Happy Trails

May 10^th, 2011

The streams were overflowing somewhat but not dangerous. Our campsite is well above the river and not very close to any of the streams. But today the rains returned so not much work got done. Our golf cart got delivered and Ernie showed us around. Brrrr, it's cold today!

That is our newly delivered golf cart on the far right. I love driving it around!  That is Scotty riding with me doing the rounds of the park!

The weather was not co-operating! As you can see from the photo, it still looks like late winter/early spring here. It has been cold and wet.  We had 3 bathrooms to get cleaned and ready, two flush bathrooms and one vault or pit toilet plus we have 3 camping areas to get ready. Each campsite had fire pits that needed to be emptied and trash in the area needed picking up.  We were opening in 3 days!

Spring Hollow Campground contains 7 sites for tent camping and 5 sites for short RV camping. Boondocking. NO water or electric at any of the sites but ours.

Then we have two Group Area campgrounds, Group Area “A “ and Group Area “B”, both able to accommodate over 100 people at a time.  This is an uphill campground. The lower area is the RV and Tent camping area, above us is Group Area “A” and still further up is Group Area “B”.

May 11^th 2011

Rain and gloom persist in this beautiful canyon campground.  Chuck managed to get one fire pit cleaned, I picked up trash and we both worked hard trying to get the 4 unit vault bathrooms cleaned up. They were dirty but not nasty and there is a fan that works to keep the smell to a minimum. We put in 5 hours each this day and we were wiped out, tired beyond words. It has been a long time since either of us had worked this hard at this 5,100 feet altitude but we had to get opened! Ernie is still trying to get the water fixed so there will be fresh water available to us and to all the camping areas! Especially the bathrooms! 

The photo below is from the group campground "A" for day use only! 

May 12^th, 2011

Finally! A beautiful day!  Ernie came over with a helper who helped Chuck clean out fire pits and shovel wet, heavy layers of leaves out of the campsites and the roads. I had more bathrooms to clean and they were hard work!  Shortly after finishing, I went down to the lower campgrounds for a break.  Sharon had been picking up trash. She and Chuck and I sat down at one of the picnic tables for a break. 

May 13^th 2011

Opening day! A beautiful sunny day with blue skies and warming sun! The parking lot below is filled with empty vehicles! Everybody is either hiking one of the many trails we have yet to explore around here or fly fishing for trout from the river. We are located just above the 3rd dam area so we have both a great stream and a marshy lagoon with a good flowing current which trout love! I have been sitting here at the computer watching hikers flow uphill some of the even running uphill! Ahhh youth! I remember that! But I was never crazy enough to run up a steep hill for exercise or fun!

 I am still on Florida time. It is 7 am here and 10 am in Florida. I generally wake up about 5:30 am. I hope I adjust soon. I get Chuck up fix us a couple of green chili bagels we bought while at The Happy Belly Deli in T or C. Yummy!

We head up to Group “B” and we were pleasantly surprised!  Both the men’s rooms and the ladies rooms were much cleaner than the previous two. These were also flush toilets. Chuck helped me sweep out the leaves as I sprayed antibacterial cleaner over the toilets and sinks. After Chuck sweeps, he goes down to the lower tent camping sites to clean out more fire pits and clean off more wet leaves. After about an hour I am done and go down to help Chuck.  I am better at blowing leaves than mucking out fire pits. I am a 64 year old woman who has been way to lax on daily requirements of exercise. An hour of blowing leaves, switching from hand-to-hand and I am wiped out! I grab the picker-upper and start picking up trash.

Just before lunch, we find out that the Forest Service has shut us down indefinitely! All this sunny, warm weather has caused the snow in the mountains to melt faster and there is the danger of flooding!  Sheeeeesh!  We were only open a few hours! We decided to let the group campers have their one night of camping as both the group campgrounds are well above the river. There is a spring at both camp area that flow into creeks that flow into the river eventually but there is no danger of flooding in the group areas.

We worked finishing the tent camping sites and quit around 4pm. These old folks were tired! 

