Green Table

We have been trying to get over to Mesa Verde for awhile now and it has never worked out, but we finally made it over this weekend. I like visting remote backcountry ruins much more than the heavily visited stabilized ones in the National Parks, but if you are interested in the Ancestral Puebloans (Anasazi) you have to make the trek to Mesa Verde. With some of the biggest and densest sites in the Anaszi world it is a pretty amazing and sacred place.

Climbing out of Balcony House

The orignal route in and out of Balcony House that you still crawl through to exit. It is a pretty defensible entrance. Your enemies are fairly vulnerable to getting thier heads smashed in when they crawl through if you don't want them around.

Balcony House

Ridge hanging out on the balcony with the entrance ladder down below

Starting up the big entrance ladder to Balcony House

Green Table II

River waiting to go into Cliff Palace
Pondering the hole between the 3rd and 4th Worlds

The main tower at Cliff Palace. Four stories tall, the corner had fallen out when it was first viewed by Wetherill in the 1890s. Pretty amazing structure

Mesa top ruins. I am always telling my boys to stay off the walls when we visit backcountry ruins, so it was nice to visit some stabilized ones that they could go into and explore

Mesa Verde residents coming out to feed in the evening

Looking for a Peaceful Sunday Drive

After the requisite 3 hour church meetings (we really need to work on cutting that back to an hour, tops). We headed up to find some peace and quiet in my other place of worship. We drove up to Medicine Lake with the idea of walking through some of the alpine meadows and throwing a few flies at trout. La Sal Pass is one of my favorite places in the La Sals, high alpine peaks all around and views clear over to the San Juans and Ute Mountain in Colorado.

Then I remembered why it can be so frustrating trying to recreate on the mountain I work on as well. On the way up we saw two women on OHV's, one carrying a small child with no helmet (both dangerous and illegal) but I thought to myself "today I am not going to worry about it I am not working and they are on a legal road". So we drove up to the lake, as I was putting my fly rod together and untangling the kids poles I noticed a new OHV track cutting right through the middle of the large meadow at the pass. Once again, I am not opposed to responsible motorized recreation, but some days it seems that I see less and less of the responsible variety and more and more of the "It is my right to drive where ever and when ever I want" variety. The new track really irritated me, so I took a mental note that I would send someone back up on Monday to sign and try to rehab the illegal trail, so much for relaxing.

As I went to make my first cast, here comes the OHVs driving right into and across the meadow. Now I am beyond mad and all thoughts of fish rising to a caddis are gone. I handed my rod to my nearest son and took off on foot to "bust some perps". I finally caught the OHV riders and flagged them over. Two teenage girls and the same little kid. I asked them if they thought they were on a road? They both answered no. I asked them if they thought what they were doing was acceptable? They both said no. Then I explained that they could both receive tickets for driving off road and not wearing helmets, gave them Travel Maps and a list of rules for motorized use and told them to drive over to their parents and explain what I had just told them and if they had questions I would be down at the lake trying to catch some fish.

There are 1000 miles of open roads and motorized trails on the Moab/Monticello Ranger District alone, why can't people stay on them? I read today that there are 70,000 miles of open roads on public lands in Utah ( I have not checked the accuracy of this total, but it sounds about right). There are plenty of legal and appropriate places for motorized recreation, despite what "Take Back Utah" says. There is no excuse for driving off road across an alpine meadow. Use your legs, let your feet come in contact with the actual Earth once in a while, it will do you good.

There was an interesting opinion piece from an OHV rider in the Tribune today about the "Take Back Utah" rally from a fellow OHV user. Read it here. I love when somebody rational and thoughtful gets involved. We need more of that and less yelling and demonizing of those you don't agree with.

Meadow with new tracks

Boys on a log with Tuk in the background

Medicine Lake

End of Summer River Excursions

Summer is getting ready to come to a close (at least for Alina and the kids who have to go back to school because of new school construction) and we have been making a few late summer river excursions. Last Tuesday I took my trail crew down Westwater on the "Centennial Moustache Ride", so called because it was Erin's (Max's wife) 100th trip down Westwater and all of the trail crew shaved thier facial hair into porn/pirate/burt reynolds moustaches, rather disturbing but we may have to make it a tradition. I somehow got completly thrown out of the seat in Sock and To Me and was not able to make one oar stroke to avoid the "Magnetic Wall", but we still did not even come close to hitting it. I guess that is the secret, just jump in the back of the boat and let it ride.

Today me and the boys took the canoe out on the Daily and made it down without mishap.

