Every Four Years

 My husband said "I'm a creature of habit" when I told him we are headed to Clark Fork Campground.

We even got the same site we did eight years ago when our daughter went camping with us in August 2016. 

We were last here in August 2020 with MeeOk. Yup, seems ever four years and in August when school has started and most of the kids are back in school. Mainly just old folks or families with young kids camping in mid August. 

After settling in and having lunch, we did the tradition of hiking over to the Arnot Creek trail for a four mile roundtrip. Sadly, there still isn't much growth of new redwoods. There are lots of sage brushes and a few flowers, but otherwise it still looks like burnt trees. So we headed back to camp and relaxed the rest of the afternoon. 

The next day we headed to the end of Clark Fork road to hike the Disaster Creek trail. From the map it looked like an easy three miles out and back along the creek. The plan was to go as far as the junction post at 3 miles.

What I didn't realize was that the start of the trail is a steep climb up with many switchbacks on the west side of the Iceberg. And that the creek flows down in elevation to the parking lot.

From the Iceberg the climb became less strenuous, but still an ascent.

Once we hit the meadow the trail leveled. The trail junction was at the far end of the meadow, but somehow we missed it. We believe the post was down and later when we were deeper into the woods someone else saw the downed post and re-erected it. 

Because of missing the post, we continued on another 1.5 miles until we came to the conclusion that we had somehow missed the trails' junction. Since the trail looked less traveled and the growth was getting more dense, we turned back. On the return was when we saw the post and the junction for the trails. I also spotted the tip of the Dardanelles while crossing the meadow. During the hike, I spotted numerous California native plants. One, is one of my favorites, the California Columbine. The first for me to see it so plentiful in it's natural habitat. We can now check off that we did 9 miles roundtrip of the Disaster Creek trail and it wasn't a total disaster! 

Dogwood Trees

The Dogwood trees are in full bloom in the Stanislaus NF right now. Traveling to our campground this past weekend was such a delight. Dogwood trees were one of my parents favorite trees. They had numerous ones growing on their 2 acre wooded property. I don't recall those Dogwood trees ever looking this beautiful.

We camped at Wakalu Hep Yo campground by the Sourgrass Recreation area. 

A mudslide destroyed a portion of the campground and the bridge back in 1999.  

This is the bridge today. At the far end of the bridge by the bend is the entrance to the campground on the right and location of the mudslide. 

The view from the bridge is gorgeous! The mighty North Fork of the Stanislaus River is high this year. On Mother's Day weekend there were no folks out fishing, which was a surprise to us. On past trips here there have been numerous folks standing on or near the large rocks casting their lines. 

There are excellent views of the bridge along a small portion of the campground trail closest to the bridge. 

Since the campground was almost empty, we decided to try a site in the back area.  In the past, we have alway stayed at the sites closer to the entrance and camp host site due to the back area being full. 

Site 44 has a very nice area with a picnic table and area for tents. The plus to this site is that there are no neighbors!  It is situated away from the other sites in the back area. And perfect for the travel trailer!

It is also located close to the historic Miwok site. From our site is a path leading up to a clearing. 

Last time we were here at this clearing it was just grass and stones. Looks like someone is starting a spiritual maze. There was also a large firepit that looks like it hasn't been used. 

We hiked our favorite hike along the 4X4 road. This Mother's Day weekend only a couple of hikers were on the road. We were rewarded with numerous seasonal waterfalls. This waterfall was new to us and such a delight!

 

Snakes...

 ...within the grasses.

This pink flowering plant is called Snake plant since it's stems wander ...

and intertwine with the grasses. 

We were back at Acorn Campground in Tuttletown for a couple of days of relaxing and Spring hikes. 

From site 62, we were able to see the lake and...

the bridge. It's like where is Waldo in this photo, but in this case it's the bridge.

It's so nice to see the water level up. Our hikes along the shoreline were beautiful since Spring here is in full bloom!

Besides seeing the Snake plant, we saw White Fairy Lantern. Having PlantNet on our phone is so helpful in identifying these plants that we aren't familiar with.

The grasses this year are super high, due to the large amount of rains this past winter. 

Even though the grasses were so high, beautiful patches of flowers were in full bloom.

We hiked the trails for three days. First day in one direction, the second day in the reverse direction, and last day a short hike down to the point. It never gets old! So much peaceful beauty to heal the soul!!

