Tuesday Foliage-Cam Filler

It’s going to be another 1-post week, due to work, travel and other stuff. It’ll be another astro-post, and I hope to have it up tomorrow. If I had more time I’d try to do some sort of foliage-related post, as the colors in the Wasatch* have been spectacular these past couple of weeks.

*I explained how and why leaves change color in this post and this post, a topic I revisited in this post and this post. Man, even in a a filler post, it is like I have a post for everything.

The forecast indicated that the Summer-y weather would finally end Monday, so Saturday afternoon I hitched a ride* up to Pinebrook, pedaled up to Mid-Mountain, climbed over the saddle and then rolled down the entire Mill Creek drainage home. Here’s the initial descent off the saddle:

*With Rainbow Spirit Paul, who was headed up for a dog-run.

Down lower, the singletrack wound me though aspen and PLTs (mostly Engelmann Spruce) over and over. The aspens sometimes closed in, creating a “Golden Tunnel” effect (check out 1:00 – 1:05):

And in the PLTs, the yellow understory seemed to light up in the dark Spruce forest and fallen aspen leaves sprinkled the trail with flecks of gold.

Even the road section between the Big Water and Elbow Fork trailheads had some great scenery. The stand of Narrowleaf Cottonwoods lining the road at 0:38 is one of my favorite spots in the whole canyon.

A couple months from now when everything’s gray and brown and cold, it’ll be nice to play these clips in my office…