Kathy Finally Sees a Moose

We went to the High Uintas Wilderness this past weekend and Kathy finally saw a moose. Earlier attempts to see one in New Hampshire and Maine had been for naught. But we saw this one along the road on the way to Moon Lake, which was actually outside the wilderness. We had spent the day before hiking in the wilderness but never saw much of any wildlife except birds, a chipmunk and a grouse. We did get close enough to see Mt. Emmons, a 13er and the 4th highest peak in Utah. It is a trailess peak and some day we hope to climb it as well as some of the other Uintas. Any of the major peaks are quite a ways in and are normally done as a backpack. We camped and hiked in from the Swift Creek trailhead and got as far as Farmers Lake, about 9 miles in. We met a wilderness ranger who was leading a mule team in to break down two of their work camps and we met one of his workers. Other than that we didn't see anyone else on the trail, and it was a glorious fall day with lots of golden aspens.

On Monday Sept 21 I gave my first evening program at Bryce. It was titled Bryce Canyon National Park: The Early Years and it covered the years 1915 - 1942. 1915 was the first year anyone had a thought about making Bryce Canyon a National Park. J.W. Humphrey, a forest ranger, upon seeing the spectacle of Bryce Canyon thought it merited national park status so all could enjoy it. Largely due to his efforts, Bryce Canyon became a National Monument in 1923 and then a National Park in 1928. I was able to gather lots of old photos of Bryce Canyon and pieced together an entertaining show. This show will be available on special request (I bring it to you).

Our hike in the Uintas was a warm up for a rim-to-rim hike we plan to do in the Grand Canyon next weekend. I tested out my new light weight La Sportiva trail shoes, even on rocky ground they seemed to hold up well and today my feet feel ok, so I think it's a go. The only complaint I have is sand gets in through the mesh uppers but we will only have sand near the bottom of the GC. We are also finishing up our work here at Bryce this week, and our bosses our having a going away party for us tonight. We can't miss that so we hightailed it back here.

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