Signpost at the junction of the Mill-D North and Desolation Trails on the way to Dog Lake.
Click on image for a larger version.

Images (.JPG format):

• IMG04554 - Across the canyon, looking into Cardiff Fork (a.k.a. Mill-D South fork.)
• IMG04556 - Below the Mill-D/Desolation Lake junction, Mike M. and Gordon stop briefly.
  
• IMG04558 - What Dog Lake looked like this time...
  
• IMG04560 - Mike C., bringing up the rear, having made good time after his late start.
  
• IMG04562 - The obligatory group picture:  L->R:  Mike M., Bruce, Mike C., Clint, Gordon, Ron, Mindy, and Scott.
• IMG04569 - The last vestiges of sun on Twin Peaks (far right) and its neighbors.
  

Below is a panoramic picture that is a composites of smaller pictures.  Please note that due to size, it 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 (exposure, time, location, etc.) are noted in file's EXIF "Comments" field.

• Dog Lake Pano (2006)- A wide shot of the area around the meadow, taken from the large rock at which we congregated.  If you look carefully at the group of people on the left side of the picture, you'll notice that some of them are "incomplete."  This is a result of some of them walking around and having moved from one exposure to another - and I didn't bother editing the "partially missing persons" out.  (2.2 meg)  Here is A smaller version (1/3 image size, 334k.)

• The elevation profile of then 2006 hike - This shows the ups and downs of the trail. 
  
• A detailed map with the GPS track of the 2006 hike (plus surrounding landmarks, 669k)

A pretty good turnout this time, requiring three cars to get to the trailhead.  Then again, being that this was a "car spot" loop (that is, we finished by coming out of a different canyon than we started in) it might have taken an extra car anyway...

After getting to the Butler Fork trailhead, we left Ron's Jeep there and we piled into Scott and Mike C.'s car, arriving at the Mill-D in short order.  At that point, I noticed that I had forgotten a windbreaker or light jacket, so Mike C. kindly offered his extra jacket - but couldn't find it.  Suspecting that he'd left it on the roof of the car or that it had fallen on the ground in the parking lot (or somewhere along the way) he went back down the canyon to see if he could spot it while the rest of the group continued.

The hike up was steep, but it was long, and we encountered only a few small patches of snow off-trail (in the shade) on the steep uphill climb just before reaching Dog Lake.  Upon reaching Dog Lake, we noticed that the water level was about as low as we'd even seen it - but because this past winter was rather dry, this wasn't too surprising.  One positive aspect of having had a recent dry spell was that there were relatively few mosquitoes at the lake, unlike some experience in previous years.

Within a few minutes of the first group arrive at Dog Lake, Gordon and Bruce also arrived, followed by Mike (who had remembered leaving his jacket in the other car, returned to the trailhead, and was making up time as best he could) about 10 or so minutes later.  After resting for a few minutes, rehydrating, and getting the obligatory group picture, we carried on.

One of the real indicators of the snowpack of the past winter and the recent weather is by noticing how much snow is present along the trail that goes between Dog Lake and Butler fork, plus the stream that one encounters (and is forced to cross several times) in Butler Fork.  On the traverse to the top of Butler Fork, only two small patches of snow were present and the stream at the top of Butler Fork was rather small - yet another indicator of the recent water conditions.

The descent into Butler Fork was rather uneventful, save the brief display of Alpenglow across the canyon on Twin Peaks and it neighbors.  By the time the main part of the group got to the trailhead, it was just getting dark enough to make one consider using a flashlight.  As it turns out, we seem to have made pretty good time, arriving back at the car just 20 minutes after sunset - earlier than in the past 3 years.

After ferrying the drivers back to their respective cars, we headed down the canyon, back to the parking lot, without incident.  Most of those in the group went home, but Mike C., Gordon and I wandered over to TGI Friday's for a Dime Lime.

In the early days, Mill-D north fork was the source of a lot of timber for a mill established near there in 1855 or 1856:  The actual mill was located along the main stream in the canyon, near the south end of the present-day Spruces campground.  Interestingly enough, this mill apparently used a "sash saw" (a reciprocating blade) rather than a circular saw and its "rep rate" was supposedly about 200 per minute.  Driving this machinery was a 9 foot diameter waterwheel fed with a penstock with a 23 foot head.  In about 1861 Brigham Young - for reasons unknown - sold off the the assets of the Big Cottonwood Lumber Company and the different portions (one of which was the sawmill at "Mill-D") went to different investors.

As it turns out, after this sale, much of the output of the Mill-D sawmill was sold by its own lumberyard (owned by various people over the years - including a Charles Bagley and the once-mayor of Salt Lake, Francis Armstrong) in Downtown Salt Lake and its operation continued until the late 1870's.  Apparently, the remains of the sawmill could be easily seen at least until the early 1900's

It would seem that very little prospecting or mining was done in Mill-D North fork.

The body of water called "Dog Lake" is one of two so-named lakes Big Cottonwood canyon.  It derives its name from the presence of Salamanders that the early explorers and inhabitants of the canyons had noticed:  The common name for Salamander at the time was "Dogfish" - hence the name.

Comments:

• 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.
• Because all of the images were originally taken stored in raw binary format, they have been down-processed to .JPG for web posting:  If requested, different color/contrast/brightness may be applied and/or higher-quality uncompressed versions may be available for most of these image.
• 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.

Go to the 2007 Wednesday Night Hike page, or main Wednesday Night Hike index page.