DAY 5 (cont.) - Leigh Creek Campground (Tensleep Canyon) to Sheep Mountain and Greybull, Wyoming
Tuesday, June 10, 1997

Early Afternoon Fish Hatchery Tour:

As we walked over to the raceways, the little troutlets were extremely skiddish and in a pulsating swarm would blast away from our approach point to the opposite end of the raceway. The kids were quite amused, but the adults suggested it was not polite visitor manners to make a game of spooking the little troutlets.

Inspecting the raceways

Upon inspection of the raceways, we noticed some wiers where the trout could jump up and get to another raceway. The gate was in the up position (photo), so we reckoned in order to graduate from the first grade, Mr. or Ms. Troutlet would have to make the jump. We assumed that when the gate was down, troutlet school was in succession and nobody was allowed to graduate yet. We looked around for the professor, but he musta been on a coffee break. Hope the troutlets were not cheating by using their neighbor's back as a stepping stone. If you look real carefully you might catch a cheater (photo). Hope that guy gets caught on a rusty fish hook and is seared on a cast iron skillet while still alive. Cooky was also keeping a list of cheaters to give to the professor when he got back from his coffee break (photo).

Speedbump and Jeremy lead us over to some large ponds that held the esteemed graduates of the raceway curriculum (photo). These large guys were lounging around in trout college. Jeremy spied a few beefy ones that musta been on the football team (photo). Bill said where there's a football team, there also must be a squad of cheerleaders, and headed over to the pond for a gander.

It is now time to get back on the road to Greybull. Cooky snaps one last scenic shot of the place. Here the hatchery is captured against the cliff faces of the canyon (photo). Clouds are drifting mountainward to the bad weather area that we left up at the fire tower. Cooky looks over and spots Bill taking a few last minute photos of a flower. (photo).