Silver Lake Resort gets by with a little help from friends

The owners of the Silver Lake Resort got a taste of their own hospitality this week, when about a hundred locals, employees, customers and campers pitched in to help load sandbags onto the banks of Alger Creek after days of hot weather caused this winter’s record snowpack to melt and overflow Sierra waterways.

“We didn’t even put out phone calls out [asking for help],” said Alisa Jones, a member of the family that runs SLR. “It was my husband Andrew, me and our daughter Samantha that we were just starting out on Sunday night. It was just going to be the three of us. So we just started to make sandbags, and people saw us and came out to help.”

Jones said that The June Lake Fire Department and Lee Vining Fire Department also pitched in, although Lee Vining Creek was also flooding this week, said Jones.

[Monday] night we were in dire need of more sandbags, and a lot of them had gone down to Lee Vining Creek, because that road was washing away,” said Jones. Lee Vining Creek Campground was evacuated due to the high water, she said.

Alger Creek is not part of the Rush Creek Hydroelectric System. “It’s just  pure runoff, it’s not controlled by anything,” said Jones on Tuesday. “So, what was happening was the part of the creek that diverts to the [trout] pond was coming so fast that essentially, if we didn’t control that, it would flood our Creek House, Cabin 5, Cabin 3, and the store.”

Although the rising water levels have caused some stress for local business owners, Silver Lake has turned into a paddleboarder’s paradise, with areas that are usually marsh becoming completely submerged.

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