Rio in the River

Take-out

I spent yesterday hiking into some of the more remote portions of the forest with the District Archeologist and the Lone Peak Hot Shot crew to do some fuel reduction around some of our more vulnerable cliff dwellings that contain a large of amount wood. One of the fires that is currently burning could potentially threaten the ruins if it moved in the right direction, so we went in an made a premptive strike and thinned out some of the vegetation around them to give them a better chance, just in case.

As a side note, this little excursion proves that we don't remove Anasazi ruins from within designated wilderness as inferred by the "Take Back Utah" group, we actually go to great lengths to protect them.

A full rainbow directly over the canyon and fire

Turkey track petroglyphs and some of the ruins that we were trying to protect.

My Radical Elitist Children

I am here alone tonight perusing the many offerings of the internet and just came across a website called "TakeBackUtah". Which begs the question who are we taking it back from?

As a public lands manager I try and stay as objective as possible and to recommend decisions on Americas public lands that are both beneficial to those who own the land (all US citizens) and to the land itself. I try not to let my personal biases affect my job. I truly believe there is room for everyone, the West is huge. But when I see outright misinformation being used to further an agenda I can't sit by. I tried to comment on the following article on their website but could not. So I will do it here on my little read blog, but maybe it will help me feel better.

You can read the whole article mistakenly called "The Truth About Wilderness" at takebackutah.org. I will just post the parts that I find particularly erroneous. Quotes from the article are italicized.

“Wilderness” is the word radical environmentalists hide behind when they are trying to close public lands to recreation

Why is everyone that has a different opinion a "radical". I think it is an attempt to divide and create the "us versus them mentality" that all sides use. It always amazes me to see how much common ground exists if people can just get over labeling and categorizing each other. I am guilty of it too. Oh yeah, and Wilderness does not close public land to recreation.

How does the designating wilderness apply to recreation? Wilderness prohibits uses of the land including, permanent or temporary roads and structures, the use of motor vehicles, and the landing of aircraft.When applied to types of recreation, wilderness areas prohibit full-size 4x4’s, side-by-sides, quads, snowmobiles, dirt bikes, motor boats, airplanes, helicopters, motor coaches/homes, house trailers, toy haulers, mountain bikes, sometimes horses (often a diaper is placed on the horse to catch harmful fecal matter), generators, any type of motorized equipment (i.e. drills, pumps), and some camping equipment (if it is motorized or mechanical).

True, Wilderness designation generally prohibits motorized and mechanized transportation (however many airstrips exist within Wilderness where they existed prior to designation) and motorized equipment. I like how the author lists every kind of motorized transportation she can think of so I will do the same. When applied to recreation Wilderness is open to day hiking, backpacking, nature study, canoeing, kayaking, rafting, inflatable kayaking, rowboats, climbing, bouldering, mountaineering, horseback riding, horse packing, mule packing, llama packing, goat packing, dog packing, dog sledding, rifle hunting, archery hunting, muzzle loader hunting, spear hunting, fly fishing, bait fishing, backcountry skiing, cross-country skiing, snow boarding, snowshoeing, and camping. To name a few, I think my list is longer than hers. Wilderness does not prohibit horses, some areas of public lands (outside and inside of wilderness) that receive very heavy use have put restrictions on horse use. In all my backcountry travels I have never seen an area prohibit horses or require a diaper.

Analysis reveals that almost all recreation is barred (except hiking and backpack camping) and contradicts the provision in the statute that states, “to preserve the land for the purpose of recreational, scenic, scientific, educational, conservation, and historical use.”[8] The following is an analysis of each component of that provision to demonstrate the limitations wilderness designation places on public lands.

Case law that tests the provisions of the Wilderness Act have shown that recreation refers to only hikers or backpacking into the wilderness area.[9]

Again, there are numerous forms of recreation allowed within Wilderness (see list above). the only form of recreation not allowed are those types dependent on motors (or mechanized such as bikes).

The only historical use would be if there is rock art (pictographs or petroglyphs). Remember there isn’t suppose to be any permanent structures so if there is any early settler dwellings the agency might remove them, and it is unclear how Anasazi or Fremont dwellings will be addressed.

Wrong, historical and cultural resources are protected under federal law and are considered an important part of Wilderness. The subtle (or not so subtle) assertion that Anasazi ruins will be removed from Wilderness is completely misleading and I don't think the author even believes it.

Clearly, you can see why designating public lands as wilderness is not preserving it for future generations. Instead, it is taking it away from most Americans except a minority group of recreationists, the hikers. A small group of radical environmentalists have continuously manipulated the public and large contributors into thinking that creating wilderness preserves land. It is becoming more and more evident that their “wilderness campaign” is propaganda. It is now easier to see that their true agenda is claiming public lands for themselves. It is time that it is known that they are not the superior group of recreationist they think they are, they are not the elite. The majority has as much if not more right to use public lands. Hikers are only one small group of people who use public lands. Previously mentioned are all of the many groups that are being barred from wilderness areas and other federally managed lands. It’s time to make our views known!

