July 12-14, 2014 We have to head Home

I got up early to do laundry at the park facilities. As I was sitting there I checked my phone and I had good service and a text from Kyle. They had an atv accident and Kristin was in the hospital with a serious foot injury. There is a possibility that she might lose the foot.  When the laundry was done I headed back to the trailer.  Susan and I started packing and getting ready to pull out to head home. We pulled out about noon. We knew we wouldn't get to far that day because we had to go thru the mountains. Sure enough we did 150 miles in 5 hrs. Lots of winding roads and  passes, one of which was Monarch Pass. Its 11,300 ft at the top  and it was 43 degrees there. It was a.pretty good pull up there.On the way down my brakes actually got a little hot so I pulled over and let them cool. Then I just put it in low and crept down the rest of the way. Of course it was raining which didn't help. When we got to Salida we found a nice campground on the river.We made Amarillo the next day and then Liberty on Monday. Its going to be a long ordeal for Kristen. There will be many surgery's to save the foot. Amputation is still a real threat.  This will be my last blog for awhile.

July 10-11 Brake Job

Thursday—I decided to get a brake job on my truck today. Yesterday when we were in Silverton I could hear my left  front brake grinding. I didn’t say anything to Susan till we got back down the mountain. I knew she wouldn’t enjoy it if she knew. I dropped her off at Main Street so she could shop. I dropped my truck off and walked back and met her. We shopped and ate lunch. While she was in a quilt shop the shop called and said it was ready. We went back to the trailer and chilled the rest of the day.

Friday-----We decided to run up to Gran Mesa and look around. First I dropped Susan off at a quilt show and I went to the library to use the

Wi-Fi. After that we headed on up. It was another nice drive. We stopped in a little town called Cedaredge. We finally made it to the visitor center at Gran Mesa. The altitude was about 9500 ft. and the temperature was 63. There were some beautiful small lakes and we looked at 3 campgrounds. We definitely could stay up here some time. On the way down I almost ran over a bear. He came across so fast I had to use my new brakes.  No pictures this time. We spent the rest of the evening in camp.

July 9 2014 A Lazy Day

We had a lazy morning. We sat outside and enjoyed the weather Susan boiled eggs and potato’s so she could make potato salad. I put some ribs in the crockpot so supper was taken care of. I fried bacon and eggs for breakfast.  Then we decided to ride up to Ouray and Silverton. Another gorgeous ride in the mountains. It is a good road but a few nail biting moments. The temperature got to 46 at the top of the mountain passes. We checked out a forest service campground just outside Silverton.  It would be a nice place to camp but no hookups at all. We ate lunch when we got back to Ouray and then headed home. Susan did some sewing and I sat by the river and took a nap. Supper was great but the mosquito's   a little bad so we went inside for the night.

July 8 2014 Blackon Canyon of the Gunnision and a Bear

July 7, 2014 Ridgeway State Park

I had loaded most everything last night so I didn’t have much to do to get ready to roll this morning. We actually got on the road by 7:30. We stopped in Dolores and ate breakfast. We took a western route to Ridgeway. It was a nice easy drive. We did have one 8 mile 7% descent that took a little time as I geared down, stayed slow, and kept off my brakes.  It was pretty but we didn’t get any pictures that really showed the switchbacks. We made Ridgeway State park and was setup by 1:30 pm. We are below the dam on the Uncompahgre River. It’s a nice place and I think we are going to like it here. We get some cell service but not enough to use my hotspot so I still will have to go into town to get wifi and update my blog. We had a few rain showers but I still was able to have a little campfire. The camp host came by and visited us. She said there are lots of mountain lions around but no recent sightings. There has been 2 bear sightings along the river. Susan kept a sharp lookout but we didn’t see anything this evening. Our neighbors Howard and Bonnie invited us to their campfire and so we visited with them till way past my bedtime.

July 6 2014 Laundry Day

Today was our dreaded laundry day. We do this every seven days before we move on. We had to go to Cortez to find a laundrymat. It’s about a 45 minute drive and we got there about 9:45 am. We just barely beat the crowd. Cortez is a really nice clean little town. We ate lunch after doing the laundry and then went to Walmart to stock up for the next week. We eased back to the campground for the rest of the day. While we were sitting outside we had visitors. It was a couple we met on one of hikes. They wanted to check out the campground for future trips. There are only 4 trailers left in our loop today. We have really enjoyed our stay here and think that this place will be hard to beat. Tomorrow we head to Ridgeway and everyone says it’s beautiful.

July 5, 2014 A Nice Hike

It was a little damp when I got up this morning. We had received a little more rain during the night. I still built a fire to sit by. We decided to try another hike this morning. We picked one called Bear Creek Trail. It turned out to be much prettier than yesterdays trail. It was a 15 mile trail but much steeper. We only did a couple of miles. The altitude is still getting to us. As we were coming down we passed a guided horseback trailride. I  think that might be the way to do these mountain hikes. We then ran to town so Susan could get something from the quilt shop she needed for the quilts she is making. We headed back to camp and chilled the rest of the day. We got a pretty good rain in the evening and it kept things pretty cool. You had to wear a jacket sit outside. Tomorrow is going to be our dreaded laundry day. Oh Well such is life.