Mackay Reservoir

I missed it by about 15 minutes.

A brand new 16mp digital camera on one of those Facebook classified sites for 15 bucks.

I asked to be put in line for it, but there were already three other people ahead of me by the time I saw the ad, so there is little (no) hope of me actually getting it.

I guess that I will have to keep looking.

Over the past few years I have gone through three digital cameras.  One doesn't even turn on now.  One is small and is the camera that I began this blog with way back in 2010, and it is still functional although not as powerful as I would like.  And the final camera is the one I took up to Challis with me, and that is the best camera.

Only..........I had it in the side pocket of my bike shorts when I spun my mountain bike out and landed in a puddle of muddy water out on BLM land over in Wyoming.

The gun was on my left side.  The camera was on my right and the entire right side of me was muddy and soaking wet by the time I picked myself and bike up off the high plains desert floor.

LC ended up hosing me down in the yard before I could walk into the house and take a shower.

The water didn't kill my camera, but the mud scratched the lens.

When the sun is in the wrong place many of my pictures are marred by dark spots and fog spots.

That was the fate of many of the pictures that I took during our brief stop at the reservoir in Mackay on the way home from Challis.

We have driven by the reservoir many times and never stopped, but with the engine running hotter than it should have been (and with us pulling the Nomad), this seemed like a good place to stop and check it out.

While LC checked on everything (low on coolant that formed an air pocket in the radiator hose, so thankfully nothing serious or that could not be remedied immediately), I wandered with Kory................

More information about the reservoir:

http://www.blm.gov/id/st/en/visit_and_play/places_to_see/challis_field_office/Joe_T_Fallini_Recreation_Site.html

Although it is much smaller than the Buffalo Bill Reservoir in Cody, the Mackay reservoir reminds me very much of that Wyoming place.

Buffalo Bill also lies adjacent to a two lane highway.

The grey, shale mountains outside Cody are also present here in Idaho.

There is barren, tree less terrain surrounding both of these large bodies of water.

And the two campgrounds look so much alike that if I saw side by side pictures I would not be able identify their specific locations.

The same camp sites divided by the same sage bushes and brown grasses.  The same covered picnic shelters, the same paved driveways and the same dual restrooms.

Almost mirror images of each other.

Truthfully I find both of them pretty, but uninspiring as a place to recreate...............

Thankfully nothing serious.................

A picture of Kory running in the back yard a few minutes after returning to the house after our camping trip to Challis.

My pup had been tied up non-stop for a few days, and when I set her free she ran like the wind, happy to be running and happy to be home..................

There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered................Nelson Mandela