Friday, July 9, 2010

Provo Canyon and Forest Drive

7/5/2010

Today we drove up into Provo Canyon. A lady in Bryce Canyon told Joe about Provo Canyon. She said she was only planning to spend one day, but ended up spending 3 days. Our first stop was at Bridal Vail Falls. People were climbing up the falls. Seems like everywhere we go people can't just look at something, they feel the need to walk out or climb up or touch or try in some way to leave their mark. A close up of all the people climbing up it. We saw a guy who looked like he was way to old to be climbing up it. I wonder how many people twist their ankles every year here? These two guys had climbed up and were standing and sitting on a ledge of the falls. The guy in the green shirt walked out to the edge of the ledge. I saw him slip where it was wet. Luckily he did not fall. I think that is why he is sitting now. Joe and I just stay down where it is safe and watch the people. This part of the canyon had a really nice park along the stream for picnics. As we drove on up the highway, I got a better shot of the falls. As we went further up, the stream got wider and there were places that rented out inner tubes for rafting down it.Father up still, we came to Deer Creek Reservoir. Camping facilities were located there. at the State Park. It was a really big reservoir. As we drove to the city of Heber, we saw planes taking gliders up. After our visit to Heber, we drove back to the reservoir and parked to have our cost saving sack lunch. A nice beach for swimming. Lots of boats in a bay area of the reservoir. If we ever come back here, we will have to stay here for a while. After we came back down the Provo Canyon we turned on Hwy. 92 to take a drive through the Uinta- Wastch- Cache National Forest and up the Timpanogos Mountains. The drive takes us up to Alpine Summit at 8000 some ft elevation. Joe had to make many stops for me to get out and take some pictures. I was in Aspen and fern heaven. We stopped at Deer Creek Overlook. Very pretty but,

I can not see Deer Creek. That is a road down there not a creek. Oh well pretty views. Next stop is Cascade Springs. This place was very different. There were board walks over the many cascading underground springs. There were lots of mosses in the springs. There were all kinds of plants and grasses growing in the springs. We had never seen anything quite like this place before. As we walked farther up the boardwalks the springs became a stream. At the top of the springs, we looked down on the springs. You can not see them from this picture, but all the plants in this picture are sitting over springs. You have top springs that turn into a stream and then back into cascading springs below with like a flooded area with plants. They say that the springs are a constant flow, never increasing or decreasing because they come from a underground source. There were brown trout in the springs, you could see them in this shallow water. We left the springs and headed back down the mountain. It was a beautiful day in the high 70's It cost us $6 to enter the forest, and also $ 6 for the springs, but because we have our annual pass, it was free. At the bottom of the mountain there is a cave in Timpanogos Mountains, but the last hike into it was 4:30, so we could not go on it. I think our national pass would have got us in free too.

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