Big A** Bass

You may be thinking that our lives are pretty boring here in north-central Idaho and the lack of blog postings is due to a gaping void of excitement that leaves nothing to write about.

Not so fast…

In between working our four-day shifts we have been exploring the reservoir from the water side of things.  Our terrific ranger friends, Andrew and Brittney, took us on a boat ride to see the northern-most portion of the reservoir and we are certainly glad to hitch a ride since paddling 40 plus miles was not in our plans.  We can't begin to tell you how much fun we are having and loving this special place!

Andrew and Brittney - our tour guides.

Work camping is hard work!

And our favorite activity is to leisurely float along in our kayaks and cast a line, twitch a jig, and wait for a bite while marveling at the spectacular scenery.  Since the results of our expeditions are usually not news worthy and you should be thankful that I do not subject you to a play-by-play of how the “big one” got away.  We catch an occasional stick, a submerged beer can, and a minnow or two but none of which require me to scamper and grab the fishing net. 

Recently, our luck has turned around and the net now smells like fish.  There are two different reasons why our poles are now bent and we felt compelled to buy a stringer at the grocery store.  Betsy and I respectfully differ on the reasons so I will present both of them. 

My explanation is the rock I found on a recent boat trip with the park rangers.  While exploring one of the 80 primitive camps scattered along the shoreline I was doing some treasure hunting and my eyes fixed on a smooth, water-worn rock that appeared to have a fish inscribed on it.  (And, no I did not then see Jesus in the clouds.)  I just knew the rock was a sign and it must have meaning.  Could it be a carving by a native Nez Perce Indian from years past or just a random figure that I desperately wanted to believe was destined to be my good luck fishing rock? 

Of course Dr. Dresser has a totally different and more analytical explanation.  She is convinced the tips (and lures) we received from a retired Corps forester who has fished this lake for 30 years is the reason we are being entertained by these feisty fish.  The forester gave us a 20 minute lesson on how to cast, twitch, and set the hook just right to land bass big enough for dinner.  He even felt sorry enough for us when we verbalized our fishy woes that he gave us a dozen lures and hooks. 

Please don’t think we are hung up on the reasons why we are now venturing to the water every day to snag bass Roland Martin style, we are too busy catching to discuss this moot point.  But, we are certainly not getting rid of the rock nor changing lures.

The "Spirit" of Dworshak

You don’t have to be a dog whisperer to know when your pooch is truly happy.  And for a Labrador retriever like Spirit the signs are pretty obvious.  She has a definite spring in her step that is more like the prance of a regal poodle.  Her nose faces into the wind and glides back and forth until pinpointing the animal scent that propels her to go darting off deep into the woods driven to discover the aromatic quandary.  And she is most happy when gently floating through the cold water as her big paws effortlessly scoop through the water.  

Ever since we arrived here on April 1, she has been in doggy paradise.  But to say that Spirit is happy at this campground would be a gross understatement.

Maybe this story about Spirit's joyous Idaho camping experience is better told in pictures.

I think you can tell a dogs happiness by the flapping of their ears.

If you want to make a lab happy just give them beautiful cold water for an afternoon swim.  (Although she seems to enjoy a dirty mud puddle just as well.)

Every walk involves a stick coming along.  This particular stick was as wide as the bridge and became a challenge of which Spirit was determined to overcome.

There are miles and miles of hiking trails and old logging roads that make for a wonderful doggy playground - a place where there is no leash and plenty of smells.  

Spirit's only complaints are that we do not hike long enough or fast enough for her taste.  Too bad, dog!

Oh, the other complaint is that we have to work four days a week and sometimes we drag her along.

But on our days off we enjoy all this campground has to offer including a 19,000-acre reservoir.  This was Spirits first ride in the kayak and she did great!   

A Look at one of the “18 Most Beautiful Structures in America”

Here is one of the gorgeous views we are privy to everyday living at the Dent Acres Campground in north-central Idaho.  Betsy took this picture of the Dent Bridge and we decided it was “post card worthy.”  And since we are not in the post card business, it became “blog worthy.”

When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers constructed the Dworshak Dam they accomplished the feat of building the highest strait-axis concrete gravity dam in the North America and changed the landscape dramatically.  The North Fork of the Clearwater River was changed forever as it swelled into the Dworshak Reservoir covering over 19,000 acres of land. 

But the Corps had another challenge – building a bridge over the reservoir that would connect the people of the remote town of Elk River to Orofino.   And they did this by building the Dent Bridge – the largest suspension bridge in Idaho.  The 1550-foot long bridge was completed for a price tag of 8 million dollars.  And this hunk of steel did not go unnoticed.  It joins the ranks of one of the “18 Most Beautiful Structures in America” so says the American Institute of Steel and won the “Long Span Construction” award in 1972.  But we don’t care about those accolades we just like looking at it.

