Your Favorite Passion

So, we just got back (well, ok, a few days ago) from our annual family campout and I have a confession to make. I took absolutely NO photos while we were there! I know, what is that!? But we did have a nice time fishing and enjoying the scenery for a couple of days before the second wave of family members arrived, bringing the rain with them! It was nice until they showed up so they must have brought it...LOL Anyway, I was very happy to see my adorable nephews, especially my newest, LilBear, who is only 2 months old! My sister and her boys braved the elements for a day or so before opting to head home to their warm, dry beds. And I really can't blame them. I'm just grateful for the time we did have. It's really the pits living so far apart. But my nephews Lil B and C had the best of times together getting dirty. My kids were really looking forward to fishing and the first day we were there they wanted to hit the creek for some fishing before nightfall. MoMo caught her fish right away! Big R was unsuccessful that evening but he eventually did get his fish a couple days later. Unfortunately the rain that came, along with the cold it brought, put a damper on things, forcing us (well, some of us. Others went out fishing anyway and my bro D caught a HUGE trout!) to huddle in the food tent around a propane heater. First time ever we've had that much rain when we've gone. But we survived. Now, Hubby and the kids and I planned to camp at Great Basin National Park on the way home. Guess we just can't get enough camping! LOL But while in UT there was a dog altercation and our dog got a nasty wound. Well, it started out fairly small and we tried to treat it with antiseptic wash and ointment, however, it got worse until it was a large wound oozing pus. Gross! So, we skipped Great Basin and headed home to get his wound treated. But on the way home we did make a couple of stops. We discovered the ghost town of Frisco along UT highway 21 and stopped to investigate and stretch our legs some. We're suckers for ghost towns. Here is the historical marker with some info about the town.And then one of the most striking features (I think) was five domed ovens or kilns set together up on a hill. Apparently at one time the tops were lined on the outside with brick, though most of it is gone now. You can see in one of the photos where there is a bit of brick left on one of the domes. You can also see that the domes are falling apart, with big holes in the tops.
It's pretty amazing to me how they were able to place the rock just right to make a domed shape. There were a few other structures there as well in various states of decay.
It was a nice little rest stop and then we headed on, soon coming to this scene.
We drove right into a storm. The kind of scary thing was that this is open range. The rain was coming down so hard that visibility was poor and we had to be on the lookout for cows in the road and cows near the road who might dash into the road as we approached. Thankfully we didn't hit any cows and we made it through, out of the storm and the rain.
As I said before, part of our original plan for the trip was to camp at Great Basin. Another part of that plan was to stop near Ely at Garnet Hill. Garnet Hill is a cool rockhounding site which is managed by BLM and is free to those who want to try their hand at finding garnets. So, we stopped there for a couple of hours until the sun started to go down to try our luck at finding garnets. Big R right away found a garnet imbedded in a rock. (Sometimes I call him "Eagle Eye" since he spots things so well) Really, it wasn't too difficult to find garnets imbedded in the rocks that lay all around, though most were pretty small. And then old Eagle Eye found a big one, just lying there on the ground and not attached to a rock at all!This photo was the first garnet he found.

And then here's MoMo. She found a number of garnets on her own and then she also claimed any that her dad found as her own! Here's a bit of a teaser. I tried (unsuccessfully) to get some good shots of our garnets. This is the best I could get. (boy, I sure do wish I had a nice DSLR and knew how to use it!)
This was one that I found. Still need to remove the remaining rock on it. This one got chipped out of a larger rock. This last picture is badly out of focus but it gives you more of an idea of the sizes. The coin is a dime. And notice that the biggest chunk of rock has TWO garnets poking out, wedged together. Oh, and Kaos is doing well. He's got some antibiotics and a lovely Elizabethan collar (think lampshade around his neck). His wound should heal up just fine. Well, I guess that about covers everything. Until next time...