Fishing in the Canebreak
Everyone in Utah Valley lives around Utah's second largest lake; Lake Utah, which gets its water from the several canyon rivers surrounding it. A river, aptly named the Jordan river, flows out of it into the Great Salt Lake. Those of us who haven't been very near Lake Utah don't realize the extent of the wetlands that surround it.

My fishing buddy, Mike, invited me to come with him to fish for white bass which spawn about now. I figured that we'd fish from a dock or some improved structure, but that wasn't to be. It was more like down the end of a Dukes of Hazzard dirt road and across the railroad tracks where the road ended in a couple of muddy paths on each side of a channel that marked the end of a stream running into the lake. Mike handed me a pair of boots, saying that they might protect me from the mud. A step into one little foot-wide puddle in the grass proved that wrong as I stepped into three feet of water. It rather reminded me of the trip that we took to the everglades last fall - I wouldn't have been surprised if a gator stepped out of the water.

There were quite a number of other fishermen around, all speaking spanish, though with a dialect that I couldn't place. They were as nice as can be, and good fishermen too. White bass are silvery, somewhat small fish and it takes a few to make a meal. I took this picture of one of the men's catch. After standing for a couple of hours, my back got to me and I found a rock to sit on, so I didn't catch any fish. I think I prefer boat fishing.

Getting Ready for Decoration Day
It was a nice day today and we thought that we would go to the cemetary and put flowers on Marolynn's mother's and father's and grandparents' grave in anticipation of Memorial Day or what used to be called Decoration Day in these parts. There were already plenty of people at the cemetary and most gavesites had flowers. Marolynn said that if we had waited till Monday, we wouldn't have been able to see the green grass for all the flowers that people brought to gravesites. There was already the white flowers and the flag at the gravesite when we arrived. We added the purple iris and "snowball" flowers from the Mineer garden that Marolynn's mom liked so well.

You Can Turn Winter Off Now!
Spring here has been cool and we were greeted this morning (May 24) by a snowstorm and a couple of inches of wet snow that bent over our newly planted fruit trees and that threatens to make us plant tomatoes all over again. Thats a record for the latest snow in the season in Utah valley. The mountains around us are still solid white with snow and one of the ski areas above Salt Lake extended its season to June 15.

Marolynn is getting along pretty well after surgery to repair broken bones in her foot. The cast will come off at the end of June.

The First Grandson
We didnt' expect it exactly, but Mike called this morning informing us that he and Jenny were headed to the hospital in anticipation of the baby being born this morning. So we went up to take care of the girls while the deed was being done at the hospital. Sure enough, at 3:30 pm, Samuel was born and we all got a look at him a couple of hours later.

Marolynn and I both got to hold the baby (7pounds, 13oz). Blurry baby - camera settings were wrong.

In came the girls who ended up being more interested in Jenny's dinner. The pie did look good.

And a burst of sunshine after a rainy afternoon, with the tulips outside the hospital making it a perfect day.

The Oregon Trip

Last week Marolynn and her sister Karen took a trip to Oregon to visit Carrie and look around. Weatherwise they picked a terrific week, especially the day they went to the coast to collect driftwood for Karen's craft projects.

The dogwood out in front of Carrie's home was in full bloom as evidenced by the picture of Marolynn.

Cape Meares was the destination on Friday where where is plenty of driftwood along the beach. One of the best days of the year.

Kurt and Carrie in Portland. Kurt is in the process of starting a software company.

Marolynn and Karen in front of the Tillamook cheese factory. Happily, we found Tillamook ice cream here in Utah at a new Winco grocery store in Orem, and Tillamook cheese can be found all around here.

The Boy Scout Yard Sale
The ward Boy Scout troop held a yard sale today on the north lawn of our front yard. I had to get up early as they were already bringing in things before 6 am. One of the headaches of my calling as program and newsletter publisher for the Ward is advertising an event only to have the particulars changed at the last moment. This was supposed to begin at 8 am, but they announced last week after the program was published that it would start at 7 am. Nevertheless, a lot of garage sale-type stuff was hauled over and sales did start at around 7 am. I was able to pick up a couple of things for the grandchildren, including a 5-gallon bucket of new Lincoln Logs. The Hot Wheels thingy you see in the picture was a heavy contraption with a 6-volt battery to drive it, so I didn't buy that. The upcoming yard sale prompted me to finish my rock and mineral display in the parlor, so I had a couple of boxes of smaller specimins to donate to the yard sale. Amazingly they sold quickly at a buck apiece. All in all, the Scouts brought in about $800 to help with scout camp fees, so the event which wrapped up around 2 pm was considered a success.

Lake Powell Fishing
Back to Lake Powell again this year for our annual Spring fishing trip. The weather which has been cool for spring in Utah was kind to us for three days and not so kind the other two days of fishing.
The way this is done is to bring a house boat 15 miles up the lake to a good beach, then fish from smaller fishing boats, using the house boat camp as a base. 18 in all went on this trip, sponsored by one of the men who had a part-interest in the houseboat.

Sometimes the adventure was a draw between fishing and photography as the lake became gloriously beautiful at times, particularly when the water was very quiet and reflected the sandstone shore. The high water mark at the top of the light sandstone is 80 feet above the surface of the lake, which was 12 feet higher this year than last.

Sometimes the fishing took us up very narrow long canyons with sheer walls above and 30 feet of water below.

Lake Powell has a 500 ft deep "main channel" where the Colorado River ran before the Glen Canyon dam was constructed, and long arms going back into side canyons. The picture above is of Wsst Canyon which runs south down into Arizona. My fishing buddy and I fished the shore in the photo, at the entrance to West Canyon on Friday and had our very best day of the week.

Plenty of fish from West Canyon on the stringer for fillets to go into our freezers.