Strawberry Creek Reopened

Strawberry Creek, in Great Basin National Park, closed in August 2016 when a big wildfire burned about 4,500 acres of both park- and BLM-managed land. Since then, the gate at the park boundary has been closed until May 1, 2019, when it was opened to day use. We wanted to see what had changed, so we went for a lovely visit.

At the lower elevations, there are lots of grasses and forbs growing. Unfortunately, many appear to be non-natives (cheatgrass and mustards), but there are a good number of natives in there. Plus, the vegetation has helped stabilize the soil, which means flash floods are less likely (they are still possible, so stay out during storms).

The bridge has been reinstalled. It had been taken out because it was thought that a big flood after the fire would have wiped it out. Big storms over nearby burned areas (Hampton Creek and Lexington watershed) created some massive floods. But Strawberry Creek lucked out. There were small floods, but nothing major.


We went up to the trailhead to start the Strawberry meadow loop, about 2 miles long. The first obstacle is getting across Strawberry Creek, since the foot bridge is gone. It's not too hard, and I have a feeling it will be improved in the near future.


A short ways up the trail is this sign that survived the fire. It has an illustration of the scenery pre-fire. You can see some changes post-fire.

 

The Nevada parsley was in full bloom!

The buttercup really decorated some hillsides.

 

Here's a view from near the top of the meadow looking down canyon.

Then we came to another obstacle: crossing the creek again without a bridge. We added some big rocks to the streambed to make it easier for ourselves and those who follow.

Desert Girl stands near the sign at the junction. To the right, the trail goes up to the Osceola Ditch (used in the late 1800s to carry water from nearby creeks to the mining town of Osceola) and to Willard Creek. To the left is our loop.


As we hiked down, we followed some pink flagging. We also saw some places where water was running in new channels. The 170% snowpack we had this winter is creating some new streams.

here's a view of the main creek, with the tall, dead trees next to it.

Another creek crossing without a bridge! Altogether there are four creek crossings without bridges. Peak stream flow will be about mid-May to the end of June, so be extra careful then.

Then we lost the trail. We knew the general direction and kept hiking that way.

Aha, we found the trail again! Can you tell this is the trail? It looks a lot different now.

Then we reached a part where some flooding had wiped it out again. Fortunately the vegetation is all low enough that it's not hard to cross.

We found another little impromptu stream.

We're getting close back to the trailhead!

And then we were totally surprised by the last bridge being in place.

Can you tell what Desert Girl has in her hand? It's a snowball, as we found a little snow patch. She couldn't wait to throw it.

This landscape has changes so much. The Bonneville cutthroat trout in the stream have really suffered from the fire, but most of the rest of habitat will rebound and actually be healthier.

It's great to have this opportunity to go up into Strawberry Creek and see how this watershed has changed. Some interpretive signs should be installed this summer, sharing even more information about how this area is coming back.

To see more photos of what this area looked like pre-fire, check out this 2013 post.

Mayday Training

I'm a volunteer firefighter for our county and over the years have responded to a variety of incidents, such as wildland fires, car fires, a hay fire, and even a structure fire. We don't have many people out here, so we don't have many structures, and fortunately they don't catch on fire frequently. But if one does, I want to know what to do, so I've gone to a variety of training. 

One Sunday the county hosted a Mayday training, which is what to do if you or another firefighter run into trouble. Basically the training was going through an obstacle course on an SCBA tank (breathing air through a mask), with the mask blacked out so we couldn't see where we were going. 

I volunteered to go first and started busting my way through some drywall. That was a lot of fun! (These photos aren't of me, but I looked pretty much the same.)

Then I crawled, following the hose and started feeling "wires" I had to try and keep the SCBA tank from snagging on the wires (hint: roll over and put it in the corner as you move). 



Here's a view from the other end. It sure was a tangled mess!


Another fun obstacle was the corrugated pipe.

It had a surprise inside (which I won't share, because if anyone reading this is doing similar training, it's better not to know what's coming!).

We also went up the stairs, where another fun surprise awaited.


Finally we had to drag a mannequin out of the "house."

I found the most difficult part was maintaining communications. I wasn't used to getting to my radio with the thick gloves and mask on and doing it all by feel since I couldn't see anything. I really enjoyed the training. Probably my caving experience helped!

I'm grateful the county puts on these training sessions so we can stay safer.

A Visit to Rock Corral Recreation Area, Milford, Utah

The kids and I wanted to go to Cedar City, so we left the afternoon before so we could go camp someplace interesting. I wasn't exactly sure where we were going to camp, but as we approached Milford with the beautiful sunlight on the granite rock of the Mineral Mountain Range, I decided that would be the place.

I had been wanting to check out The Rock Corral Recreation Area for many years, but had always just gone by this sign along Utah Highway 21 on the south side of Milford.

It was a Friday night, so we were expecting to see lots of people up there. But it turned out we didn't see anyone else! We found a nice place to camp that even included a bathroom.


The moon was rising early, so I tried to get a photo of an awesome tree in the camping area with some of the stars showing.

The next morning I woke up early and wandered around. Even though I was in flip flops, I couldn't resist scampering to the top of a ridge for this view.

We left our camping area and headed to the day-use area.

We found more amazing rocks--and no one else!

The end of the road has a nice picnic shelter. 

We took a social trail from there and went by some maple trees.


And some oaks! We don't have oaks by us, so I'm always excited to see them.


We wandered for a bit, admiring the rugged scenery.


Then we headed out and actually saw one other person! We also took a short walk out a ridge, and down in the ravine next to a spring saw a deer.


We also stumbled across a Utah Life Elevated Geocache.


There are lots of opportunities for rock climbing and rock hounding in the Mineral Mountains. We didn't come prepared, so we headed on to Cedar City, taking the scenic way across the mountains. Some cows joined us on the road.


We didn't know where we would end up, but eventually we got to a tiny town with some interesting ruins.

Our morning explorations got us to Cedar City about lunch time, where we ate at the Hong Kong Buffet, which has really good sushi. Yum, yum.

Our next stop was to the Mastermind Room Escape. Desert Boy had gone for his birthday with my husband and Desert Girl, and with some hints, they had made it out of the Ski Lodge in 65 minutes. I had made a snafu ordering the tickets, so had the ones that I had gotten on Groupon that were only valid during the open hours (meaning you might be paired with another group). The snafu meant that I had the opportunity to go too, so we signed up for the Detective's Room.


While waiting, we worked on some other puzzles.

Well, I'd like to say we were awesome detectives and got out in 39 minutes, but we didn't. We didn't get out at all. But it was fun (for the first half hour) and then a little frustrating (when we couldn't figure out clues).  Overall it was a good experience, and we learned some things about ourselves (like we need to be a lot more thorough searching).

On the way home, I snapped a photo of this wildfire that had burned right across the highway near Minersville. The retardant drops were really obvious.

It was a fun short trip, and I always enjoy checking out new things!