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| Rocky Mountain High, Colorado! |
Last year we traveled through Colorado from the southeast to
the northwest but this year we basically cut across the middle of the
state.
Traveling across the middle part
of Colorado was another pleasant surprise for us.
Entering
Colorado from the east side, traveling west into Denver, is wide open farm land
lush in hues of greens with a wide, expansive blue sky.
Then, as we approached the western border of
Denver we headed northwest a bit up into Golden Gate Canyon State Park.
It was a beautiful but steep and curvy drive
up to Reverend’s Ridge Campground which is at 9000 feet elevation in a tall
pine forest on a mountain top.
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| View from our campground - Reverend's Ridge |
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| View from our campground - Reverend's Ridge |
Just as
we finished un-hooking our camper from the truck and getting set up, we were
shocked to realize that it was only 37 degrees at 3:30 in the afternoon (it had
been in the 90’s in Kansas), and we were getting a deluge of marble-sized hail
that was covering the ground.
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| our campsite covered with marble-sized hail as white as snow |
The views
from our campground and the surrounding mountains, especially on the drive down
into Boulder were stunning.
It is no
wonder why John Denver sang his beautiful song about “Rocky Mountain High,
Colorado.”
It was only 37 miles from our
campground into Boulder to visit our nephew, Matt ( Jean’s sister Janet and her
husband Tim’s son), but the very scenic, long, winding road down the mountain
road actually took us an hour and 15 minutes of driving time.
The highlight of our visit here was to see Matt but before we met him for lunch we took a stroll
through the Pearl Street Mall area and we took the Celestial Tea Factory Tour,
both of which we thoroughly enjoyed.
A
fellow camper in the KOA in Kansas highly recommended the "tea tour" and we agree that
it was worth the time.
We especially enjoyed inhaling in the “mint
room” and tasting many of the teas.
Even
coffee-drinker Jerome decided he liked a couple of the teas enough to say that
he would drink them too if Jean bought some.
Matt choose a great, quaint restaurant, called River and Woods, on Pearl
Street for lunch and we had such a wonderful, though short visit with him and
his friend, Jeneka.
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| Jerome, Matt, Jeneka, and Jean |
We loved Boulder and
promised Matt that we would come to visit him here again in a heartbeat.
After leaving Reverend’s Ridge, we dropped back down onto
Colorado I-70 west and headed towards our next destination… Saddlehorn
Campground on the top of a mesa in Colorado National Monument near Fruita. We try to avoid driving on interstates as
much as possible, but with all the mountain ranges in the western parts of Colorado, there
isn’t much of an alternative.
Fortunately, this was one of the most scenic stretches of interstate
that we have ever traveled through.
Just west of Denver is the incredible Loveland Pass at 11990 ft. elevation
with two very long tunnels at the top.
Our poor truck was slowly chugging up the steep climb, just as the other
trucks and trailers were, then on the way down we could smell our brakes as
well as others, and even saw smoke coming from some of the semi-truck
tires. Several trucks and RV’s were off on
the side of the road with their hoods up. We then passed many of the well-known skiing
areas, like Vail, and on west through Glenwood Canyon, a section of the White
River National Forest, where the interstate followed the Colorado River in a
two-tiered road in the narrow bottom of a gorge with straight-up towering red
rock walls on both sides of us. The
scenery was breathtaking and the engineering of that road was a sight to
behold.
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| view from Fruita overlook with Road to the Moon Way in the valley |
“The Road to The Moon Way” up to the Saddlehorn Campground
from Fruita rivals “The Going to the Sun Road” in Glacier National Park for
sure. This road with its many switchback, hairpin
turns, two curved tunnels, and very few guardrails or protective walls along
the edge that plummets straight down to the canyon floor as it snakes its way
up the canyon walls to the campground on the mesa top definitely fits the
comments that we had read about driving it as “not being for the faint of
heart.” We found the drive was worth it
though as this was one of our favorite campgrounds so far. The campground was rather sparse with small
juniper and pinon pine trees and scrubby plants and overlooked the town of
Fruita on the valley floor below.
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| looking out our front window in Saddlehorn Campground at the juniper, pinion pines, and red rock peaks |
It
was hot and dry. We had no electricity
and had to haul our water from a nearby water spigot but there was a steady,
strong wind that kept us comfortable and the temperatures were cool at
night. Carly had a lot of fun chasing
the big whiptail lizards and watching all of the birds that frequented our
campsite to check her out and fuss at her.
We were able the do some hiking and a lot of sightseeing here.
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| panorama of Monument Canyon |
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| female longhorn sheep |
We even drove the four miles back down into Fruita to fill up
our gas tank and to have lunch. What a
fun surprise for us to discover it was “Mike the Headless Chicken Festival” in
town.
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| Jerome with the "Headless Mike" sculpture in downtown Fruita |
Yep, you read that right! This is the town that is famous for the
chicken that did not die when it’s head was chopped off. His owner syringe
fed him and made a tourist attraction of the whole deal until “Mike” finally died 18 months later! If you search online you can read all about
it, pictures and all. The festival is an annual event here with
bands, antique car show, and lots of art and food vendors. Some people have weird senses of humor for
sure!
We’re heading to Moab, Utah after this, so our next blog
will continue with our Canyonlands experiences there. Until then,
we wish you all well and hope you’re having a great start to your
summer,
Jerome and Jean (and Carly)
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