Corkscrew Gulch

This is a delayed posting — the described events actually took place yesterday (Tuesday, July 12).

The day was simply magnificent. Our route: up Corkscrew Gulch to Lake Como, then California Gulch to Animus Forks, then down to Silverton. The wildflowers were the best in California Gulch and just below Animus Forks. We took many short hikes to see them, including one with about 150 foot vertical change on an amazingly steep slope (I'd guess 60%) to see a beautiful bunch of wildflowers growing in and around a small spring. The scenery was breathtaking starting at the upper parts of Corkscrew Gulch and continuing all the way to Animus Forks.

In the afternoon we met up with some friends of ours: John and Grayle Blecker. They live in San Diego, but stopped in South Mineral Campground for a couple of days in their RV while on the way to other adventures. They invited us to their RV for dinner (great!) and company. And tomorrow (Wednesday) we're going to do a little four-wheeling with them (they have an ATV). This made a very pleasant end to the day!

The picture at right (that geezer is my dad) is from the high end of Corkscrew Gulch, looking back at Red Mountain. At left is at the summit of the pass just to the southwest of Lake Como, at 12,400 feet. We've been wondering what kind of snowplow could plow a four-wheel-drive road with snow that deep!

The pictures at right were all taken in California Gulch. The dog at right is our female field spaniel Lea, running very happily through one of the many meadows in the gulch. The two flowers are denizens of the wetlands. With a little imagination the left-most flower looks like a collection of elephant heads, complete with trunks and ears — and my dad tells me that the common name for these is "elephant flower". We ran across one mass of these that was comprised of several hundred square feet of densely packed stalks. The second flower we couldn't identify. It grows right along the streamlet banks and nowhere else, but it sure marked those streamlets clearly! In some places these things looked almost like snow, they were so plentiful. And the massed blooms emitted a perfume that was very strong and sweet.