Aspen carving: Folk art form or natural desecration?

The following originally appeared in the June 26, 2009 edition of the Tooele Transcript Bulletin.

Arborglyphs, or tree carvings, can be found in many of Tooele County’s aspen trees. American Indians and many subsequent cultures to arrive in the Rocky Mountain region have used the aspen’s smooth surface as their canvas. (photo by Echo Thomsen)

by Clint Thomsen

I’ve always wondered what happened to Red H.  I don’t know who he is, but I know he frequented the Manti la Sal National Forest during the sixties and that he loved to carve his signature into the pale bark of aspen trees there.  I know because I’ve passed by, taken shade under, and camped near scores of aspens bearing his scarred autograph.

As a kid, I always pictured him as a lonely, somewhat narcissistic outdoorsman from one of the small towns nearby.  Perhaps he had red hair (hence the moniker).  And maybe he wore a red flannel woodsman shirt that smelled of salmon eggs and DEET.  One thing’s for sure; the man had some serious time on his hands, and was fairly skilled with a knife.

A recent trip to an aspen forest in Ophir Canyon spurred a brainstorm about tree carvings, or arborglyphs.  Almost every aspen trunk along the small trail bore at least one set of initials.  My sense of discovery wasn’t hampered in any way, but the wealth of time-warped scribbling begged some questions.  Was I looking at art or graffiti– valuable cultural resources or blatant defacement of natural resources?  The answer, I suppose, lies both in purpose and perspective.

First let’s consider the aspen tree.  If I’ve learned anything in my years of practically umbilical connection to the Internet, it’s that no matter what topic interests you, there’s at least one person in cyberspace equally—if not more—interested in it than you are.  And fortunately that person runs a website dedicated to it.

On the topic of aspens, some deep Googling led me to the Watching the World Wake Up blog authored by Alex Obbard.  Obbard makes his living as a technology sales executive, but dabbles quite passionately in botany and the natural sciences.  The self-described “motivated perpetual amateur” writes studiously about Utah’s flora and fauna.  His particular fondness for aspens was apparent.

The rustling sounds of nearly round aspen leaves, he writes, sound “almost like a chorus of soft whispers in a gentle breeze…as though someone is telling you something you can’t quite catch, but maybe could, if you stopped and somehow listened more closely.”

“Aspen forests are unlike any other forests in North America,” Obbard explained in an email to me.  “The white trunks and wide spacing create an open, airy canopy, that invites you to stroll, explore and linger more so than coniferous or Eastern hardwood forests.”

Aspens in the Intermountain West are thought to grow as shoots from interconnected root systems rather than by seed reproduction.  According to the Utah State University Forestry Extension, aspen forests in our mountains consist of vast, genetically identical clones that have regenerated for centuries.

Thus, while it may spread across many acres, a stand of aspen clones is classified as a single living organism, based on its common root system.  A single male stand in Fish Lake National Forest dubbed “Pando” consists of 47,000 trees and is considered the largest, heaviest, and oldest organism on Earth.

In the Intermountain West, the distinctive white-trunked forests thrive on south-facing slopes above 7,000 feet.  Individual trees can live up to 100 years, give or take.  Modern arborglyphs can be found in most conveniently accessible aspen forests– especially near streams, trails, and meadows.

If you’re lucky, you might spot a near-ancient carving among the droves of modern initials.  Most every culture since the American Indian has used the aspen’s smooth bark as a natural canvas.  Explorers and prospectors used them as trail markers.  Trapper journals suggest that mountain men may well have started the initial-plus-date trend that continues to the present as a way to say “I was here.”

Archaeologists consider near-ancient arborglyphs to be valuable cultural resources.  Especially prized are those carved by immigrants from the Basque regions of France and Spain during the late 19th and early 20th Centuries.  Most became sheepherders and spent many lonely years in the forests of the American West.  Their carvings are renowned for their delicate artistry.  Often depicted were elements of sheepherding life and nude women.

Basque arborglyphs are well documented in the mountains above Park City, and Dr. Joxe Mallea- Olaetxe, an arboglyph expert at the University of Nevada, Reno, is pretty sure more exist in our own Deep Creek Mountains.  He said he hasn’t been there to investigate yet, but he’d love to see them recorded there.

