundings.  On the left (in the yellow jacket) is Shauna, while on the right side, moving left to right, is Dale in the foreground, Gordon, above his head in the distance, Bryan, and Mike, taking a picture.
• A slightly less-wide angle view of the beaver pond.  (1958 kB)  This is a narrower view, consisting of 6 images taken about 2 feet above the waterline, of the beaver pond.  Unfortunately, the bottom-center image was slightly blurry.

Note:  Owing to the narrowness of the canyon and the body-shielding of the antenna toward the southern sky, the elevation readings of the trip to the peak are mostly bogus and are offset by several meters.  The "to" track is the "upper" one while the "from" track (the more accurate one) is the lower one.

• The elevation profile of the hike (As noted above, most elevation data is missing from the ascent.)
• A detailed map with the GPS track of the hike (plus surrounding landmarks)

This is to be the last "official" Wednesday Night Hike of the 2005 season:  It is now officially fall and with the sun setting before 7:30 PM, there is just too little time to do much after work.

The weather earlier in the day did not appear to be promising.  Gordon had been on the phone earlier with Brett and had mentioned that he'd thought that the weather would probably clear up in the evening:  It might have been the brief but intense storm that immediately followed the telephone call that dissuaded Brett from coming.  While in the parking lot, Roy, W7ROY swung by, having just come from the Park City area via Guardsman Pass and reported that he'd seen hail, thunder (and lightning, of course) and that the rainfall had been intense enough that it had washed rocks and gravel across portions of the canyon road.  We thanked him for his report and said that we'd not changed our plans (likely reinforcing his opinion of our sanity) and he took off.

Going up the canyon we did, in fact, see (and had to avoid) some of the larger rocks that had fallen from the sides - particularly in the steep parts by the Birches and Storm Mountain;  Dale commented that someone screaming down the canyon on their bicycle might risk life and limb if they were unfortunate to hit the rocks and gravel while trying to maneuver.

When we got to the trailhead, most of the dark clouds had cleared and the sun was shining through the parting clouds.  Wisps of fog were drifting around and the sunlight, warmed by the blue of the sky being blocked by the clouds to the east, was playing off of the recently-engoldened aspen:  Dale mentioned that that Aspen had not yet turned when he was last up there, just a few days earlier.

We started up the trail:  It was only slightly muddy in a few parts, but nothing too difficult.  There was never, during the entire hike, any hint or threat of rain - but we still got wet shoes and pants owing to the fact that we were walking through and amongst plants and grasses wet with the day's earlier rainfall.

Getting to the meadow just below the pond, we could see the interplay of the setting sun against the fall colors and the thin clouds drifting about the ridges higher up.  Getting to the pond, we were treated to the warm alpenglow on the ridges above, reflecting off the very still waters of the pond.

When we got to the pond, we spotted two bow hunters moving off to the east:  We were trying to figure out exactly what they might be hunting at this time of year and, in light of the nearby "No Hunting" sign, where exactly the hunting boundaries might actually fall.  One possibility that we'd half-seriously tossed around was that they'd been hunting ducks.  Although I'd thought that I'd seen several disappear in the grasses at the far end of the pond, the lack of the usual flotilla of fowl made us wonder for a while.  Just before we departed the pond, however, two appeared and Dale had fun throwing pieces of bread onto the water and watching the ducks scramble to get them.

Continuing our circumnavigation of the pond, we thrashed around briefly, trying to find the (somewhat faint) trail that traversed the upstream end of it.  Finally locating it, we continued around through the trees on the East side and regrouped at what appears to have been a hunting blind.  At that point we dug out flashlights and put on our jackets while Ron, who was sure that he'd dropped a glove on the trail, found it stuffed either in his pack or coat pocket.

Descent of the trail was done in the failing light, aided by flashlight.  It is in heading down the trail that one is reminded how much slipperier it is when wet.  As we headed down the trail to the vehicle we noted that, unlike the past several years, we had not seen hide or hair of moose:  Perhaps the hunters spooked them into the trees...

After driving down the canyon (avoiding the new rockfall) most of us convened at the Rocky Mountain Pizza Company and enjoyed the food, accompanied by the usual Wednesday gathering of the bluegrass music folks - a nice conclusion of 2005's Wednesday Night Hikes.

Comments:

• 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.
• These images 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" (if any) 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 and were taken using the 18-50mm zoom lens, except as noted in the EXIF data.

Go to the 2005 Wednesday Night Hike page, or main Wednesday Night Hike index page.