The next day we drove to Dinosaur National Monument and stayed at the Green River Campground ($6 per night with the Golden Age Passport, no hookups). On Monday, we took the 22-mile round trip Scenic Drive through the western part of the park.
Earl Douglass discovered the dinosaur quarry when he was looking for fossils for the Carnegie Museum in 1909. The Monument was created in 1915, and consisted of 80 acres -- today it includes 210,844 acres. The park contains 23 exposed geological strata, the National Park System's most complete such record.
At the end of the road, we found Josie's Cabin -- a log cabin built by Josie Bassett on land she homesteaded from around 1914 until her death in 1964. Can't imagine homesteading all by myself!
Tour of the Tilted Rocks -- Dinosaur National Monument
On Tuesday, we returned to the Rangely Camper Park. The next day, we drove the 31-mile Harpers Corner Scenic Drive. There were thousands of Mormon Crickets on the road...crunch, crunch, crunch as we drove! Mormon Crickets are very large -- bigger than most grasshoppers (pictured below) and quite ugly! We had to watch where we stepped when we got out of the truck to see something.
If you are interested in geology, archaeology, and/or paleontology, be sure to stop and explore this park as well as the national parks and monuments in Utah. You'll receive quite an education, as well as seeing some magnificent scenery.
Harpers Corner Scenic Drive -- Dinosaur National Monument
On Thursday, July 3, when we were getting ready to leave Rangley, a hot air balloon took off from the park where we were staying.
We drove to Grand Junction where we checked in at the Junction West RV Park, and then did shopping at Sam's Club after setting up. We spent a week in Grand Junction: got more shopping done, did laundry, had lunch at the Olive Garden, and took my computer in to have it repaired. It was nice to just be able to kick back and relax for a little while after pretty much being on the go since we left Quartzsite back on May 1.
On Thursday, July 10, we left Grand Junction and drove to one of our RPI parks in Montrose, Country Village RV Park. We had lunch at Fiesta Guadalajara, and Earl golfed at The Links at Cobble.
On Saturday, we drove US-550 from Montrose to Silverton, driving over Red Mountain Pass. The section of the highway from Ouray to Silverton was exciting! Actually, just the few miles south of Ouray was a little tense -- you're on the outside with little or no shoulders, and a long drop. After that, the road isn't bad, although there are some tight turns. No problems with our small, 25' fifth wheel, though! Just south of Ouray, we stopped at Box Canyon Falls. The waterfall appears to emerge from the center of solid rock; actually, Canyon Creek eroded the fault through which water rushes 285 feet into Box Canyon below.
Downtown Ouray:
Our rig:
Box Canyon Falls
Box Canyon
We found a place to dry camp along South Mineral Creek north of Silverton. One of the fifth wheels parked near us had several hummingbird feeders out, and there were dozens of hummingbirds flying around! In fact, we've seen more hummingbirds in Colorado than we've ever seen in our entire lives before!
View from our campsite at South Fork Creek:
The second day at South Mineral Creek, we drove into Silverton and explored that town. Quite an interesting place. Stopped and had lunch at Hi Noon Hamburgers. If it hadn't been for Maxx, we would probably have taken the train ride between Silverton and Durango; however, it's about a 10- to 12-hour round trip. I suppose we could have found a kennel to put Maxx in if we'd really wanted to take the trip bad enough.
On Monday, we drove into Durango. We looked at one forest service campground for a place to stay, but didn't like any of the sites, so we ended up staying at the Durango RV Park which is about 11 miles south of Durango on US-550. We spent a week in Durango with the intention of having the missing spring stop on the right rear of the pickup replaced. We went into the local Chevy dealer to order the part, but when it came in, they had ordered the wrong part! Since it wasn't a critical part, we decided to wait until we got to Junction City, Kansas to have it replaced at the dealership where we'd purchased the truck the year before.
Molas Pass with Molas Lake in the background:
In the meantime, we did laundry, grocery shopping, washed the truck, and went out to dinner for Earl's birthday, which was on the 19th. We also took a trip into Farmington, New Mexico to do shopping at Sam's Club (Farmington is only about 50 miles south of Durango -- less from where we were staying at the RV park). While we were at Sam's Club, we purchased an Averatec laptop computer, which we'd seen at an Office Depot in Durango for about $200 more! While we were in Durango, Earl went golfing at the Dalton Ranch Golf Club.
On Monday, we headed east on US-160, stopping in Pagosa Springs for lunch at Shanhai, a Chinese restaurant, and to do grocery shopping. We continued northeast on US-160, and spent the night at Wolf Creek, a forest service campground just before Wolf Creek Pass (10,850 ft.).
The next day, we continued on to Creede where we stayed at another forest service campground, Marshall Park, which is located on the Rio Grande River.
The headwaters of the Rio Grande are to the west of Creede, in the San Juan Mountains...it starts on the slopes of the 13,821-foot Rio Grande Pyramid. The Rio Grande is the second longest river in the U.S., flowing 1,885 miles from its headwaters to the Gulf of Mexico.