I saw nothing older than 1980 during my hike in Ophir Canyon, but in 2001 Alex Obbard found a carving there with a 1928 date.  “The digits were clear and legible, though stretched by growth,” he said. “The date surprised me.”

More recent carvings spark the art versus graffiti debate and the bring up the question of perspective.  What one may consider a meaningful memento, another sees as defilement of nature.

“It’s destruction of a natural resource,” Carol Majeske, Recreation Manager for the Salt Lake Ranger District, told me, adding that carving in national forests is prohibited.  Aside from the argument that modern carvings detract from a forest’s beauty, she pointed out that breaching a tree’s bark makes it susceptible to insects and disease.

Early arborglyph carvers may have known this.  Their carvings were superficial, penetrating only the outermost layers of bark.  Modern initial carvers tend to cut much too deep.

“We’re living in different times with many communication methods at our disposal,” Majeske reasoned. “We don’t need to carve messages on rocks or trees.”

She’s got a point.  Circumstances of human presence in these forests are much different now.  A trapper or sheepherder’s sojourns there were long, lonely, and often arduous.  My visits are spur of the moment and purely recreational. Much has changed since olden day wanderers chiseled their fantasies in aspen bark.  Future archaeologists certainly won’t need to rely on tree carvings to study our culture.

Still, there’s something about even semi-old arborglyphs that, as Alex Obbard put it, “adds a dimension of human history to the forest.”  If ol’ Red H. is still around, he might agree.

——-

Special thanks to Alex Obbard for his eloquent insight.  His blog, Watching the World Wake Up, is now on the blogroll.  It’s a must-read for anybody curious about the natural sciences.  Good stuff.

 

To better serve you…

I’ve long been aware that this blog lacks one of the proven foundations of successful blogs:  Focus.

Most topical blogs focus on one specific theme:  politics, photography, hunting, tech, etc.  Or they cover a variety of topics but are geared toward a single demographic.  Mine does neither.

This blog’s tagline is ‘Adventure, History, Americana.’  It might as well read “Random Stuff I’m Interested In.”

But that’s not completely true.  Everything I cover here really is interrelated in my own mind– different cuts of the same fabric, so to speak.  I have interests other than those I blog about here, but I tend to omit them because they’re not part of that contiguous stream of consciousness that I’m trying to tap.

If my goal was pure numbers, this modus operendi would be fine.  I get plenty of hits on certain posts here.  Stats-wise, I’m doing well.  The problem is that the majority of these hits are one-time visitors.  Somebody Googles a topic, finds a post here, uses it, and never comes back.

My goal isn’t to attract hits.  My goal is to attract regular readers who think my blog, for whatever reason, is worth spending a few minutes reading.  To that end, I’d appreciate it if you’d take a second and respond to the following poll:

 

I got me a truck

Yep, an old ‘85 Ford F250.  A man can only explore so far in the family minivan.

My last trip to Iosepa must have been the last straw.  When I pulled into the driveway in our mud-caked minivan, Meadow was understandably confused.

“Where did the mud come from?” she asked (Iosepa is a pretty dry place most of the year).

“The river,” I teased.

“The river at Iosepa, huh?” she asked (she knows there’s no river at Iosepa).

She must have forgotten that I had planned to locate parts of the Iosepa’s historic irrigation sources, which lie along a mountain stream a few miles south of the townsite.  This spring being an unusually wet one, said stream was running higher than normal and had flooded part of the dirt road I was following.  Hence the mud.  And my lack of footwear.

“I don’t even want to know,” she said.

The next week she texted me a picture when I was at work.  “I think I found you a truck,” she captioned.

A good find, too.  Frankly, I don’t have the money to buy a new truck outright.  And as much as I hate admitting that American-made cars are inferior, I’ll just bite the bullet and say it:  American-made vehicles simply do not hold a candle to most foreign counterparts.  Anybody who doesn’t believe that needs to buy, drive, and depend on a late model Ford or Chevy for more than 50,000 miles.  Seriously, just do it and see what happens right about at mile 50,001.  Then buy a Toyota and conduct the same experiment.  ‘Nuff said.

