Where's the Beef?

Back in 1984 there was a hamburger commercial that was pretty popular.  The premise was a little old lady who goes to a fast food hamburger place and when she gets her order, she looks at the hamburger and says, "Where's the beef"?

It became so popular that people started to say that slogan when it came to many things, anything that you felt might be "lacking" you would say, "where's the beef"!

Well, this weekend, that commercial came to my thoughts.  Scott and I went to Folsom Lake, and it was severely lacking WATER!  This is the lake that we grew up at, we dated at this lake, we've kayaked on this lake and swam in this lake and fished in this lake, we learned to water ski on this lake and then in later years taught our children to water ski on this lake. We had been hearing rumor of the lake being extremely low, in fact the lowest that it has been in 90 years.  I was unprepared for what I saw.

The boat ramps all the way around the lake are on the ground.  All boats have been pulled out of the area and there is no longer boating allowed on the lake, because there simply isn't enough of it left.

In the Summer of 2012 I swam in this spot and Scott kayaked as I was preparing for my triathlon.  As you can see, there is no worry about there being no lifeguard, there is no water!!  It's gone!

This is the Folsom dam.  The water is so far below the spill gates.  You could almost walk right out to the dam.

All sorts of sports enthusiast could be seen with their mountain bikes, biking across the dry lake bed.

Scott was taking a picture of how far the land went out to, and I was taking a picture at the same time of how far I was away from where the water used to crest.  See the tree line, that is where the water used to reach.

The only cool thing about this horrible drought is that a town called Mormon Island was unearthed.  When the Folsom dam was built, the people who lived on Mormon Island had to move to a new area, because their homes became a part of the lake.  Now that the lake is so low, we can see old time treasures, that once again have found the sun!  Curious people and history seekers have been coming to this spot in droves over the past few weeks.  No one is allowed to take anything that is found home, but people are taking the items and putting them out for display.  

Pots and relics, from a time gone by.

Scott really loved these old nails, they had square heads.

This was a well that was used back in the day.

Scott is standing in someone's cellar.  We kind of imagine this might have been someone's cold storage.  It was so fascinating to know that people lived here.

As interesting as this all was, I am praying that it will soon be covered up by the water, and my beloved Folsom Lake will be back.  Prayer is what is needed at this time!