Salamander Lake Family Night

Me and my ladies in the ATV, Max rode with the Burts

Last Monday, Sept 16, we had a great night out with Nate Burt and his wife and kids.  We rented a side by side ATV and headed up American Fork Canyon to Tibble Fork and then made our way to a small mountain lake called Salamander Lake. 

Here is a cute video I took after we came home and put the salamanders in an aquarium we had in the garage. 

Believe it or not these little guys are still alive a week or more later!

We had a blast doing this and had to take about a 45 minute ATV ride from the parking lot at Tibble Fork all the way up some pretty treacherous terrain.  If you are not currently aware, Adyson has inherited my ability to worry or have anxiety so she was white knuckled part of the time because we literally were right near sheer cliffs on the way up!

Part of the way up we had to do some pretty legit rock crawling that made the entire ATV lean way sideways etc and even had to maneuver through some deep mud puddles to where water was getting into the floor areas.  It was a great adventure getting up there.

Max riding along with the Burts

Look how tough I think I am

crossing the mud puddles

Nate Burt navigating the trail

Once you get up to the top you see this beautiful mountain lake.  It really is amazing to come out of the trees to see this.

At first we  were worried that maybe we were not going to see any salamanders because Nate said they normally were everywhere but we could not see any!

panoramic view of Salamander Lake

After a few minutes of searching, we started to see a ton of them and the kids quickly removed shoes, rolled up pants and even stripped down to their boxers (max) in order to join the hunt.  We must have seen hundreds and caught 20 or so.

Ady on the salamander hunt

Lucy is even getting involved and enjoying playing with Cameron Burt

I of course had to show off and act like I was eating one!  I didn't though

It started to cool off once the sun was setting so we had a quick picnic with subway sandwiches and then loaded up and headed back down.  I am sure we will be back next spring first thing and a handful of times next summer.  We are so glad we got up there before winter hit us. 

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