But this was an ‘85 Ford.  Back when, as my Ford fanatic uncle says, they still made solid trucks.  This truck has 150,000 miles on it.  It’s not much to look at, but it runs better than our ‘07 Ford minivan.

The guy selling it had priced it well under Blue Book, and Meadow had talked him down several hundred from that.  It needs a good tune-up and I’d best get rid of the pink heart seat cover, but otherwise it’s in great shape.  I tested it out in Ophir Canyon last week and it performed well above expectations.

So everybody’s happy.  Meadow gets her van back, I get to finally explore offroad without sweating bullets, the kids get the experience of riding in a real truck, and the dog finally gets to come along on our outings.

You know who else is happy?  Whoever owns the gas station near our house.  In fact, with the whopping 10 mpg my new truck gets, he may just be the happiest of all.

 

Ophir hike proves if a river runs through it, boys will get wet

The following originally appeared in the June 18, 2009 edition of the Tooele Transcript Bulletin.

Bridger Thomsen stands in a stream in Ophir Canyon during a hike. The canyon’s small rivers criss-cross along the trail.

by Clint Thomsen

We called it Coney Island. Where we got that name, I’m not sure, because at around 7 years old, my cousins and I weren’t exactly fluent in east coast geography. It was a little rocky island in the middle of a little rocky river. But we had discovered it, named it, and claimed it as ours.

Summer after summer, Coney Island was our headquarters. If you were to come looking for us during our annual family reunion, you’d likely find us there or at nearby “Waikiki Beach” fishing for albino trout with our hands.

We must have forded that portion of the Upper Provo River in the Uintas hundreds of times. A pair of double-knotted sneakers was all it took. We took great pride in our fording skills, often using them to impress groups of young women from the various girls’ camps along the river. The stream could be crossed at any point, we argued. It was just a matter of finding the right method. To Matt, Adam and me, nothing was more thrilling.

It’s been several years since I last set foot in the icy waters of the Provo, but I was reminded of those times last weekend during a hike in Ophir Canyon. My sons Bridger, 7, and Weston, 6, were there with me and the Transcript Bulletin’s editor, Jeff Barrus, and his 7 year old son Real. The little trail at the upper end of the canyon is a favorite of Jeff and Real’s, and the two would be our official guides for this hike.

Somehow we had chosen the only non-rainy afternoon so far this month for our hike. The flora in the canyon was vibrant and eager to soak in as much moisture as Mother Nature would send it before the inevitable summer famine.

“There’s really no good way to keep your feet dry,” Jeff told me as I paused to calculate the driest bank-to-bank route at the first stream crossing along the trail. Apparently, the passing of a decade or two had eroded my enthusiasm for getting my feet wet.

Bridger and Weston were less wary of getting wet than they were of stepping onto slippery rocks under moving water. They’ve forded a few creeks in their days, but they seem to approach the first crossing of each season with a bit of hesitance. It didn’t take me long to shed my reserve and I walked in to help them across. Real found a nice walking stick and used it to steady his way over some exposed rocks.

The small single track interweaves with the creek, crossing it many times as it climbs the Ophir Canyon drainage. The trail also crosses several vegetation zones before reaching the back of the canyon at the Lowe Peak/Rocky Peak cirque. Both peaks are accessible from the trail.

We had no specific destination in mind this hike. We decided to let the kids set the pace and lead the way. It was their hike. Frequent stops to analyze spiders and caterpillars were expected and enjoyed.

A small snake sunned itself near one of the crossings. “Pick it up, Dad!” Bridger said, subtly mocking my ophidiophobia. “Come on, it’s obviously not a rattlesnake.”

“Yeah, but what about his mom?” I asked. “She’s got to be close, doesn’t she?” I have no idea whether mother snakes defend their young like bears do, but the fact that Jeff echoed the idea when he and Real arrived made it all the more credible.

