Borrego Palm Canyon "Fannypack" trip

After our Bighorn Sheep Count orientation meeting we headed up to the 4th grove to see how the canyon was doing water wise. The droughts suggested the sheep would have another very dry summer. I am going on 8 months now of L5/S1 sciatic nerve impingement and my left leg is impaired with about 30% loss of strength and numbness but improving each day. With a Mountainsmith Day TLS fanny pack I can get out and do things now, like a single overnight "fannypack" trip. No backpack trips in sight for some time.

I drove out the night before the orientation and slept out on the ground on a bluff at Fonts Point. Camera gear was a 1916 Kodak Junior No. 1 Autographic I picked up on craigslist last week and my Canon S100 point-n-shoot. Wind was just way, way too much...sand blowing all night and my bivy was filled with sand thru the no-see-em mesh.

Foints Point at sundown


Fire Moonrise


Fonts Point Wash and Toro Peak off in the distance. One shot from the 1916 camera and one from the S100

Kodak Jr


S100


Fonts Point long exposure with a full moon. A bit under exposed


I had 2 rolls of 120 film to shoot so I stopped to take some photos of the Sky Art with the old camera. I used some filters and Series VI adapters that got on Ebay from Caroles314, you won't find a better seller on ebay than her.

The 1916 Kodak Jr No. 1 Autographic








Over at the Visitor Center I put a roll of Redscale film in the old camera. With Redscale film you can over expose quite a bit, the film was 400 ISO and I exposed it at 25 ISO.

The VC and Indianhead


Indianhead from the VC


Our trek up into the canyon was uneventful but enjoyable. There were no other hikers past the first grove (in 100+ temps mind you) so we had the whole canyon to ourselves. Plenty of water was flowing for the sheep, birds, bugs and humans.

Some gorgeous scat on the trail


Check out the detail of the red seeds or whatever they are


Coming up to the 1'st grove we can see plenty of water flowing, no huge punchbowls like in years past but enough for wildlife to drink


1'st Grove


More water flowing up near 3rd grove


Indianhead




While we were making camp around 7pm we heard some rocks falling on one of the hillsides and started looking around, after about 15 minutes we spotted the bighorn sheep. There were 9 of them, 3 older rams, 3 ewes and 3 lambs. They were quite happy to frolic around while we watched and as the sun went down they sauntered off past our camp.






As the sun set they made great silhouettes as they climbed the ridge


Lots of wildlife, insects and other living creatures in and near the water. I probably spent an hour photographing stuff in the water while the rest of our gang went hiking around.
























The reflections from the Palm Grove on the water surface were really cool




Lots of really cool looking rock surfaces all thru the canyon


A really big "Moss Blanket"


On the way out we found a dead lamb, probably from disease or injury


Palm Canyon was a great overnight trip, recommended for anyone but watch out for high temperatures during the summer.

Here is a video of the sheep frolicking around on a boulder, they did this for 10-15 minutes, chasing each other around like "catch me if you can"



On my way home I still had some film left to burn so here are a few more photos from the old 1916 Kodak folder

View Point going up Montezuma Grade


ABDSP Sign


The now restored Butterfield Stage Shop. It is open for tours, be sure to stop by and check it out.





Total mylar ballons this trip - 2 (no photos but they were fresh ones)

The Impossible Railroad

After reading this book about The Impossible Railroad I now understand a bit better some of the things I have seen in Carrizo Gorge and on the railway tracks.

This was one of many telephone booths placed along the tracks in the 1940's, it helped communications between the long distances of the railway


About a mile and a half north of the De Anza Resort there are some wheel and axle debris on the side of the Gorge and down in the bottom. I always thought this was from the railway efforts, turns out to be from a 1928 movie called Beggars of Life (the train wrecks at the end but watch the whole movie anyway)

Here are some photos of the debris in 2011-2013








Workers along the route made camps as needed and many were just below or above the current tunnel or trestle project
Here are a few remains Scotty C and I found


I believe this to be the air compressor plant remains




This is at the air compressor plant area but shows an east view. You can see foundations and remnants of a tram/trail going up the canyon


Some of the incredibly tough cholla landscape they had to deal with, even with modern REI gear this is tough terrain




Rattlesnakes were always a problem as well, here is one Scotty C and I saw at the bottom of Goat Canyon Trestle on one trip...it was gorgeous but huge!!

Scotty C whacking his way thru the thick Carrizo brush in the Gorge


Part of the seven sisters trestle cluster, view from down in the Gorge


The Coors Beer car you see in the distance was an accident from a junior engineer that over throttled the train on his first run. Two Coors Beer trailers derailed.

Mojave Desert

I have been out of commission for about 5 months now from severe back problems but recently was able to get out for a 3 day trip out to the Mojave Desert with Gary, car camping and easy 1-2 mile day hikes, lots to see. Here are some photos from the trip.

The Turtle Mountains lived up to their name, this was the first Desert Tortoise I have ever seen



The Blythe Intaglios, they are fenced off and kinda hard to get a good picture of from the ground, I am sure Google Earth would shsow them better




Some random petroglyph photos with my S100 digital camera, I used that when I ran out of film




I kinda liked this one, looks like a Christmas tree


These next photos were all taken with my 1937 Zeiss Nettar 515/2 folding camera with Kodak Portra 160 film




Here is Gary coming up out of one of the canyons we visited, I really like the colors on this photo


A few more petroglyph panels





In this photo you can see we are not the only ones visiting these sites, most of the sites we went to are on BLM land and you can find out more info about how to see them by going to the BLM website.


We also stopped briefly to check out the Topock Maze


I also brought along my recently aquired Graphic View II large format view camera



These next few photos were all taken with that camera with Arista EDU ISO 100 B/W film and developed by me at home

Spirit Mountain


Some petroglyphs near our campsite



And of course my star trail photos

This one looks like there is a small light leak in the film holder, notice the white spot coming in from the top


Another one but with some of the hillside in view