Where the Ospreys Rule!

We headed back to our favorite lake during St. Patrick's Day weekend thinking the campground would be close to empty.

And we were correct! We were able to get our favorite site too!  

An easy walk down to picnic table!

Between the views, easy parking the trailer into site, the short walk down to the picnic table, great hiking trails right from the campground, and few folks at this time of year camping, we loved this area at this time of year. You couldn't pay me to come here in late spring or summer when it is hot...and it gets HOT! 

After lunch, we headed out to hike the trails. One of the trails heads down to the boat launching area. This weekend the parking lot was full-a surprise to us! We discovered there was a Bass fishing tournament. 

Onward we hiked just a bit inland and spotted this osprey hanging out on a branch just above the trail we were on. He showed he wasn't a fan of us by pooping. Luckily his aim was off!

We headed down to our favorite point before heading back to camp. We were surprised at the water level height. Back in April 2021, this area was so low that we took a hike down to look at the lupine. Back at camp, we enjoyed a quiet and restful evening.

Tarantulas and Love

We went to Eastman Lake to camp and check out the water level.  Last time we were here in Feb 2022, the lake was almost dry. On this RV trip, we were elated to see the lake full--or almost. We learned that they had released some water from the lake that week. It might be in preparation for this winters rains or it could be that the farmers are in need of water for their crops. 

We also learned that end of October/ beginning of November is Valentine's Day for Tarantulas!! They are out looking for love. We saw 8 of them while hiking the trails. 

We also saw 1 bald eagle, two coyotes, 1 rabbit, and two deers. 

And lots of jets busily heading to their destinations.

For the first time, we checked out the visitors center, which is excellent and has an awesome vista point. The views of the lake and the Sierras that day were spectacular and so clear. 

This is the view of the dam from the visitor center.  

We met a guy fishing that told us more history on the dam and Chowchilla. We drove over to the day-use area to hike to 1.5 mile trail there. The trail is ok with great views of the lake, but...

I prefer this trail to Raymond Bridge! 

Wildcat campground doesn't have views of the lake, but I don't care with a view like this right out my window. I kept looking for a coyote to come walking up to the window, but none showed. Instead, we were serenaded at night from the howling of the coyotes! Eventually, they stopped and we fell into a peaceful sleep. 

New Melones Tuttletown

 Last time we were here at Acorn was in December 2021, which was the last time camping with Meeks.

This time we picked a new site for us....

with a view of the bridge and lake that is now 80% capacity. 

At this site, we were able to access the picnic table with no steep grade down. 

After a relaxing lunch with the spectacular view of lake, we headed off to hike almost the entire trail system. We hiked the trails closer to the lake. The only sections not hiked were a portion of the Black Bear loop and the trail from Acorn campground up to the Entrance Station. Total miles were 6.15. Nobody else was using the trails, at least we didn't encounter anyone-- not even a mountain biker. We saw numerous deer that were alone. One was over by the dump station.

The winds started to pick up when we returned from our hike. That only lasted about an hour. As evening settled the temperatures dropped. We stayed warm inside the RV eating our veggie/mushroom ramen soups.

Fraser Flat

 

Fraser Flat Campground is one of our favorite campgrounds in the Stanislaus NF since there are numerous forest roads to hike and explore located close to the campground. 

We got lucky by arriving around 10 AM to snag site 7. We snagged this site last year. It is located away from the river and closer to the road 4N01, which means away from the crowds. We really don't use the picnic area of this wonderful site. Instead, it's fun sitting up by the RV watching other campers' children bicycle around the loop below the site. 

After settling in and having lunch, we hiked 4N61 from campground to 4N14 and back, about 5 miles. We noticed some bear scant heading up to the junction of 4N61 and 4N13, close to the flume. This year there was one person camped up the hill near the flume. 

On Sunday, we hiked the 4 miles along 4N13 that follows the flume/ditch on the north side of the Stanislaus River into Strawberry and another 1.5 miles to the Strawberry General Store. The General Store is just ok. Our return trip to camp was by way of Old Strawberry road and then the Strawberry Grade Trail down to Fraser Bridge. That trail is very pretty with a gentle incline since it was once a railroad bed. Total hike was 10.2 miles. The hike on 4N13 had four steep inclines.  Next year we'll just hike the Strawberry Grade to town and back to omit those grueling elevations.