So there, now you can say you have seen one of the "18 Most Beautiful Structures in America" (at least according to the American Institute of Steel).

The Dam Fish

Animal migration is a remarkable feat that absolutely baffles my mind and exhibits one of the truly beautiful acts of nature.  The fact that seabirds can fly over thousands of miles of open ocean with seemingly no cues or that monarch butterflies can flap their delicate wings for over 2,000 miles without feeding and end up in the same cypress grove as years past is astonishing.  We were fortunate to see the monarch migration in Pismo Beach, California and the thousands of butterflies that were gently gliding around entertaining onlookers in the warm winter air of coastal California.

Steelhead trout appear gray and silver when
they live in the ocean but take on a pronounced
red color when they migrate back to their
spawning grounds.

So fast forward to our location in North-central Idaho where we are surrounded by gorgeous streams and rivers that are bubbling with the mystiful migration of anadramous fish.  This fish tale of the steelhead trout starts way upsteam in the shallow inland waters of the North Fork of the Clearwater River where they are hatched – far away from the Pacific Ocean that they will call "home" for three or four years before swimming back to their birthplace.  (“Anadramous” is the fancy term used to describe fish that are born in fresh water, migrate to salt water, and return as adults to their natal grounds to spawn.)  Nature has provided an enormity of challenges for these creatures to survive a 600-mile journey.  Young fish imprint (through smell of all senses) on the rivers they swim through on their journey to the ocean and undergo physiologic changes allowing them to survive in salt water. 

A few posts ago when I introduced you to the Dworshak Dam and Reservoir (our work camping location for the next two months), I mentioned that the dam was not without controversy.  The Dworshak Dam provides flood protection, hydroelectric power, and recreational opportunities but what it DOES NOT provide is access for native salmon and steelhead trout to reach their historic natural spawning grounds.  The towering 717- foot dam rises from the base of the North Fork of the Clearwater River and, as you can see below, abruptly blocks the migrating fish.  

How would you like to face this dam as you are swimming to your spawning grounds - a journey that takes
 nearly two weeks and in which you don't eat and loose 30-50% of your body weight?

So enter into this interesting environmental picture a multitude of fish hatcheries that replenish juvenile fish that would have been hatched naturally if the dam did not exist.  There are two huge fish hatcheries in our new town of Orofino - The Dworshak National Fish Hatchery (NFH, run by the U.S.  Fish and Wildlife Service and the Nez Perce Tribe) and their sister hatchery - The Clearwater Hatchery (run by the Idaho Game and Fish Dept.).  So last Tuesday during our big day in town, and in between lunch and grocery shopping, we decided to visit the hatcheries.     

We were lucky enough to get a first-hand look at how the egg and sperm collection works from the viewing platform at the Dworshak NFH.  I must confess that I find hatcheries to be fairly boring as it usually just entails walking around outdoor ponds and looking at fish of varying sizes.  But this experience was much different and both hatcheries where a buzz with activity.  At the Clearwater Hatchery young fish were being moved from the hatchery for release into nearby rivers and at Dworshak NFH they were collecting sperm and eggs from returning steelhead trout who came home to spawn. When we visited the Dworshak NFH, they were well on their way to achieving their lofty goal of collecting 2.5 million eggs.

It all starts outside with the fish honing in on the fish ladder (as seen below in the picture) and swimming up it until they reach outdoor holding tanks.

Fish are moved to the processing location via a large basket that dumps the fish onto the sorting table.  Steelhead are sorted according to sex and machine-scanned for implanted microchips that were placed in hatchery-raised fish received as youngsters (that's the blue machine on the left the man in the black shirt is feeding them into). 

Now they are moved down the line for milking of sperm and retrieval of eggs.  

Eggs from females are collected into individual containers and will be mixed with sperm. Remarkably individual steelhead females produce an average of 6,500 eggs.  

Males are milked and the sperm is collected in a small cup.

Eggs and sperm are mixed and placed in these incubation trays for one to three months before being moved to nursery tanks.

In early summer, the young fish will be moved outside to rearing ponds where they will stay for nearly a year.

When juvenile fish are ready to be released they are "vacuumed" up into transport trucks and moved to a nearby river or stream.

Once released, the fish start their migration to the Pacific Ocean which is a much richer and productive feeding ground than the inland rivers and streams.  The journey to the ocean is a difficult one for the young fish.  There are eight dams that must be navigated (or the lucky ones get barged or trucked around the dams) and they must reach the ocean in a timely manner.  Life for the steelhead is difficult and only an estimated 1% of those released make it back to the hatchery.

