Ontario OR 8/23-29

Fished and read at the ranch for the last four days.  I decided to learn how to take videos with my still camera.  The enclosed is my try taken from the bridge over the creek.  I'm including it despite its obvious deficiencies, because it shows some of the beauty of the place.  I sometimes can't believe it exists.  This is Ames at the boundary pool.  When he worked his way to the upper end I told him "you are going to catch a big brown right here."  Then a big head rose and sipped in his fly.  I knew because that had happened to me in the same spot on the two times I had fished this pool.  This is a 17 inch brown trout resting in the shallows after being released.I left the ranch yesterday.  At my suggestion Ames changed his point of departure from Butte to Twin Falls, saving about 300 miles. ( I suggested Idaho Falls but something was lost in transmission and both are on the way.) So on the interstate till past Boise when a reasonable blue highway option was available, thence on to Parma,  beets and hay but no cheese,  across the Snake on a low bridge, no canyon here, to Nyssa OR, home of a huge onion packing plant, and up to the farm town of Ontario.  In Parma I passed the Motor Vu Theater, a drive-in theater with current features on its marquis.  I wonder if its the last one standing.  I hope to reach Tualatin today, if I can do so without using the interstate.  Driving"s no fun there and there are interesting alternatives.   

Dillon 8/22

Here is an entry I wrote yesterday at the ranch, hoping to simply incorporate into the post.  I'm not able to do this, so I'll retype it.  It covers 8/19 to 22.

Russ and I travelled from Phillipsburg to the ranch mostly using blue Highways:  Over a divide from Anaconda to the Big Hole.  Then up Wise River and over a divide into Grasshopper Creek, then over twenty miles of gravel to Grant, on the interstate to Dell, and Big Sheep Creek Road.  The Wise River portion was especially pretty--forested with a medium size clear river and many National Forest Campgrounds that seem hardly used.  A tempting place to park a camper for a week.
 

At the ranch Russ and I fished upstream on the 19th.  I wanted him to show me the stream improvements that we paid $26,000 for. They are not very obvious.  About all we could do was guess that here they had deepened the channel, there they had built up the bank, and elsewhere partial rock dams were laid in the stream.  But the stream is greatly improved.  What part is due to the healthy water flows of this year and last and what is due to construction is hard to say.

The fishing has never been better.  We fished together, alternately trying promising runs and caught fish in almost all of them.  The next AM we did the same thing from the bottom of the lower meadow to about half way up with the same results.  Here are some pictures

How nice these seem.  And how nice it was to fish again with my old friend.  I could not help thinking that after fishing with Russ over a 45 year span, this could be the last time.  I think that awareness of this possibility makes the present even sweeter. 

On the afternoon of the 20th we took a walk to the mouth of Patterson Canyon.  The BLM has taken down the shearing shed.  The old bath tub is also gone, perhaps taken for a Levitra commercial.  In the evening a run to Lima for take-out pie and ice cream--dessert for the Caesar salad main course.

Yesterday after Russ left I took a walk up Woodpile Canyon.  Saw a pair of large owls guarding their nest.  They flew close but did not strike me.  Also saw bear sign, a rarity for Sheep Creek.  Today another hike.  And I finished Amy and Isabelle, a very good book I thought. 

That's what I wrote yesterday.  Today I'm in Dillon on the way to pick up Ames at the Butte Airport.  I write this in the basement of the public library, having played 9 holes of golf.  Yikes I'm late. 

Valley View to Brooks to Montana 8/14-19

Reaching the prairie, I felt inclined to push through to the ranch without dawdling.  One long day to Brooks,  a stockyards town I sensed, and another to the ranch.  I did find a wonderful shortcut, eliminating a wrong way salient on the interstate toward Great Falls.  Here is a vista of this fun way.

 Reached the ranch in a thunderstorm.  Just as Tom was talking to a guy who had been fishing on our property.  He had several fish on a stringer.  But he may have been legal as Tom did not see him out of the stream bed. 

At the ranch I got a call from Ken's brother Al.  He said he would be up the next day to pick up a horse trailer.  Should he bring a tent or was the bunk house free.  I told him they should use the other bedroom.  They arrived the next evening.  two grey guys my age dressed in coveralls and feed store caps.  I offered them food, no, something to drink, no, pillow cases, not necessary, and set out towels, not used.  The rhythm of their conversation was like I heard at grandfather Matthews.  But as I expected, they were not country Bumpkins.  Al is a plant scientist specializing in sunflowers. He has consulted all over the world,  a world of Fargos as he puts it.  Ron was a professor at U of Wyoming for more than 30 years.  His field (forgive me) forage crops.    I wish I had a picture of these two country gnome scientists sitting on the couch, but I was reluctant to ask.  I enjoyed their visit. 