What fear Bridger lacks for carnivorous reptiles—he’ll grab any lizard or snake without a second thought—he more than makes up for in his morbid fear of ants. Specifically African driver ants (thanks, Discovery Channel). In Bridger’s mind, every ant is potentially an African driver ant. After seeing a few ants on rotting logs, Bridger became our official driver ant spotter.

When it came to fording the creek, I took the straight through approach—not out of laziness but because I love to feel the current. Jeff and Real stopped at each crossing to strategize. Using a combination of exposed rocks and downed timber, they sought the driest, neatest route possible. Bridger and Weston followed suit, but with less care toward staying dry.

Not that anybody really stayed dry. There’s no feasible way to follow the trail and avoid fully stepping in the creek at some point. That may pose a problem during the cold months. But for us, on that one non-rainy summer afternoon beneath a light, green canopy, the stream was the perfect trail complement.

We passed Picnic Canyon and stopped in a thick aspen forest above Powder Gulch. Hundreds of names were carved into the aspens along the trail, some of them quite old and scarred over beyond readability. Real grabbed his pocket knife and carved his, Bridger’s, and Weston’s initials into white bark before it was time to return.

The boys grew more proficient with each stream crossing, often branching out to brave a stronger current or deeper pool. That’s when I noticed the same gleam in their eyes that was in mine when I discovered the joy of rushing water when I was their age. Had we the time, they would have spent hours wading and exploring. The Upper Provo may be bigger than Ophir Creek, but the gleam was the same.

The small snake greeted us again as we passed his grassy peninsula on the way out. I was tempted to prove that I really wasn’t afraid of snakes, until Weston repeated my warning about his undoubtedly vengeful mother. I’m sticking with that excuse until Discovery Channel proves me wrong.

TRIP TIPS
The Ophir Canyon trail is a primitive single track trail on public land that begins just outside the small town of Ophir. To get there, drive through Ophir and continue up the dirt road for approximately 1.5 miles to a small parking area. The dirt road is rocky and 4WD or high clearance vehicle is recommended, as it crosses the stream several times.

 

Utah adventure expos can be as wild as the great outdoors itself

The following originally appeared in the June 11, 2009 edition of the Tooele Transcript Bulletin.

The boys land rainbow trout simultaneously at the Utah Outdoor Adventure Expo at the Utah State Fairgrounds on Saturday, June 6, 2009.

by Clint Thomsen

The feeling’s the same every time. Your bobber twitches, your line jerks taut, and your heart flutters. You pause, waiting for instinct to tell you the fish has taken the bait. You reel in the slack, point your rod toward your prey, and snap it to the side. What follows is either elation or disappointment—another rise or fall on the emotional roller coaster that is fishing.

For a boy, there’s nothing like catching a fish– even if it’s in a 2 foot deep fishing pond at the Utah State Fairgrounds.

Sure, my boys have reeled in their share of trout and bluegill from real lakes. But the Division of Wildlife Resources-sponsored pond would be a nice primer for the new fishing season. Plus, with the DWR guys handling baiting and snags, I’d be able to enjoy a peaceful half hour on the sidelines. Or so I thought.

The activity was part of the Utah Outdoor Adventure Expo last weekend. The event’s organizers, Brian and Becky Brinkerhoff of the Backcountry Radio Network, had invited me out to network with outdoor experts and to hand out copies of the 2009 Tooele County Summer Guide. The guide details outdoor recreation opportunities in the county and was distributed as an insert in this newspaper last month.

I spent the first part of the day passing out the guide at a booth. Most people I talked to had never seen Tooele County. Some had no idea where it was. While I was proud to be our county’s unofficial representative, I’ll admit I was torn at the prospect of advertising some of what I consider the state’s best kept outdoor recreation secrets to the greater population.

I can never decide what’s more fun at the expo—browsing exhibits or people-watching. Crowds at this type of event are always a potpourri, but many passers-by fall pretty easily into a few distinct categories.

First is the single-sport die-hard — the mountain man, the Dutch oven pro, the archer, or the trail rights activist. These are always the most interesting people to talk to. They’re passionate about their respective sport and possess a jackpot of knowledge. Among the die-hards I’ve met at these expos are a man who rode his ATV 602 miles from Tooele County to St. George, a professional bass angler, and a 10 year old archery prodigy.

