Checking Trail - A Few New Gorges

Bill and I decided to check the trails yesterday, just to see how far we could get and what water was still remaining.  We are effectively shut down for a while, at least until the road people start letting others come in, and the weather cleared for a few hours.  We saddled Ranger and Washoe, and took Jesse for a drag just to get all three out of the corral for a bit.

Well, no surprise here.

Some of the work going on was removing cliff walls that had sloughed off onto the roadway.

We started up the trail beside a small stream coming down.  The top of the hill looked pretty good; good solid footing and no washout.  Once we started down toward the meadow we started seeing small washouts.

This looks worse than it is; a little shovel work will remedy most of this, just like Spring run-off.

Now it's getting a little worse, but it is down to bedrock, so still possible to use.

Here's the first real chasm, at the meeting of the trails that circle the meadow.

Looks like a mini Royal Gorge.  This is probably three to four feet deep and goes for some distance.

We continued on toward the fallen cabin on the east side of the meadow, following water the whole way.  We opted to turn back before going down into the really marshy area; didn't want to cause any damage.

This is what the meadow was looking like.  Since our horses are barefoot, we tried to keep them to areas where we wouldn't do any trail damage.

We crossed toward the upper part of the meadow; what we thought looked to be the driest.  When we came to the next trail, both horses said, "Hey, is there supposed to be a creek here?"  It wasn't long after that that Jesse decided it was play day and started bouncing around Ranger in the mud.  Result:  one joyful mare and one grumpy, old man gelding.  It was going downhill from there, so we decided to head home.  Jesse had sunk to her back hocks in mud and decided to have a temper tantrum.  Suddenly, she stood stock-still, as did the other two, with ears and attention up the hill, "Yo, animal!"

Sure enough, they had seen/heard/smelled or somehow spotted a coyote scooting up the hill.  Play time over; let's chase the coyote.  That brought everybody back to their senses and we continued on home.

This is looking down on the switchback to the road.  Again we were told there was something 'out there'.

Five big dump trucks of dirt passed us.  We are very thankful for all the work the road crews are doing, and sending our prayers to all those places that did not fare as well as we did.  The Lodge is unscathed so far, even though it is raining heavily again.  This morning we started receiving phone calls; still can't call out, but pass the word that phone calls can come in.  We are closed until further notice.  Thanks to all for your kind thoughts and wishes.
Bionic Cowgirl