A Relaxed Shabbat in Flaming Gorge

Day 22: Sept. 17, 2011

We spent a peaceful night in our exquisite campsite last night, except for the fact that at some point it started to rain. We have been very lucky with weather on this trip (as we usually are!), but it’s always preferable not to have to deal with rain, especially when you are in the mountains. These narrow windy roads can be scary enough sometimes, without the added worry of being wet. So when we woke up and it was raining quite hard, we simply went back to sleep! I didn’t have a lot planned for us today, and the first part--take a boat onto the Flaming Gorge reservoir--was obviously scratched due to the weather. Which meant a sleep-in!

We finally got out of bed around 9am, and really took our time getting breakfast, and by the time we finished, the rain had stopped and the sun was out. The sky was blue, and it was just a gorgeous, albeit cool, mid-morning. So we took a short walk on the trail to the Firefighter’s Memorial, which the campground was named for. This was a plaque overlooking “our” valley, dedicated to three firefighters who lost their lives while battling a forest fire in the national recreation area. It was a beautiful spot for a tribute like that, looking over the trees and valley.

Then Joey and I had a discussion--should we do anything else, or maybe we should just set up our lawn chairs, and read our books and gaze out over the view all day. It would have been a perfectly fine thing to do, actually! But then we decided we would at least go take a tour of the Flaming Gorge Dam. So off we went.

The dam tour was very interesting…the dam is just huge. It’s too bad we didn’t get to really tour the Bonneville Dam when we were there, but the shape seemed very different. We had views from both sides, and from the bottom.

Besides admiring the white concrete of the dam itself against the red rocks, we also admired the wingspans of the turkey vultures who were drifting on the air currents in front of us. Our guide pointed out how several of the birds were perched on the struts of the nearby tower, warming themselves in the sun. One of them had his wings completely open to catch the rays--it seemed like a very sane thing to be doing just then, because the weather had really warmed up. If you look at the photo close-up, though, you can really see how ugly these birds are.


After our tour, it was 1:30, so we ate some lunch and then thought maybe we would rent a boat on the lake after all. So we went to the nearby marina, but by the time we got there, a big black cloud was coming up and the wind had picked up again, and the warm day had disappeared. We figured we’d freeze on the lake, so then we had to decide: back to the campground, or continue north back towards I-80 and our eventual trip back home? We decided to head north.

As soon as we crossed the dam again, however, we had to take a brief detour so I could photograph the dam from the river side (the photo I posted above). The Green River at that point is fantastic for tubing (alas for the cold weather we’ve had here!) and fishing, especially for trout. In fact, we saw a lot of fish at the base of the dam during our tour.
We parked Mo in a parking lot which is set up for boaters and rafters. The lot is still about 400 feet or so above the river; the put-in point is down below and then they have to bring the car back up to park it. We found a foot path leading down to the riverside, and we started to walk down it It was steep, with a number of steps just a little too high for my comfort. I was dressed too warmly for this--the path was all rock, no shade, and the sun had come out again, and I was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt--but I followed Joe and Roxy, taking photos all the way. They seemed to have no trouble with it.
We got to the bottom and it was REALLY nice--the river moves very quickly there and the sound was so lulling, and there were very few people around besides us. I enjoyed sitting on the rocks, and Roxy joined me, despite the fact that they were steep. She managed to get to the edge for a drink despite the angle. However, when it came time to climb back up, I realized that the steep hike was just too much for me. So Joe gallantly left me with Roxy at the bottom of the path, climbed back up, and drove Mo down to pick me up. I have simply GOT to get in better hiking shape for our next trip! On the other hand, if I had climbed up the path, we would have gotten caught in the rain--because as soon as Joe got to the bottom to pick me up, the sky clouded over, and it started raining on us as we drove back up.

