Colorado Walk

The plan is to work our way north…

…after we break camp in the San Isabel National Forest. We parked next to the very noisy creek and the elaborate cement weir whose purpose escaped me on this wild creek. Then a worker came by and opened the gate in the wall watching the pool of water flow out into the lower creek. I asked him what was the point of the barricade in this lonely place. 

Apparently when they close the dam the water spills into the grill and is sent to irrigate a different destination. With the gate closed the water backs up behind the cement dam and then flows over the top and is drained off to irrigate a different area downstream. 

He laughed when I said he drained my swimming pool. I did have an idea to go for a paddle when we first arrived but even though the water wasn’t totally freezing  it was pretty muddy so I skipped the swim. Then it was too late. 

So after a few days listening to the creek rushing by…it seems time to move on. 

We take a morning and an evening walk Rusty and I and it’s been a pleasure watching him gallivant through the woods just like he used to in the mangroves in the Keys. 

It’s a beautiful spot and at nearly 10,000 feet I have to stop on the steep bits to catch my breath. I take a couple of Tylenol to clear my high altitude headache in the morning and yet as we walk I find myself hunting for air. I’m not physically tired and I can walk easily but the air is surprisingly thin and I notice that on the uphills. Rusty doesn’t notice. 

The peaks all carry specks of white even in late August, snowfields that soon will be covered with even more snow. At night temperatures drop to around 40 degrees but we are comfortable inside our well insulated GANNET2 without any heat. 

The woods are dry and silent, I hear no birds and see no squirrels and no bears either. Just as well that, but I rely on Rusty to find our way safely and to return whence we came. 

He’s pretty good at it too, so we circled through the pines for as long as he felt like it and then at one point he looked back at me and set off directly for our starting point. 

I knew roughly where we were going as I had noted the angle of the sun but soon enough I could hear the rushing of the creek and he sat down and waited for me to catch up before we crossed the road together. 

We got home across the dirt road where Rusty curled up in a shrub and I got to grips with the hammock and my book.

Cars rush by to the interior where there are proper paid campgrounds where campers sit cheek by jowl instead of free camping dispersed like us with no facilities and there are also trailheads as destinations where hikers clump off to check out the views above the tree line. 

Rusty took up his position monitoring the approaches to our camp and I had tea to recuperate from our wander. 

I’m reading an autobiography by Ed Webster an American climber who wanted to summit Mount Everest in the 1980s called Snow In The Kingdom. 

It is a little overwrought  but it is vivid and gripping describing a world of extreme climbing I will never experience which means I should forgive Webster his rather lurid prose describing exceptional places and riveting human effort. So as I stagger up the gentle pine covered incline seeking oxygen for my lungs I think of the four climbers trying to get to 29,000 feet up a rock face with no oxygen tanks. 

I have never wanted to climb mountains or peer into a passing abyss but when I was waiting for 911 calls I liked to explore lives I had no desire to live and visit places on Google Maps I might or might not get to visit in retirement. Peru? I hope so. Everest Base Camp? Very unlikely. 

My own base camp with electricity and cooking stove and toilet and water tank but no hot running water and only an outside shower. If it isn’t onboard I don’t have to fix it. 

I shall miss the serenity and ease of camping on public lands as these places don’t exist abroad as public recreation wilderness but I don’t take any of these days on public lands for granted. Good fortune camps with us, for now. I trust as we wild camp South America we shall find equivalent peace and serenity occasionally. 

What wonderful places we have to enjoy right here. 

The Great Sand Dunes

What a strange and unexpected place. I was advised to visit so we drove a bit out of our way to check out this previously unknown National Park. I’m glad we did. 

Some people think the Dry Tortugas are off the radar of most tourists and Big Bend in Texas is about as unknown, much to my surprise but the Great Sand Dunes of Colorado? 

Never heard of them. 

We did Sleeping Bear in Michigan three years ago and I’ve traveled the desert southwest plenty over the years. And yes White Sands New Mexico is on the list but this is the country’s largest pile of sand. Here you have it: 

Rusty loved it even if he had to be attached to me. I was amazed the National Park was okay with dogs on the dune (not all the way in but enough to get you up a hill).

The park is open 24 hours so our plan was to camp and get to the dunes at or near dawn to catch the light. 

It turns out that the campground was full, checking the recreation.gov app it was clear there was no availability. However our constant companion iOverlander showed a free parking area thirty minutes from the park. We called the national park and they said we had access 24 hours so we parked at the spot humorously labeled UFO Highway Pulloff just north of the village of Hooper in the San Luis Valley.

It was windy and bleak such that even Rusty gave up sitting outdoors and we spent the afternoon waiting for rain and watching Endeavor on Prime on our iPad.  

It was surprisingly comfortable confined as we were to GANNET2 but I was glad when it got dark and I could set my alarm for five am. Which is not to say it wasn’t equally bleak when I got us on the road around 5:30 on a frigid windy morning. What a place! And not a single UFO came by to say hello.  

My theory is they created a UFO sighting spot because life in the dry barren agricultural valley needs some drama injected into it. So, back to why we were here, why did this great sand dune thing occur? It turns out the valley was a lake millennia ago and after the lake dried out winds blew sand particles up the valley and they came to rest in what became the dunes. 

I spotted the sign board on our way out of the park as we left a few hours after arriving. It’s an easy place to visit as you just drive in and turn left to the dunes parking lot.  We arrived with half a dozen early birds on scene and one couple was actually finishing up sledding down the dunes.  They said the sand was cold. 

Rusty really was allowed on the sand and he had a blast dragging me at a gallop. That must have been a sight. After the dunes he wanted to check out the parking lot. 

Changing rooms and cold showers (no thank you!).  

A lovely picnic area was hidden in the shrubbery behind the parking lot. Apparently in rainy season the valley in front of the dunes can flood with rainwater runoff and the parking lot area is a bit of an oasis with greenery. 

I made a discovery back here and brought GANNET2 back after Rusty was slightly worn out. 

I attached our hose to the water faucet and we filled our thirty gallon tank. We were only down ten gallons but it’s nice to keep it full when we are wild camping all the time. We take it where we find it. 

The blue funnel is a Water Bandit, a five dollar piece of rubber you can slide onto a smooth water faucet which allows you to screw on your hose for easier water transfer. Very cunning. 

Aside from all that the place was great fun to visit and we are grateful for the suggestion. Up next Leadville and wild camping at high altitude.