Wow, this paragraph is all over the place hard to follow any logic here. Designating Wilderness does preserve land in as natural a state as possible, that is the point. Apparently my four boys think they are "superior and elite" when I take them into Wilderness areas and they didn't even know it. "A small minority" of people enjoy wilderness? I wish that was the case. Wilderness Areas are overrun with people who love Wilderness. I just waited 6 years to get a float permit for the Frank Church because so many people love that place and what it means to them. Todd and I counted over 100 people hiking out of the Lone Peak Wilderness a few years ago, people love wilderness.



These pseudo arguments are so old and tiresome. The amazing thing about Wilderness is that while it allows for many forms of recreation that is not the only purpose. These are areas where we as a rationale, thoughtful people have said (through a democratic process) "This place is special, it is different, here we will not bring our structures and our roads and our motors, here we will let be so that these systems will continue to be wild and not controlled, here we will bring our children to show them what the world used to be, and what it can still be."

There is room for all of us. There are hundreds of thousands of roads and trails open to motorized use and where appropriate they should remain open for those that like motorized recreation, but we need big wild places to escape these modern conveniences as well and we need to not be so selfish that we think our own recreational uses (both motorized and non-motorized) are more important that the survival of species and wild places.

My radical elitist wife and children enjoying designated Wilderness on the California coast

San Juans

We left the heat of the slickrock and went to the San Juans in Colorado last weekend. The San Juans are some of my favorite mountains, amazingly big. It was one of the first places I fled to post mission. It is also the southern stronghold of the Lynx and possiblly Grizzly (a pregnant female was killed here in the 1970s). Read Ghost Grizzlies for a good description of the mountains.

Tyler telling the kids to stop playing in the fire, while he is playing in the fire.

The Hobbits and Alina heading back to the trailhead after the thunderstorm

Rio and I looking back down to the Animas and the Weminuche Wilderness

Mo Middle Fork

Deep in the Canyon
Toad and Creed fishing the big pool in Big Creek

Upper Canyon at Trail Flat

River at the put-in ramp

Wild Idaho

After a six year dry spell we finally drew a permit for the Middle Fork Salmon this year, actually four permits. If you boat wilderness rivers this place is Heaven on Earth. It flows 100 miles through Frank Church -River of No Return Wilderness the largest designated wilderness in the lower 48. The area is considered the heart of the largest temperate zone wilderness on the planet and it is the longest undammed river system in the US, my kind of place.


No roads access the river for 100 miles and big predators (wolves, mountain lions and bears) thrive along with herds of Elk, Deer and Bighorn. Steelhead and Salmon still run up the side streams (though their populations are much diminished due to the damn dams on the Columbia) and wild Cutthroat are abundant. The water is normally so clear you can see down 20 feet to the golden boulders on the bottom of the river and the rapids still get choked with logs and washed out again in the high water every spring. The landscape changing forces of nature still function. I have always said my two favorite places on the planet are the Colorado Plateau (Southern Utah/Four Corners area for those that recognize political boundaries) and the Central Idaho Batholith. I live in one and visit the other as much as possible.



Highlights of the trip were River catching his first fish on a dry fly, floating up on a mountain lion sipping water out of the river, big rapids, no flipped rafts, soaking in almost every hot spring along the river (playing cards until midnight in the Loon Creek hotspring) and beating a commercial group in a coin toss for the Loon Creek Camp.

Rio and I at Elk Bar looking down into the Impassable Canyon section of the river

River holding down the gear in the stern


Elk Bar camp

Fly fishing lessons from uncle Ty at the Loon/Middle Fork Confluence

Morning light in Impassable Canyon

Hike off the Recession

Interesting story on NPR about people thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail after losing their jobs (might be hard with a family though). I love the idea of people turning to wild places to deal with the recession. Hopefully it makes us all appreciate simple, authentic, wild experiences.

River and Ridge smelling the flowers

Owl Man with the Old Man

Today we went out to the Owl Man panel before the family left back north.

Hanging out in the shade with the Owl Man and the Old Man

I love this part of the panel because it looks like the artist put the hunter around the corner from the bighorn sheep, so he could sneak up on them.

Unnamed Canyon

The family came down for Ridges baptism this weekend. We got out to a few places and ate way too much food. The weather continues to be much cooler than normal which makes for great hiking temperatures, still a little cool for swimming.