On the amusing end of the spectrum is Free Stuff Guy. He’s the guy who takes at least one of every sample and flyer, regardless of its content. What he’ll do with 5 maps of the Moab area and 3 “Life Cycle of the Butterfly” posters from the BLM is beyond me. But between Dutch oven samples, exhibit candy bowls, and free bottles of water from the Sam’s Club booth, he’s set for the day.

When the last of my magazines was gone, I took my rightful place among the another category of expo goers—the outdoor gear freaks. We’re the guys who buy outdoors magazines for the ads, who consider Cabelas a perfectly valid vacation destination, and to whom the fact that the new Petzl headlamp now sports 350 lumens is extremely important (even though we could never justify buying one).

As I walked with my family past the archery exhibits, the boys stopped at the kids range to give bow and arrow a whirl. “I don’t want to aim at the animals, though,” said the Discovery Channel-bred Bridger, 7, as he scanned the line of life-size 3D targets. Weston, 6, had no qualms. He drew, aimed, and sank an arrow deep into the foam belly of a deer. “Hmm,” Bridger backpedaled, “Maybe I’ll shoot one animal. But just one.”

After kayaking in the Jordan River and watching some wakeboard competitions, we did more exhibit surfing and explored the rows of meat smoking camps that were competing in the barbecue cook-off. We decided to finish off the day at the fish pond. And it’s a good thing we planned to finish the day there, because the day would have ended there regardless.

Understandably, the DWR managers wanted to be in charge of baiting the set of short casting rods. There was no complaint from me. I took the time to teach 3 year old Coulter how to cast. A variety of small trout and medium catfish idled in the pond. The trout were the first to hit, and to his utter delight, Coulter hooked one on our second cast.

Another boy had cast over the top of Coulter, and when we reeled in his fish, the other line came in with it. One of the DWR managers rushed over to untangle the lines, and that’s when things got exciting. Not because of Coulter or the rainbow trout flipping and flapping at the end of the jumbled lines, but because of Coulter’s 2 year old sister, Ella.

Ella nudged Coulter aside to get a better look and he fell backward into the pond. The DWR manager, who held the fish with one hand, quickly pulled the little castaway ashore with the other. He was soaking wet and scared, but none worse for the wear. “Well,” deadpanned my wife. “I guess that about does it for the day.” Ella had no comment.

The commotion didn’t faze Bridger and Weston, who stood on the other side of the pond. They had refined their casts and were now concentrating on a group of trout at the center of the pond. Two fish struck their lines almost simultaneously. They set their hooks and eagerly reeled in their catches.

The sweet scent of barbecue hung on the breeze as we made the long trek back to the parking lot, our bag of samples and flyers in tow. The topic of conversation was our next fishing trip. That, and where we were going to find dry clothes for Coulter.

No, this week’s adventure didn’t take place in the wilderness. But given our collective contentment and exhaustion, it might as well have.

—–

LINKS
Backcountry Utah

 

Summer Tunes: Tristan Prettyman’s ‘Madly’

Yeah, it’s been a couple weeks, but I didn’t forget my Summer Tunes series. This week’s offering comes from San Diego-bred singer/songwriter Tristan Prettyman. Enjoy!

more about "Summer Tunes: Tristan Prettyman’s ‘Ma…", posted with vodpod

 

Get well, Spot: Skydiving acquaintance injured during Monday jump

A skydiving acquaintance of mine was seriously injured during a jump Monday afternoon.  Douglas “Spot” Spotted Eagle pulled out of his final turn too low.  He crashed to the ground at about 20 mph, breaking his pelvis and injuring his back.

“This was entirely pilot [skydiver] error,” Spotted Eagle told the Transcript Bulletin.  “The parachute deployed perfectly fine. It was a normal dive until the last two or three seconds. I lost grip on my toggle.”

He is expected to make a full recovery.

I mention the incident here because it was Spot who talked me into jumping out of a plane last summer (read about that here).