April 14^th 2011

We headed up to Group Area “A” and were surprised to find that all the campers had already left by 9am! I had seen cars going downhill past our campsite but never expected it to be empty! We drove on up to Group Area “B” and only 2 vehicles left there! All the tents were down, only a couple of boys and the 2 scout leaders were there.  We talked a bit and thanked them for coming and drove back down to “A” to check out the bathrooms. We worked so hard the day before we didn’t expect to do much but change toilet paper.

 WRONG! In the first toilet was a big old drowned rat! Probably the one that had camped in there all winter and left all those nasty droppings behind. With the water finally turned on and in the toilets he decided to take a drink and fell in and drowned. Good! Chuck got him out of the toilet for me and tossed him in the woods!  We took the afternoon to explore Spring Hollow!

 There are creeks everywhere !They are running fast and furious due to snow melt!

 Each of the camping sites are beautiful and near one of the many creeks. The creek is just beyond the fence here. You can see how nice the fire pits are! Chuck had to clean the out after each camper left. Some folks were really nasty, tossing beer cans, bottles, plastic bags, anything you can imagine into their fires!

 There is even a small waterfall near one of the campsites!

We loved all the natural springs in our campground. A lot of the creeks started out just like this, water seeping out from rocks and forming a small creek that flowed into a bigger creek and finally into Logan River!

We are actually responsible for 2 campgrounds, Spring Hollow and Bridger. Bridger is scheduled to open the first of May so we drove the mile over to take a first look. A hiker had parked in front of the locked gate on the bridge and we had no way to enter. We left and headed east into the canyon to Guinavah-Malibu campground to talk to Sharon and Ernie and find out how long they expected us to be closed down.  Well, in a way it’s welcome shutdown. Sharon said to take a couple of days off and enjoy. She really isn’t sure how long Forest Service is going to keep us shut down. We went to town and explored! 

The drive into Logan is spectacular! 

First we drove North on Main street and found Sam’s, Home Depot, Office Depot and Best Buy. We also discovered the Texas Roadhouse Restaurant…. The best rack of ribs in the world! We were trying to find a Laundromat so we headed for the college area.  Sure enough we found a laundry behind Smith’s Grocery that offered free wifi as well as washers and dryers! We did our laundry, caught up with our emails and our Facebook page.  We are having online withdrawals! Chuck and I spend a lot of time online.  Here there is a huge communication gap! No cell phone service and no air card service! We are deep in the Cache Canyon!

After the laundry was all folded and loaded in the truck, we headed back up North Main to the Texas Roadhouse! Chuck and I shared a full rack of ribs AND brought some home for later plus our beverages and the bill was only $25,50!

Their ribs are so good and tender, the meat just falls off the bone! It had been awhile since we had a full meal at a restaurant and we really enjoyed it.

The weather was turning nasty! Dark clouds building over the mountains and we have a cold front coming in with rain/snow expected Monday or Tuesday. Brrr! It was summer when we left Florida and New Mexico.

May 17^th 2011

We have enjoyed our days off! We explored Logan and are amazed at how clean and new everything feels here. No “poor” areas of town that we could find. The west side is the industrial area and seems to be going strong. Even all the older buildings of downtown look well scrubbed and new! It is amazingly clean here!

Our campground supervisor, Ernie came over about 8pm last night and announced that we were now open. Forest service said only Spring Hollow was allowed to be open for camping, the others are still under flood watch!  Last night we had our first campers in the lower campgrounds!

The weather is still winter with spring trying it’s best to pop. It was 34 degrees this morning and now at 9:30am it’s 42 degrees.  Still gloomy, we are supposed to get more rain or maybe snow this week! I went out yesterday to take some photos of our pretty campground. We love it here, little creeks pouring out of springs nestled in the rocks. Tumbling down waterfalls to bigger creeks and finally the bigger creeks falling into the Logan River that runs between our campground and the highway. The water here tastes wonderful!

 

Happy Trails to you from The MotherShip, docked at Spring Hollow Campground near Logan Utah until we meet again!