Saturday at Flaming Gorge...

Looking down from Red Canyon.

Looking southward to Utah.


Aren't these Big Horn Sheep ewes cute? They were no further than 10 feet from us and not the least bit spooked. Further down the road we spotted the rams on a cliff and they ran off before we could get any photos of them.


How did this picture get in here?




Looking northward into Wyoming.

Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area was established by Congress October 1, 1968. The area contains 207,363 acres of land and water, almost equally divided between Utah and Wyoming.

Flaming Gorge is famous for its trophy lake trout. A good number of 30+ pound fish are caught each year. The Utah record went 51 lb 8 oz, and there may yet be a bigger one swimming in the reservoir. Fishing is also very good for rainbows, brown trout, kokanee salmon and smallmouth bass.

Rising 502 feet above bedrock, Flaming Gorge Dam impounds waters of the Green River to form the reservoir, which extends as far as 91 miles to the north. The reservoir has a total capacity of 3,788,900 acre-feet. At full elevation of 6,045 feet, it has a surface area of 42,020 acres.

Petroglyphs (rock art) and artifacts suggest that Fremont Indians hunted game near Flaming Gorge for many centuries. Later, the Comanche, Shoshoni, and Ute tribes, whose members spread throughout the mountains of present-day Colorado and Utah, visited the Flaming Gorge country.

On a spring day in 1869, John Wesley Powell and nine men boarded small wooden boats at Green River, Wyoming to embark on a daring exploration of the Green and Colorado Rivers. Powell and his men slowly worked their way downstream, successfully completing their journey in late summer. It was on May 26, 1869 that Major Powell named the Flaming Gorge after he and his men saw the sun reflecting off of the red rocks.

Within the Ashley National Forest, the forest is thick with evergreen trees, pinyon pines, and junipers that grow down to the clear blue waters of the reservoir.

I love going to the Gorge because it is so beautiful and rugged.