Drove yesterday to Phillipsburg to fish with Russ and Robert.Robert is working here on a fire crew and knows the area well. Here we are next to a falls on a forest road.  The fishing was fast and enjoyable on a small creek.    

There were white moths everywhere at the first stream we fishedThe picture doesn't do the actual scene justice.  They were like snowflakes or something mythical.  I half expected a unicorn to step into the clearing. 

Pink Mountain to Valley View 8/14

Golfed today in Ft. St. John.  A links course, so they say.  The term I think refers to a golf course laid out with minimal disturbance to the land.  Just planted and mowed and some traps thrown in.  Fort St John is nothing like it was 46 years ago.  Then it was a tumble down store and a couple of decrepit gas stations.  Now it's two or three miles of strip malls in full bloom.  Much like Wasilla, both then and now. 
The countryside is changed too.  It was forest, now it's hay and grain fields. 
 Valley View is in the prairie.  Real breadbasket country with lots of wheat, barley and rapeseed.  But woodlots too, as you would expect of a country that was once forested. 

Not much of a blog so I am adding another never before published picture.

Whitehorse to Pink Mountain 8/12-14

This is one of Whitehorse's two golf course.  I played it on the morning of the 12th.  Very well maintained and with a creek in the center of every second fairway.  Very magnetic but lots of fun.

I stopped for lunch at this pretty spot on the Morley River on the way to Watson Lake.

Camp at Watson Lake.  Taken by a Japanese guy who spoke English worse than I speak Spanish.  He asked about bears (he didn't pronounce it that way).  I told him there might be some but not to worry, just put his food in his car.  Then I noticed he was sleeping in his car. 

Wood Buffalo east of Watson Lake.  Bigger I think than the plains Buffalo in Yellowstone.  The second one caused me to turn around because I thought he'd been speared.  In a way he had.  A piece of rebar had pierced his hide.  The other end seemed to be stuck in the ground.  Maybe he had rolled on it.  I reported this at the next habitation, and showed the picture, suggesting that the mounties be called.  Nobody seemed too interested.                                                                                         Muncho Lake at the Northern end of the Rockies. ( My hair is now standing on end because a squirrel ran up my leg as I am writing this.)  I drove on to Fort Nelson hoping to play golf.  Alas, the local oil men's club was having a tournament and the course was closed.  A big crowd of mostly big all white all guys.  Apparently there are no oil women in Ft Nelson, at least none who golf.  The guy at the desk was apologetic.  He told me he spends winters in Anchorage racing dogs.  I asked his name, "Streeper" , "hey you're famous".  He's won the last three Fur Rendezvous races.  He comped me a bucket of balls for the range.  After hitting I decided not to stay in Nelson, and drove on another 3 hours to Pink Mountain. 

Warren's Travel Posts Tok

8/10-11/10: Dithered so that I didn't leave town till 2. Still made Tok by 7:30. Camped in an RV park. Arrived a little too late for the nightly pancake toss--about what it sounds like. The winner gets a free breakfast.Set up a new tent. ( I decided the Sydney was too much for me so I bought a more manageable one). Then took a walk. Tok is a little like Kalua Koi. Lots of streets with no houses. Thence to bed. Temp in the 30's. Too cold for my gear. After an all you can eat pancake breakfast, on to Whitehorse. I was in Tok last on a court visit. Joe Miller, the tea party Senate candidate, was the magistrate. I thought we were doing pretty well in light of his resume. But I told, him a joke about my Big Delta visit. (After the court visit we were to have a community meeting in the council chambers. We got a call asking if firearms would be allowed. I said that I'd prefer that they leave them in their trucks.) I laughed, Joe didn't. For Whitehorse I promise pictures.

first

Holly suggested that I blog my trip to Montana and Oregon.  I,ll try.  Here is the tent I'll use, assuming I actually camp.  Note the new cot.  The tent(called the Sydney for obvious reasons) is about 25 years old and has always been a little hard to put up and take down.  But I imagine there will be lots of help available if I stay where there are RVs. My vision is of a lot of handy friendly people with very little to do.  The third picture is off the point, but too cute not to include.  It was on the chip but never downloaded till today.