Headwaters of the Rio Grande River
(note peak of Rio Grande Pyramid in background):
Creede is where my Grandmother was born, but her family only lived there until she was 6 months old, when they then moved to Idaho. We went by the local historical society, to try to find some information about her family, but had no luck. However, we did tour Creede, including the Creede Historical Museum, which is housed in the old Denver and Rio Grande Railroad Depot. We stopped to have lunch at the Tommyknocker Tavern.
Creede:
One of the mines near Creede:
Downtown Creede:
The people who were camp hosting had a couple of hummingbird feeders out, and, again, we were able to watch dozens of hummingbirds feeding -- in this case, Rufus Hummingbirds.
On Thursday, we continued west and north on SR-149, stopping at Slumgullion Pass to view the Slumgullion Earth Flow. This is an area where unstable volcanic under rock began to flow into the nearby valley 700 years ago. The mass eventually blocked the Gunnison River tributary to form Lake San Cristobal. The earth flow is still moving at the rate of about 20 feet per year!
Slumgullion Earth Flow:
When we got to Gateview, we headed north on 25 Road to Red Bridge Campground in the Curecanti National Recreational Area.
The next morning, we decided to continue north on 25 Road (also called the Blue Mesa Road) to US-50. The road started out fairly good, but degenerated into a pretty rough road. It took us quite a while to make the few miles up to US-50 since we had to go so slow. Once we made US-50, we headed east and stopped at the Elk Creek Campground, also in the Curecanti National Recreational Area. This particular campground is on the Gunnison River. After setting up, we drove into Gunnison to do grocery shopping and pick up our mail.
Sunset:
The next day, we explored the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.
This canyon is called "black" because it is so deep, so sheer, and so narrow that very little sunlight can penetrate it. Only the rims show evidence of human occupation, never the gorge -- not even by the Ute Indians who lived in the area since written history began.
In just 48 miles through the canyon, the Gunnison River loses more elevation than the 1,500-mile Mississippi River does in its entire length, dropping an average of 96 feet per mile in the national park. It drops 480 feet in just one 2-mile stretch. Before the dams were built upstream, the river used to slam through the gorge during flood stage at 12,000 cubic feet per second with 2.75-million-horsepower force, scouring the riverbed and eroding the canyon walls.
We drove the South Rim Road, stopping at the various viewpoints, and had lunch at the turn around point, High Point.
Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park
On Sunday, we drove back into Gunnison to do laundry, grocery shopping, and filled the truck up with diesel and washed it.
On our way out of town on Monday, July 28, we stopped to get our RV washed. We traveled US-50 east, stopping at Monarch Pass to have lunch. After lunch, we continued east on US-50 until we got to US-285, north of Poncha Springs, where we headed north. Turning west on 162 Road, we tried getting into Forest Service campgrounds, Mt. Princeton and Chalk Lake, but they were both full. Third time's a charm, and we were able to get into Cascade campground. We found out later that there was a whole group of people who come to this area each year to camp, and that is why the campgrounds were so full (have forgotten the details as to who they were, and what state they came from).
The next day, we continued north on US-285 until its junction with US-24, where we headed north and east on US-24 to the Round Mountain campground in the Pike National Forest. After setting up, we drove into Florissant to visit the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument.
This is an area where, some 34 to 35 million years ago, during the late Eocene Epoch (about 30 million years after the dinosaurs and 33 million years before humans appeared), Lake Florissant existed, stretching 12 miles through an ancient forested valley. The lake was created from volcanic mudflows which created a dam across the valley. Fossils of a diverse mix of more than 140 species of plants and 1,400 species of insects have been discovered at Florissant. There are also large petrified stumps of ancient Sequoia trees.
Petrified Sequoia:
Also in the national monument, was the Hornbek Homestead. Adeline Hornbek was the first to homestead land in what is now the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. She was the sole support of her family, which consisted of four children, and got the land under the Homestead Act of 1862. Under this act, Congress offered free public land to settlers. The homesteader was required to be a loyal U.S. citizen (or declare intent to become a citizen), head of a family, and over 21 years of age. Five years of continuous residence on, and improvement of, the land was necessary before the final proof could be made. For the first time in American history, women had access to land ownership, since the Act specified that not a man, but a head of the family could file. Makes one wonder if that language was an error on the Congress' part, especially considering women couldn't even vote at the time...they may never have considered the fact that a "head of household" could be a woman! At any rate, Adeline Hornbek built up quite a successful homestead.
Adeline Hornbek Homestead:
On Wednesday, we drove into Cripple Creek, found a place to park, and walked around town. Cripple Creek is the site of the largest gold-producing deposit on earth. We could see that the town had been a prosperous mining town, as most of the building downtown were brick rather than wood that one sees in most of the old mining towns. However, we were disappointed to see that almost all the buildings were now turned over to gambling.
Downtown Cripple Creek:
Thursday morning, we left Round Mountain and drove into Monument (north of Colorado Springs) where we stayed at one of our Coast to Coast parks, Colorado Heights. When setting up our satellite dish, we discovered that our receiver didn't work. I called Dish Network's technical support, but we never could get the receiver to work. So Earl and I drove into Colorado Springs and bought a new receiver at Comp USA (actually, it was a complete system with 2 receivers and a dish). Then, of course, I had to go through the whole procedure of setting up the new receiver, and calling Dish Network back to get it up and running. After all that, we decided to go out to eat, so we had dinner at On The Border.
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