This year (2003) we went to the north east corner of Utah near the town of Vernal. We tried to hunt Elk. I say tried, since we didn't have much success. The weather was far too warm and sunny for good hunting weather, and that area of Utah had experienced a very dry summer. Therefore, there were very few watering holes and springs for the Elk to drink from.
You can get an idea where Vernal is on this map from Mapquest.
Vernal is fairly high in elevation, something like 6000 - 7000 feet above sea level. Our hunting area is much higher up in the mountains above Vernal. We camped at somewhere between 9000 - 10,000 feet, and hunted all the way up to over 11,000 feet. It's just a bit difficult to breath at that altitude when you're trying to hike around with a pack and rifle on your back < huff > < puff >...
Here is what our camp looks like. We use my dads Army surplus tent that he bought in 1947. He had it lengthened so it is now something like 10 x 16 or maybe 10 x 20 feet. A good sized tent for two or three people. You can see there is room for two beds, a wood stove for heat and the cooking stove. We also have a clothes line that runs the length of the tent along the ridge pole.
Here you can see some of the views of the country up on the mountains. Lots of large canyons, trees and mountains. Some of the canyons:
The trees in this area, as in most Elk hunting areas, consist mainly of pine, spruce and aspen trees. At this time of year, the aspens are in the process of losing their leaves, and we got to see them turning from various shades of red, orange and finally to bright yellow, just before falling off for the winter.
At the very end of the road we were camped on, up past 11,000 feet, was Hacking Lake.
A bit lower down on the slopes of the mountains, you can see the spectacular view looking down towards the town of Vernal.
We usually drive my truck to the hunting area, and tow my dads Toyota 4x4 behind my truck. We then hunt out of the Toyota, because this sort of country just isn't well suited for full sized, long bed trucks. The trees are often so close together that even a Toyota can't make it between them, or the roads, such as they are, are just too rocky and rough for a heavy truck like Godzilla. Ocassionally, you come to a natural obstacle that even a Toyota can't get past.
Utah has some of the most awesome scenery in the western United States. That is, if rough, rugged and rocky terrain appeal to you. Here you can see pictures of some of this terrain.
This is called Split Mountain, where the mountain appears to have split down the middle to allow the Green River to flow between the rocks. If you look closely, you can see that in a couple of places, a natural arch is starting to form in this area. A little farther up the road, we found another arch forming.
This is a picture of the Green River.
Now, this area of Utah is part of the Badlands, where a lot of dinosaur bones and skeletons have been found. A few miles east of Vernal is Dinosaur National Monument. My dad and I had to go into town one day for fresh supplies, and we decided to visit the monument. My dad had been there several years earlier on another hunt in this area. I am a HUGE dinosaur nut, so this was truly an exciting opportunity for me to see an actual, live dig site. It isn't a huge museum, but they have a very large rock face that has countless hundreds of exposed bones. It is an ongoing dig, but they only extract a few samples from this particular spot each year, so as to leave it fairly intact for tourists.
This is a middle aged site, the specimens here come from about 155 Millions years ago. The majority were Sauropods, the very large plant eating dinosaurs. Here is a leg bone from one such monster, still in the rock.
Here is a similar leg bone, mounted upright so you can see just how large it is. The third picture shows the entire leg of this dinosaur, along with hand drawn representations of the muscle groups attached to it.
One of the predatory dinosaurs found here is Allosaurus. The museum has both a skull, and a full skeleton of an Allosaurus mounted and on display.
Also included in the Dinosaur National Monument, are several sites of Native American Indian settlements and places where they carved pictures into the rocks, called Petroglyphs.
Well, that's about all there is. I hope you have enjoyed yet another of my vacation picture albums.