A mile or so along the road, we had to stop for yet another viewpoint--the dam and reservoir area from the south. It was still raining lightly but not too much, and I was able to take some more photos. I’d say this place is well worth a visit, especially for people who like to fish! And if we come here again, we have got to come when it is warmer--I was so disappointed not to go kayaking or rafting or something on the lake or river. It really is a water-lover’s ideal destination. Not too crowded, and views to be gaga for. I took this panorama photo, I hope it comes out okay in the blog (click on it to make it show up on the entire page.)

The two-lane highway from Flaming Gorge to I-80 is marked as scenic on the map, and it really is amazing. I thought I’d seen a lot of panoramas and overlooks already, but this was really something else again. We left the lakeside and soon after crossed back into Wyoming again (the 6th time on this trip we’ve passed a “Welcome to Wyoming” sign!) I think maybe Utah and Wyoming could be in a competition for the most beautiful vistas. We stopped at one place where we just couldn’t stop drinking in the views--the shades of dark and sage greens, the red and white and gray striped rocks, all blended together. It was fantastic. I tried another panorama for this.
It was about 5pm when we finally got to the interstate near Rock Springs, WY. We stopped at a Flying J to fill the gas tank, and the stop was delayed slightly by a small entanglement between Mo and a rock next to the parking lot (why do people decorate with rocks, anyway? They are just hazards!) After that, we drove a short 1.5 miles to the Wild Horse Viewing Area. Southwestern Wyoming has a large population of wild horses. Because they have no natural predators, the herds increase very quickly, putting a strain on the rangeland and leading to starvation for the horses. So the Bureau of Land Management counts and culls the herds regularly, and they put the extra horses, burros and mules up for “adoption”. There is a wild horse corral facility in Rock Springs, and there is a place to view the horses. They were GORGEOUS.
Joe has been admiring horses all along our trip, and he wanted to adopt one of the little frisky colts we saw prancing and dancing in the corral. There were more horses than I expected, and they looked to be in excellent condition. If you are interested, it costs on average about $185 to adopt a horse, and the requirements include an enclosure of a mere 20’ x 20’. Of course, that seems a little small for a horse who grew up running free on the range. But the food is probably better in captivity. Anyway, that was a very fun stop.
By then it was 6pm and we got back on the highway for about 45 minutes. We stopped at a rest stop to make dinner, and then decided to just stay here for the night. So that’s where I’m writing this--the Mile 144 rest area on Interstate 80 in Wyoming. I have decided to set a new course home, however. Nothing really fabulous is jumping out at us to visit along I-80, and for a mere 150 miles more, we can route ourselves home via I-70 instead. We travelled I-80 west on this trip (as well as in 2010 and 2008) and east last year from mid-Nebraska onward. We’ve never taken I-70 east, and we took it west back in 2007, but only as far as Indianapolis. So we are going to swing south from Cheyenne, WY to Denver, and then pick up I-70. Besides being new scenery, this will also give us two of our missing Midwest state stickers--Kansas and Missouri, bringing our new state sticker total to 6 for this trip (and leaving us with a mere 6 states in the continental US to visit in Mo!)

Driven to Extremes

Day 13: Sept. 8, 2011

We started our day early, grabbing some showers at the very nice facilities at the Wallowa Lake State Park in Joseph, OR, and getting on the road by about 8:30 a.m. We drove almost two hours on the Hells Canyon Scenic Loop until we reached I-84. There we found yet another Walmart, and made a very quick stop to see if they had a small gas grill (we’d thrown our old broken one away a few days ago.) We did find what we were looking for, so the stop was worthwhile. And then we got onto the interstate for the first time in 3 since Monday.

The road was uncrowded and the scenery was surprising--it was quite hilly, but that lovely hay-colored yellow pretty much everywhere, with a lot of farms and rangeland. In fact, it was a lot like the scenery in Washington the day before. We sort of pictured Oregon a little greener. I told Joey it will be greener further south. It was also hotter than normal today--in the 90s rather than the 80s (which after Yellowstone feels too hot anyway…we’ve been cooler in Montana and Idaho until now.)

