July 20-27, 2012 – Kamas, UT

We left Coalville Monday morning and drove about 40 miles southeast to another Camperworld membership park, Knotty Pine Park outside of Kamas, UT.  Knotty Pine is a beautiful park with nice grassy sites and our site is in the trees just across the street from the Provo River.  We can’t see the river because of all the trees and brush but we can hear it – great to sleep by.  The park has a small swimming pool and a nice hot tub.   The weather is great here – in the mid 80’s and cools off to the low 50’s at night.

Unfortunately, Nancy came down with a nasty case of shingles and had to visit a doctor in Kamas to get some much needed medication.  Consequently, while Nancy was recovering we did not do a lot during our week at Knotty Pine Park.  This is a very nice area with the Wasatch Mountains to the west and the Unita Mountains to the east.  The Provo River borders the south end of the valley and the Weber River borders on the north.  We had wanted to do a lot of exploring and get the kayaks wet in the Provo River and in some of the hundreds of small mountain lakes in the Unita Mountains, but Nancy was not up do doing much so we stayed in the park for most of our visit.

Toward the end of our stay we took a ride on the Heber Valley Railroad.  The ride starts in Heber City, goes past Deer Creek Reservoir and then follows the Provo River through Provo Canyon.

In the wetlands at the inlet of Deer Creek Reservoir we saw lots of wildlife, including these Sandhill Cranes. 

 We also saw a deer grazing along the track.

The train followed the shoreline of Deer Creek Reservoir.  In some places we could see fish swimming close to the shore.  Along the way we had the usual “big train robbery” and then one of the bandits sang some great old cowboy songs.

After passing the Deer Creek Reservoir dam we followed the Provo River through beautiful Provo Canyon.   The Provo River looks like a great river to kayak so we will definitely come back to this area again.

The train stopped at Vivian Park, a small riverside park, where we had a boxed lunch while the train crew turned the engine around for our trip back to Heber City.   We enjoyed this really nice train ride in a beautiful canyon and are getting anxious to get to Chama, NM so we can ride the Cumbres Toltec Scenic Railroad.

 

The next day Nancy again was feeling better so we took a drive on the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway which runs through the Uinta Mountains from Kamas, UT to Evanston, WY.  This 78 mile byway provides access to many of the 400 lakes found throughout the western portion of the Uinta Mountain Range.  We stopped at the Slate Gorge Overlook.

We also stopped at the Provo River Falls, a series of waterfalls.  The upper falls were beautiful and we can only imagine how nice it is when the river is running fuller in the spring.

We hiked down-river a short ways to some lower falls.  There were more small falls below this one but the trail did not go any further.

The Uinta Mountains provided us with some beautiful views.

We passed many beautiful small mountain lakes on both sides of the road.  We stopped at Butterfly Lake where we hiked around the lake and ate our picnic lunch on some rocks.  Nancy was getting tired so we decided not to go any further on the byway. 

We really enjoyed this drive and again decided we need to come back to this area and take the kayaks on some of these beautiful small lakes.

We enjoyed our time here despite Nancy not feeling well and have decided we will definitely visit here again but now we need to start for Chama, NM where Rex will volunteer on the Cumbres/Toltec Scenic Railway during the month of September.