Working Girls

I don’t want you to think that my blog posts are becoming more infrequent because my new working schedule has overwhelmed my time or that the wilds of Idaho have made me forget about RVAGOGO.  In fact, it is because our 4G’s have shrunk to an abominable 1X and the bars have all but vanished into cyber hell.  There is 3G in Orofino, which is the closest town, but at 45 minutes away we don’t get there but once a week.

Opening day kind of made us sad since
we had to let other people into our wilderness paradise.

We are really getting a kick out of our work camping experience.  The deal is we work 30 hours a week (for the two of us) with four days on and four days off.  When I told my 90-year old Grandma that I was going back to “work” she exclaimed, “You are going to work and are not getting paid…what kind of job is that?”  Now this is coming from a woman who was widowed young with five kids and worked well into her 80’s – she is no stranger to hard work.  When I explained that we are working for in-kind payment in the form of our campsite and hookups, she seemed to approve. 

On our way to clean up a "mini camp" we found more
work that needed to be done in the form of removing an obstacle. 

Our days on are filled with virtually mindless, nonstressful tasks that run the gamut from trail maintenance, checking campsites for occupancy, cleaning fire pits, litter pickup, refurbishing horseshoe pits, cleaning restrooms, raking leaves, and whatever else we see that needs to be done.  There is total freedom as to what we do and when we do it.  Our hours pass by quickly and we frequently laugh at how nice it is to leave work with no stress or responsibility on our shoulders.  (Sorry to say that for all of you who are reading this at your desk.)  This job is certainly not going to add any more gray hairs to my head. 

The reservoir has 80 "mini camps" available for primitive camping.  This one we could drive
to so we set out to clean up the trash and fire pit.  Not a bad office!

So far the campers have been respectful and no trouble.  Well, except for the guy who parked his truck where he was not supposed to and the turkey hunters who were target shooting across the hiking trail.   But these minor infractions are not like the horror stories from years past when a hunter killed a deer and dressed it out in the bathroom…or the man who threatened to shoot his drunk neighbor because he didn't  like where he parked…or the two guys that stole the self check-in lock boxes for the pittance of money that was in it. 

Betsy did a terrific job blowing leaves and dirt from the roads.  Hope the campers appreciate her hard work!

The campground is on a first-come first-serve basis with self-check-in until late May when it will open for reservations.  Then, we will be working in the entrance station and handling the computer reservations.  This means we will have to have “training” and be learning a new skill since neither of us have used the NRRS system.  What a great resume builder!  Betsy can list it right under her PhD.  Let’s hope this system is no trouble because we don’t want any stress in our lives and want to be the cheerful smiling faces that campers see when they first drive into Dent Acres Campground.

Raising the flags at the entrance station - Betsy's soon-to-be new office.

Cleaning the kiosks while sporting my red Army Corp hoody.

Betsy attending a staff meeting with Ranger Brittney (in the green) and Chuck and Linda (the other work campers).
Now this is our kind of staff meeting!

Our work camping job will end in late June and we will be sorry to go...the time is flying by.

Dinner Rolls

So what made me decide to bake bread?

Well, our 70-degree days vanished as Old Man Winter temporarily poked his ugly head out of his state of impending torpor.  The wind started howling, the rain began to freeze and we relinquished ourselves to a quiet book reading day in the moho.  And we did not mind our predicament at all!  We both had books we were engrossed in and warm blankets to keep our toes toasty.  The only thing we needed was something baking in the oven to release a smell that would waft through the air and tickle our taste buds.  The day before I made gumbo so dinner was already to go but it was the smell of something baking that I desired to complete our afternoon of wintery warmth. 

We sat inside and watched the snowy slushy
 mix pile up on the windshield wiper.

And that is why I decided to bake bread….more specifically - dinner rolls…slash…hamburger buns...slash…bread for lunch sandwiches…slash…whatever you want to call them.   This is a recipe that I found on one of my favorite cooking blogs (www.thekitchn.com) as I am not very adventurous in the baking arena and do not dare create my own recipes.  Baking is a science with ingredients needing to be in exact proportions and is not very forgiving when it comes to mistakes.

When I was a kid, my dad spoiled us with homemade baked bread.  It would rise in front of the fireplace on a cold winter day and fill the house with a sweet yeasty smell.  He made three kinds – white, wheat and cinnamon raisin and often we would eat the entire loaf right as it came out of the oven.  Along the way he learned a very valuable lesson about baking bread…make sure you take a stick butter sitting out on the counter a couple of hours before the bread was done baking so it was nice and soft for spreading on the hot steamy bread.  And if he forgot to take the butter out of the refrigerator, mom would remind him! 

That lesson was passed on to me and I made sure the butter was softening up nicely before the rolls even went in the oven. 

