Oct 25 - Little Cottonwood Creek Trail

Beautiful sunny morning. Been thinking about Red Pine Lake a lot and figuring this week-end maybe my last chance to get up it without snowshoes (and it hasn't rained/snowed in over 2 weeks so the trail may be clear-ish).

So I drove up to the trailhead, parked, looked at the trail and I wasn't feeling it. So back in my car and I drove up to Alta -- thinking Albion Basin would be great if the little 2mile dirt road was open. (It usually open to Nov 1 at the latest but it was closed earlier because of our brilliant Administration's decision  due to the Govt Shutdown - unmaintained 2 mile dirt road -- saved a lot of $$$ I'm sure but I digress). I wasn't hopeful because why open it for a week and I was right because although there was no snow on the south facing mountains, the road was closed -- Darn!

But the north facing mts at Snowbird and Alta ski resorts had a good amount of snow at the upper elevations --- could ski season be opening shortly on the high trails -- with the cold and snow predicted for Monday/Tuesday perhaps.

So I drove back to Red Pine and I just wasn't motivated to climb today so I drove back down the canyon and decided to walk the Little Cottonwood Creek trail - haven't been on it since early June. It's still 6-7 miles and over 1000ft in elevation but it just sounded better today.

First note is that although most of the trees have dropped their leaves (especially at the higher elevations) there still enough color in spots on the rocky mt-sides to make them incredibly pretty.

The lower part of the trail had no water in the creek. Not really surprising as the summer was a drought (again) and the creek is part of SLC's watershed.

There's still a fair amount of yellow color in some of the trees and understory bushes along the trail.  And the trail is in the shade, the sun hasn't made it over the mts yet and this late in the fall, I'm not sure if much of the trail will get into the sun today -- but I hoping it will because its a bit chilly (but at least I have my gloves :))

Before I get to the 1st bridge, the sound of water returns and the gushing waterfall of the Spring/early Summer is no a very tame 2-forked waterfall (very cute).

A bit further up the trail, the water disappears again. I see a few rather large moths flying around -- seems a bit chilly for them but they're out anyway.

Although the water in the creek is off-n-on, my little south flowing stream still has water and it's still pooling - I'm really surprised!

Parts of the trail took a beating this summer -- especially in 2 spots where its a bit washed out. I know we had some big mt rains this summer and there were mud slides in both the canyons, I'm assuming this is some of the results.

The end of the trail is the old rock building. It sits on the opposite side of the creek. Since the creek is low enough, I could rock-hop across but I just like looking at it at a distance. Someone has built a little bridge (new lumber), I'm not sure why --- perhaps they will attempt to restore it.

I have my lunch (lots of bikers out today). And head back down. I explore some of the camping areas near the creek. And parts of the dry creek bed -- hard to believe that this was a raging creek a few months back.

There are now part of the trail in the sun and it feels good but still most is still in the shade.

I'm almost to the parking lot and I see a bfly --- Red Admiral (1st one all year) and a bit later a Milbert's Tortoiseshell --- quite a surprise.