I conducted an extensive interview with him the day of my jump.  I asked him to list his motivations for skydiving.  His first response?  “It’s a serious responsibility.  How many other situations in life do you have complete control over?”

Makes perfect sense to me.

Spot is a videographer with Skydive Utah, a job that in my book takes some serious cojones.  Aside from concentrating on executing their own safe dive, videographers spend most of their jump filming somebody else, using helmet-mounted video and still cameras (the still camera is controlled with a special tongue switch).

When the plane reaches jumping altitude (around 13,000 feet), the videographer climbs out onto the fuselage to get an outside-in shot of jumpers approaching the exit platform.  He then falls backward to film their exits from below.  He spends the entire fall focusing on the jumpers, then times his own landing such that he is down and ready to film their landings.

Yes, skydiving is dangerous, but considering that Spot has 1,400 jumps under his belt, you could say he’s had a pretty safe run to this point.  Everybody I know at Skydive Utah is highly trained and uber-competent.  I have no qualms about jumping with them again this summer.

“People spend their whole lives working to have a life, but life’s not about working to live,” he told me the day of my jump.  “Live while you’re alive. If you wait til you’re 80 to enjoy life, you’ll not have the body nor the mind to appreciate whatever you’ve been working for.”

Here’s wishing him a speedy recovery and many more jumps afterward.

 

Early summer’s the season for spring foliage in the surrounding mountains

The following originally appeared in the June 4, 2009 edition of the Tooele Transcript Bulletin.

Chokecherry Blooms in South Willow Canyon are a great subject for foliage photography. (photo by Clint Thomsen)

by Clint Thomsen

“Have you ever wondered about the life cycle of a leaf?” ponders professional photographer Jacquelynn Buck on her blog.

“It begins in the cold damp of the spring as a tight bud on a tree, close knit, trying to keep warm as it shivers on the branch.  Then as the sun begins to thaw the earth and life bursts forth from the barren and cold overwintered ground, the leaf too breaks forth from its cocoon and spreads its points to the sky.”

Buck is based in Ohio, but her words rang true as I balanced on the rocky banks of the mountain stream Monday morning in an attempt to photograph the some of the season’s spanking new greenery upstream.  The sun had yet to fully penetrate the canyon, and as far as I could tell, I was completely alone.

Meteorologically speaking, spring has already come and gone.  Ground vegetation in the valleys is already browning, and the peach fuzz covering the foothills peaked weeks ago.  The kids are out of school and the weather has forsaken its springtime ambivalence to embrace a bold summer warm.

But in the mountains—at least for the flora—spring has just begun.  I was reminded of this apparent seasonal delay last weekend as I drove south toward Tooele.  Khaki fields along SR-36 gave way to olive-colored benches.  A lush patchwork of green cloaked the mid-section of the Oquirrhs.  Snow still covered the rocky summits above.  I felt like I was witnessing all four seasons at once.

“It’s elevation dependent,” Tooele County Agriculture Agent Linden Greenhalgh told me when I described the view to him.  “The higher you go, the season comes later and is shorter.”

I consulted Greenhalgh in an effort pin down the best time to view spring foliage in the foothills and mountains.    For droves of people, the changing of leaf colors in fall merits a special excursion.  Unfortunately, many relegate spring foliage to mere ambience—a beautiful, but an ultimately mundane phenomenon.    Few actively seek it out.

According to Greenhalgh, the best time to view spring foliage in the mountains is any time during the month of June.   “I especially like to see sego lilies,” he said.  “They are very beautiful, not too common, and only appear for a short time.”

The rare white-petaled perennial was declared the official state flower by the Utah State Legislature in 1911.  They are currently in bloom and may be found in the foothills.

I’m not a big botany fanatic, but I kinda dig leaves.  I like them most when they’re green.  Maybe it’s because I think they’re pretty.  Perhaps it’s because they personify renewal and vibrancy.  Psychological minutiae aside, let’s just say I like leaves because they just plain make me happy.

And this time of year I know just where to find them.

The Stanbury Mountains are unique in that they are climactically more similar to the Wasatch Mountains to the east than they are to other ranges of the Great Basin.  This is due, in part, to their elevation and topographic prominence.