This recipe is really easy and I mixed all the ingredients and kneaded the dough in my stand mixer (yes, our RV does have a Cuisinart stand mixer – some things I just could not bare to give up).  There is only one rise and you can shape these rolls to whatever size you want.  I made mine larger for sandwiches rolls and hamburger buns and cooked them on a sheet pan.  If you want them to be taller and fluffier, use a deeper baking pan as the recipe calls for.  Oh, and if you space them evenly they will not have the odd shapes that mine did.  

Hope you enjoy!

Ingredients

1 tablespoon active-dry yeast

1/2 cup (4 oz) warm water

1/2 cup (4 oz) milk (whole, 2%, or skim)

1 large egg

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt

3 cups (15 oz) all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon butter

Directions

In the bowl of a standing mixer (or a large bowl, if mixing by hand), stir the yeast into the warm water and let it sit until dissolved (approximately 10 minutes).  In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk, egg, oil, sugar, and salt.  Add this to the yeast mixture and stir until combined.  Add all the flour and stir for a minute or two until it forms a shaggy dough.

Knead at low speed with a dough hook (or by hand) for 8-10 minutes, until smooth but slightly tacky.  It should spring back when poked.

Cover the mixing bowl and let the dough rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about an hour.  Meanwhile, line a 9x13 pan with parchment and spray with nonstick coating.

Dust your work surface with a little flour and turn the risen dough out on top.  Divide the dough into 12 pieces with a bench scraper or knife.  To shape into rolls, tuck the edges underneath to form a plump little package, then roll the dough against the counter or between your palms until round.

Arrange the rolls inside the pan spaced a little apart.  Let the rolls rise until they look pillowy and fill the pan roughly 30-40 minutes.

While the rolls are rising, pre-heat the oven to 375°F.

Melt the butter and brush it over the risen dinner rolls. This helps the tops to brown and keeps the crust soft.

Place the rolls in the oven and bake until golden, approximately 15-18 minutes.

Lift the rolls from the pan using the parchment and let the rolls cool on a wire rack until cool enough to handle.  They are best if eaten within a day or two, but will keep in an airtight container on the counter for up to a week.  Rolls can also be frozen for up to 3 months and reheated in a warm oven.

Death at Dworshak

Two days before the big opening of the campground when families were due to arrive for their much anticipated inaugural camping trip of the season, there was some big excitement in the campground.  It was nothing major like a water main break or complete electrical outage; it was just a dead deer behind site #32 that appeared to be killed by a mountain lion.  O.k., so that could be big!  The wildlife biologist (Russ) discovered the deer and alerted us and the other four work campers –  since we all have dogs, he was concerned about their safety.  The bite marks around the neck and missing innards were indications that a carnivore had killed it and was eagerly feeding on it.  This was no natural death by old age.  So now things are getting interesting at Dworshak Dam and Reservoir!

Warning:  the next photo is not for the squeamish.

Betsy and I were totally intrigued with this new development so we leashed up Spirit and ventured over to site #32 to survey the situation.  The kill was fresh and the aura of the site sent Spirit’s hackles up as she approached the area with monumental caution.  Her nose was going crazy with unknown smells and her slinking posture indicated she felt this was not a good place to be. 

Note the campground in the back right of the photo.

So now we were off to find Russ and interrogate him some more about this Wild Kingdom episode that had unfolded.  Mountain lions are fairly common in the area and Russ felt this was more likely to be a mountain lion kill than wolves.   Betsy and I pleaded with Russ to set up a motion-activated wildlife camera near the carcass as we wanted to know more.  It was not good enough for our minds to run wild with possible scenarios, we wanted facts (and pictures).

Russ and Andrew (the Park Ranger and our “boss”) decided it would be a good idea to move the carcass out of the campground and set up a camera at a new location.  After all, they did not want to attract large carnivores in child-filled campgrounds and site #32 was going to really start smelling.  We agreed whole heartedly with that decision.  So the deer was loaded up in the ‘gator’ and relocated about 75 yards away from the campground into the woods.  The plan was to set up a camera and the next morning Betsy and I would retrieve the memory card, download the photos, and report back our findings.  (At this point Spirit was really hoping she was not involved in the plan.  It seems she may have better instincts than us and was not so sure about hanging around a dismembered animal.)

Betsy driving the doe to her final resting place.

The next morning, we awoke with anticipation and headed into the woods to retrieve the memory card and investigate the most exciting campground happening.  And what did we find…

It seems the does friends were coming to pay their final respects.

Yes, we were monumentally disappointed that we did not get to see a majestic mountain lion strolling across the cameras view, but our interest did perk up when Andrew made the comment that the now rank deer may attract bears. 

Russ let us keep the camera to play with so stay tuned for more drama…

Me happily replacing the memory card and Spirit staying close by worried about what might be lurking!