Today some DCV Group member met at DCHS for our combined November/December meeting. We had a pot luck lunch around noon sitting in the sun ( which didn't last for long ) in the grass area above the Aniversary Pool. It was a chilly day with snow still on the north facing canyon hills and lots of ice along the creek. The trees at DCHS and along the creek took a real hard hit from the unusually heavy snowfall a couple of weeks ago. Trees were stripped, snapped, and bent all over the place. The Willow by the Aniversary pool had one of its biggest limbs snapped and fallen. Sycamores near the Arizona Pool had there tops broken off. A bueatiful big Sycamore just down stream from the Crab Cooker had all of its limbs in its top 20 feet broken. I have never seen anything like this before in my 20 years of visiting the springs. Between the big flood and this big snowstorm the area along the stream has taken a serious beating late this year. What a change from what things looked like back in August before all of this flooding and snow came along. I put four photos taken today at the Wizard's pictures link below, they are the last 4 on page 48. One showing the damaged sycamores by the Arizona Pool and the other three showing icy conditions by the rock crossing at DCHS. Since this last week saw very cold temperatures, lots of ice has formed on the rocks in various places. We had a nice day soaking in most of the pools. Ron used my thermometer to take pool temperatures. Arizona Pool-104, Aniversary Pool-102, Womb-96, Serenity Pool-100, and the Crab Cooker 114-112 depending on which end the temp was taken. Deep Creek was measured at 43 degrees making for an invigorating sensation on the legs while crossing. Depth of crossing in the creek by the beach was just to the top of the thighs. We hiked out just before sunset. On my way into the canyon in the morning I let my new dog Bear off his leash to see if he would stay with me. He dissappeared off down the trail and I did not see him all day. Thankfully he found his way back to my vehicle and was there when I arrived and I was greatly relieved. After we hiked out of DCHS we all headed over to our new digs for some Pizza and we watched Spiderman on our Big Screen TV! It was a real enjoyable day, just sad to see all of the damaged trees down there at Deep Creek and DCHS.