With the 11,030 foot Deseret Peak as their crown, the Stansbury’s are the most prominent range east of the Ruby Mountains in Nevada.  Thus, they receive large amounts of orographic precipitation, which occurs when a storm encounters and is forced upward by a physiographic obstacle.

The heavy snows that occur at the peak feed many perennial streams, the largest of which flows through South Willow Canyon.  A drive up this deep, intimate canyon provides a tour of a wide range of vegetation types, and is arguably the best way to experience spring foliage in the county.

I had started out before dawn so that I could see the sunrise from within the canyon.  Dense populations of Bigtooth Maple, Scrub Oak, and Gambel Oak choked the stream bed, setting the floral tone for the rest of the 6 mile drive.

I parked at Boy Scout Campground 1.7 miles past the Forest Service boundary.  The lower campgrounds were still closed from last summer’s Little Bald Mountain fire, though little visible evidence of the blaze remained.

I walked toward the campsite where my wife and I stayed for an entire week one spring.  The morning was warm and the ground slightly moist from overnight rainfall.  The boulders banking the stream were slippery, but I braved them for photography’s sake.

I continued my drive and turned around at the Loop Campground, where the road ends and the Mill Fork Trail begins, winding its way through mixed aspen forests and old-growth pine before topping off at Deseret Peak.

Many of the photos I took came out fuzzy– probably because it was still too dark when I took them, or because I have yet to learn what all the little icons and acronyms on my camera’s display window mean.   Jacquelynn Buck would have known what to do.  When I got back, I asked the self-taught photographerf or a few tips on capturing spring foliage.

“Chase the light,” she said.  “The best times of day for photographing flowers are the most inconvenient – but the most wonderful.”  She’s right.  I snapped photos of a chokecherry bloom and a scene at the Upper Narrows that came out decent, thanks to the soft morning light.

Buck also suggested trying new angles, experimenting with macro settings, and cropping photos to emphasize certain aspects of the subject.  Lastly, she told me, “Go back.  Just because you’ve been to a place before doesn’t mean you have taken all the photos there are to take at that place. The difference a day can make is astounding. The sky can change. The light can change. The photo will change.”

Darn.  It looks like I’ll have to return to South Willow Canyon yet again.

TRIP TIPS
To get to South Willow Canyon, turn south on West Street in Grantsville and drive 5 miles to the signed turn-off.  Other great spots to view spring mountain foliage include Bates, Middle, and Settlement Canyons in the nearby Oquirrh Range.

———-

Thanks to photographer Jacquelynn Buck of Photography by Jacquelynn Buck for letting me excerpt her blog post and for the tips.  Check her out [website | blog | twitter].

 

Zee Avi’s debut album a vocal and instrumental masterpiece

Album art courtesy Brushfire Records

Why do I like Zee Avi so much?  Could it be her novelty?  If you’ve listened to her, you know what I mean by that.  Avi’s voice is completely unique.  And not in a calculated or blatant way.  Her sound is a striking mix of Billie Holiday and Norah Jones.  The former was known for tailoring her vocals to sound like a horn.  Indeed, play some Billie Holiday and walk away from the speaker until the words sound muddled.  What you still hear will sound very similar to a trumpet or a sax playing.

Purposefully or not, Avi’s voice shares this characteristic, which may be why the horn accompaniment on her recently released debut album sounds so appropriate.  In fact, one of this album’s pillars is the instrumentation used in these songs, my only previous exposure to which were Avi’s minimalist YouTube videos.

The more I listen to Jack Johnson’s Brushfire artists, the more I conclude that ingenious instrumentation is what sets them apart.  Somebody (or somebody’s) over in Mango Tree has an impeccable knack for mixing instruments and sounds.  I’ve noticed it ever since the Jack’s In Between Dreams.  For the record, whoever tweets for Brushfire told me kudos on Avi’s album go to members of Jack’s and Matt Costa’s bands and Ozomatli.  Somebody’s calling the shots, though, and I’d like to shake their hand.