So, we drove. We drove for a long time, stopping only for lunch. It was several hours before the scenery changed--about the same time as when we got to the Columbia River. I felt quite like Lewis & Clark, appreciating the river so much. I only wish we could have ridden down it rather than having to continue driving. But then across the river, what we saw was totally barren hills, and after that, cliffs which looked as if they were formed by an ancient sea. It wasn’t what we expected, and we wished we had more time to stop and learn about the geology of the area.
My hope today was to stop someplace along the Columbia River, in the area of the scenic highway which stretches from just east of Portland to The Dalles, roughly 80 miles. We managed to arrive at the Bonneville Dam and Fish Hatchery just before 4:30, and they close at 5:00. It was really cool driving across a “road” on the front of the dam to reach the visitor’s center.
We rushed into the dam’s visitor’s center, and I asked the man at the counter, “What should we see? We only have 30 minutes until you close!” He directed us down the elevator to the first floor, so we could see the fish ladder.

The Bonneville Dam is blocking the river where millions of salmon used to spawn. In order to allow them to continue to reach their spawning grounds, they built a fish ladder into the dam so the fish can swim upstream past the dam. There are windows which allow the visitors to watch the fish go past. There’s also a small room adjacent to the windows were someone sits to count the fish. They keep track of all of them so they know how the dam is affecting the fish population.

We only had 30 minutes, but we watched the fish go up the rapids which are sent through the fish ladder from not only the inside of the building (under water, so to speak), but from the top outside.

We chose the best time to come to visit to see the salmon returning to spawn--they have been doing this since mid-August or so. The rest of the year, I guess there are not as many fish anywhere near the ladder. We were outside watching them leap up the steps, when they announced that the building was closing. So we had to rush out pretty fast. I did have time to take a photo of the spillway adjacent to the dam area. We figured we’d have to learn more about the dam itself, how it was built, etc. from the brochure we got when we arrived, since we didn’t have time to look at all the exhibits in the building.

Happily, the fish hatchery was open until 7, so we went there next. That was totally fascinating. Having already seen the salmon swimming upstream past the dam, we could even more appreciate the hatching process nearby. We saw a video of the entire process of raising salmon (in this case--that is the fish raised at Bonneville) and how they artificially inseminate the eggs (that part was pretty graphic!), nurture the eggs until they are fingerlings, and finally how they send them from the hatchery into the river and hence to the ocean. In 4-5 years, they will return to the hatchery to spawn. Unlike the salmon we saw at the dam, who were heading up the Columbia River, these salmon literally return to the fish hatchery itself.

We saw the returnees once we left the visitors center when the film was over. There are salmon runs outside with stairs again, which allow the salmon to come up into the hatchery. We watched them leap up over the stairs barring their way.
They swim upstream to a collection area; when there are enough of them, they are actually lifted up into the hatchery where they are caught and the insemination process begins. We watched them in the trough where they were collecting, and it was fascinating. There were spilloffs of water running into the trough, and the salmon were leaping out of the water trying to get “up stream”. Some of them leapt really high--they are so amazing!

One salmon actually managed to leap onto the cement between two containment areas, and we watced it flap around for about 5-10 seconds until he flopped back into the water. I was so upset for him (or her) that I forgot to take a photo!

We also saw the rooms where the fish eggs are incubated and the fingerlings fed and raised; those rooms were all empty, though. Then we went to see “Herman the Sturgeon”, who lives with several other sturgeon in a pool. The sturgeon are tremendous fish but quite unattractive--they look very like dinosaurs. This is not so surprising, since they evolved during the Jurassic period and haven’t changed since then.

We had a great time at the fish hatchery. After that, we decided to continue driving toward the beach. Joe did a great job taking Mo through downtown Portland, from I-84 to I-5 and finally back to a local road, and then to another Oregon state park, this one about a 30 minute drive from Portland along the Willamette River. It is so hard to compare the drive through the heart of the city with the stark empty hills where we started our day--that’s where my title comes from. We drove from the extreme semi-barrenness and lonesome roads of Wallowa County to the crowded mid-city traffic of Portland. I am quite sure Joe loves the barren loneliness the best!