Another fun day on the water. Today we went to Willow Springs Lake. Although not quite as large as some of the other lakes Willow Springs is a good lake to kayak on.
When we awoke this morning around 5:30 am the skies looked ominous. Dark clouds were coming in over the Rim and the radar showed heavy rains coming up from Payson. A further check, however, showed that between Payson and Phoenix was clearing with most of the weather moving further west.
Willow Springs Lake is up on the Rim and east of Payson on SR260 so we decided to wait out the worst of the rain and then load up the boats. After a half hour the rain stopped, we loaded the boats, and headed to the lake. Although the skies were pretty dark we launched and got out on the lake. Within about 10 minutes a light drizzle developed and out came the ponchos. The drizzle lasted about 45 minutes and stopped. Eventually the skies cleared and we had a blue sky, puffy white cloud day ahead of us. Glad we decided to head up to the lake.
The lake didn't have but one other boat on it, and that was my friend Barry and his brother Martin who had come to Pine last evening from California. They were in an inflatable rubber boat with an electric trolling motor. All was quite on the lake, just the way I like it.
As I quietly paddled along the shore I saw several blue heron and was able to glide close by for some good pictures. It almost seemed like they were posing. A little while later and further along the shore I saw two large birds high in a pine tree ahead of me. At first I thought maybe they were bald eagles as I had seen at Wood Canyon Lake. It turned out these were osprey as I got a clear look at them once they took wing. For the rest of the morning I could see them swoop down to the water and pick up fish every ten minutes or so.
Along one low part of the shore there were white-tailed kite. When they flew it was typically in a formation of 10 - 12 birds. They would fly from one end of the lake to the other and then return to where
they had started.
All along the shoreline were many beautiful scenes. The rock formations came down to the shore and often continues into the water. Trees along the shoreline were mirrored in the water along with many tree trunks that suggests that the water level has been much lower at some point in time.