Of course the real star on this album is Miss Zee Avi, her songs, and the emotion she conveys in her voice.  Avi is one of those artists that make you feel like you know them simply by singing a song.  Each of the albums 12 tracks is a musical delight.

I won’t go track by track, but favorites include “Just You and Me,” “Monte,” and “Honey Bee.”  If you’re a selective music purchaser like I am, I’d buy these tracks online for a nice introduction.  Then, in this case, of course I’d buy the rest.

Noteworthy highlights include the simple guitar melody on “The Story,” a song that is best listened to at night in the mountains, and the horn/vocal duet on “Just You and Me” which illustrates my point about the voice-horn comparison.  The rolling “Darling” would sound equally at home on a road trip or in a club.

You might assume, based on my previous doting, that I’d have no complaints about the album.  You would be wrong.  “Poppy,” Avi’s first original song, and “First of the Gang” are lackluster at best.  And “Kantoi” is downright annoying.  Mind you, these tracks are fine vocally and musically.  They’re just somehow less than the sum of their parts.

I also might have arranged the album differently.  Ordering the slow, emotive “Is This the End” right after the bubbly “Just You and Me” takes the air out of things mid-album.  “Is This the End” would be better appreciated were it the album closer.  A track featuring Jack Johnson in some way would have topped things off very nicely.  Here’s hoping that happens on her next album.

These criticisms considered, Miss Avi has me hooked.  This album is mature beyond its scope and rich beyond its simplicity.  I just ask that after she becomes a mega star, that Avi not forget the little old bloggers like me who had her back from the beginning.  Here’s to the beginning of a beautiful career!

www.zeeavi.com

 

Product review: Buffalo Jerky from Jerky.com

I gotta be honest—my first thought when I opened up my latest package from Jerky.com was “Oh no, not pepper.  Anything but pepper!”

I was worried about giving their buffalo jerky a fair shake in my review, since I have no doubt they wouldn’t have sent me the sample were they not fairly confident I’d like it.  I just happened to dislike peppered jerky just like I happen to dislike mushrooms.  Would it be fair to discount a gourmet dish prepared by Iron Cheff Bobby Flay simply based on the inclusion of mushrooms?  No, it wouldn’t.  And that’s why I was worried about this review.

Of course that worry was decisively quelled the second I opened up the bag and gave the stuff a try.  Aside from “delicious,” one word can describe the taste:  balance.

Jerky.com’s peppered buffalo jerky is quite possibly the best jerky I’ve ever tasted.  Before you dismiss that claim as hyperbole, consider that beef jerky might as well be its own food group for me, and that I live just down the street from a very popular local jerky manufacturer.

Anybody can gather good ingredients, just like prominent sports teams can buy the best players.  But as any sports fan will attest, if the team doesn’t have chemistry, they’ll fall short every time.  And while the fine ingredients used to create this buffalo jerky certainly play their part, it’s the balance of those ingredients that makes it so good.

I quickly realized that I don’t hate peppered jerky—I just hate how the pepper upstages all of the other flavors in every other peppered jerky I’ve tried.  Don’t get me wrong, the pepper here isn’t muted.  It simply knows its place:  to enhance rather than define.

The buffalo itself is amazing.  I’ve always preferred it to beef when it comes to jerky.  Buffalo isn’t gamey at all, and it’s much healthier than beef.  The soy sauce and pineapple juice marinade used here brings out the natural flavor of the buffalo meat impeccably.

When it comes to texture and chew, this stuff gets a solid A.  One element that’s often overlooked by jerky makers is manageability.  I was able to portion out slabs of the jerky with one hand while negotiating a rough doubletrack in my minivan (see my recent post about bushwhacking near Iosepa), proving that jerky doesn’t need to be processed and formed into bite-sized nuggets in order to make it a good on-the-go snack.

In short, Jerky.com’s Buffalo Jerky is a satisfying balance of salty and tangy that is positively addictive.  My advice?  Exercise restraint and savor it when you get yours in the mail.  Because even if you go with the big pack, all too soon you’ll wonder where it went.

Buffalo Jerky comes in 2 and 8 oz. bags ($9.99 and $25.99 respectively, free shipping).  Buy it here.