water, water everywhere

After my race (yes, a week ago now - just trying to catch up) and breakfast, and a quick trip home to clean up, H, Paul and I jumped into the truck and headed east to search for more large mammals - inspired by the cow moose we'd spotted in Big Cottonwood Canyon who was enjoying her own breakfast.  We decided to try Cascade Springs first, outside of Midway, in the Uinta National Forest.  After a long, winding drive up a dirt road busy with ATVers and dirt bikers, we found it, a lush oasis hidden away in the foothills.

The cascading pools

Cascade Springs is a natural artesian spring where rain and snowmelt in the Wasatch Range makes its way through fractures in the bedrock and bubbles up to flow down the hillside in a series of cascading pools.  More than 7 million gallons of water flows through here every day, making it a prime wildlife watching spot.  There are slim brown trout in the shallow pools, badgers, moose, deer and elk, and songbirds galore.  The DNR has constructed careful paved and wooden boardwalk paths in three short loop trails around the springs.  We walked them all, marveling at the beauty and diversity of plant and animal life.  (We didn't see any badgers but we did spot a mule deer trying to pass unnoticed in the gambel oaks.)

After Cascade Springs, we headed to Kamas to pick up the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway.  You can't go all the way through to Wyoming because of the still-deep snow, but you can get in there to camp and tour around.  To be completely honest, at this point I was pretty sleepy from the 4:15 a.m. wake-up and the run, so I snoozed in the truck while H and Paul walked along the madly rushing rivers - there is a LOT of water in northern Utah's rivers and creeks right now - and took photos of moose and mule deer.

River along Mirror Lake Byway/UT 150

When the clouds had started to roll in and the temperature dropped, the guys woke me up and we headed back to the Salt Lake valley.  Knowing it was going to be an early evening for all of us, we got a quick meal of garlic burgers and beer at the Cotton Bottom before heading home.  I daresay each of us slept pretty soundly, thanks to the long day and plenty of fresh air.