Friday we went out to a new canyon that I had been to the bottom of a couple times but never all the way through. It turned out to be a really great techincal canyon with smimming, downclimbing and a couple of rappells, and River was excited because he got to save a bat from drowning in a pothole.

River heading down the last drop

Downclimbing into the cold water



River being a little dramatic

Conan in Moab

In case you missed the opening of Conan hosting his first late night, here it is. It is a little cheesy but check out where he is at 1:48 and 1:25. That's right, it's the La Sals in the background, he's running just behind our house.

Horses, Hitches and Rocky Trails

Wilderness Volunteers came down this past week to volunteer for the Forest Service maintaining trails in Dark Canyon. We had originally set up the trip to work on eradicating tamarisk, but for a number of reasons we switched to a trail project. The volunteers hiked in with our trail crew last Sunday. Monday and Tuesday we packed thier food and group equipment in on horses. We came back out on Wednesday and Thursday for meetings and office work and back in on Friday and Saturday to pack the rest of thier food and gear out. They got a lot of much needed trail maintenence done down in the canyon. We packed watermelons in to them on the last trip in, it may have been the first time watermelon weas eaten in the bottom of Dark Canyon, unless the Ancient Ones were growing corn and watermelons.

We could not come down the Trail Canyon trail with stock so we ended up coming down the Horse Pasture trail which meant we had to go 12 miles one way in to get to their basecamp. We made the the trip twice last week for a total of 48 miles with the packhorses.

Two bull elk in Horse Pasture Canyon. They thought our horses were elk and ran right up to us before they realized we were'nt elk.

Scorup Cabin. The cabin was used as a line cabin by some of the big cattle operations that used to operate in the canyon.


Coming up one of the steep sections with unloaded packhorses.

Ponies watering up at a lunch break

Constantly Changing Priorities

I am fortunate to be employed doing something that I am passionate about and that I love doing, however the constant shifting from one problem to the next can get frustrating. Today was one of those days where every five minutes a different "crisis" erupted that I had to deal with. I started listing all of the things that occurred today and realized why it is so difficult to stay focused and concentrate on one thing in this job. So here is the list from today.

-I just got back from two days in the wilderness packing 200 lbs. of food into a volunteer group and trail crew doing trail work. I left Monday morning at 5 AM and got back Tuesday night at 8 PM. One of the horses started having problems with a leg so we were trying to get him into a vet to take a look at him. I also found a new illegal OHV trail in the wilderness that I need to go back to and deal with.

-Started this morning trying to download GPS data on new tamarisk trees we found in the wilderness and photos of OHV damage.

- First phone call of the day was from a local game warden who said that bears had broken into out weather station and had bitten into a line containing antifreeze (which causes kidney failure in animals) and that we needed to remedy the problem. Problem is that it is not our weather station it is run by a different agency but is located on the forest, So I started trying to track down the person responsible for maintenence.

-Found out several volunteer agreements for Campground Hosts were filled out incorrectly and need to be changed before we can pay them.

-The Health Dept. calls saying some of our water samples were bad for two of our campground water systems and that we needed to shut them down and retest.

- Campers called mad that they could not get the gas stove working in cabin at Warner Lake.

- Two letters requesting a permit to conduct a non-commercial "Mountain Man Rendevouz" and a Stake Girls Camp come in.

- Public calls wanting to know the best place to backpack in the La Sals

- Tried to work on an Environmental Assesment that I have to get done to designate roads and trails in seven different areas on the La Sals.

- Campground host comes in to the office to tell me he has turned off the gas to the cabin at Warner Lake, mystery solved.

- Call wanting to know if the road over Geyser Pass is open and where is the best place to take 12 high school kids.

- One of our permitted outfitters (who leads New Age backpack trips) called wanting to add several trips to thier permit and wanting to know where they can go to avoid cattle. Apparently cattle are not conducive to New Age Vision Quests or something.

- Tourism Board calls wanting a permit to film mountain bikers on the mountain for an ad campaign.

- 4 hour Staff Meeting to discuss numerous topics including next weeks orientation/BBQ for the seasonal employees, quarters, NEPA, planning, etc..

-After meeting, try and return phone calls and work on Environmental Assesment but get stuck approving Travel Vouchers and responding to other mundane emails.

-County calls to say that several large trees are down on a trail and needs to be cut out, add it to the list.

- Scout Camp emails wanting to know if they can gravel a road into their permitted camp.

-Supervisors Office in Price calls with questions on a design for a new campground that we may get stimulus money for in Colorado (a small portion of District is actually in Colorado)

- Give up working on Environmental Assesment and have still not downloaded GPS data

-Go home

If I could concentrate on one thing I might actually be able to get something done, but I am not complaining and I still love my job.