Our Journey : June 7, 2013 Buffalo, Water, and Flowers

6/10/2013

June 7, 2013 Buffalo, Water, and Flowers

Since we initially planned to move after a few days, we were not very conservative with our tanks. Because we really like this campground we decided to stay for a few more days. So you know what is coming...this morning we had to go and dump our tanks and refill with water. (Just one of those things - ).

When I signed up for a few more days, I found out that there is Wi-Fi right behind the campground office. So after we reset up, I spent an hour there uploading a few blogs and checking on some items. We have little to no cell phone service and occasionally I do get and can send some emails. It has been nice to unplug for a while.

After lunch we went on another road trip. We were heading to the Jackson Dam and Reservoir but we made a stop at the Elk Ranch Flats Overlook when we saw the buffalo herd:

There were lots of babies - :

Another view from the overlook:

We made another stop at the Willow Flats Overlook and I found this interesting:

Our next stop was the Jackson Lake Dam and Overlook:

Swallows flying all over the dam - many nests:

There are fifteen 2.5 ton gates at the base of Jackson Lake Dam that control the reservoir level by controlling the amount of water released. This is one of the controls:

Almost 50% open:

Jackson Lake formed 10,000 years ago when water filled a glacial depression. To store irrigation water, the Bureau of Reclamation built a temporary dam at the mouth of Jackson Lake in 1906. The dam partially failed in 1910 but within a year the new dam was created and water was being stored again.

Jackson Lake Dam is part of the Minidoka Project that provides irrigation water to southeast Idaho. It is one of the 9 dams that irrigate over 1.2 million acres that was once sagebrush flats.

Jackson Lake Dam is the furthest upstream. Irrigators rarely draw their full share of water, allowing Jackson Lake Reservoir to remain above natural lake level.

Our next stop was Signal Mountain Overlook where we took a nice 5 mile drive up the mountain from the valley floor.

The views were spectacular:

The flat area covered in yellow flowers is Elk Ranch Flats where the herd of buffalo are in the above picture. Through the binoculars we could still see the herd.