Colorado Camp at 9,033' updates

August 11 - A couple of days ago I spent the night up on the Continental Divide taking a few pics of the milky way (Lobo Overlook above Wolf Creek Pass, 11,770' elevation - less forest fire smoke there). I eventually crawled into the back of our new Subaru electric car and slept a few winks until dawn. Then I got uup and hiked a couple of miles along the Continental Divide Trail, which runs from Canada to Mexico. (top photo above, early morning sunshine). Lots and lots of beetle-killed trees in this part of the state, and a lot of dusty roads and trails from a prolonged drought, but still few wildflowers. On the way back to camp I stopped to get a snapshot of the largest RV park in the area - FUN VALLEY (lower photo above). This is about 1/3 of the campground. We prefer smaller ones, hahaha.

WILSON UPDATE Many folks have been asking about our puppy dog, Wilson, and I am happy to report he has been living at 100% after his cancer surgery last October - and in fact has been going with us for many of our hikes around camp and doing just great. His cancer is terminal, and has returned and is growing - all of this was expected. But in the meantime, he is enjoying life and so are we! Mia is also enjoying life at 9,033' as well. HAPPY DOGS!

TODAY I'm headed out towards Utah, and in particular going to be a a student in a nighttime photo workshop in the High Unitas Mountains northeast of Salt Lake City later in the week. Along the route I'll visit Arches National Park (it was 102 degrees there yesterday) - my first visit there in a long time. Temps during the workshop are supposed to be in the low 40's and into the 30's, with possible heavy rain and maybe hail - always possible at 12,000' in the mountains - sometimes you can get both heat extremes in the same day - I have just about every piece of outdoor wear Iown with me!

SMOKE has mostly cleared out after a few waves of rainfall (YEA! Here's a shot of our campsite - I'll be taking our camper van to Utah, and my lovely bride will get to zip around in the electric Suburu. HAPPY TUESDAY TO YOU!

August 7 - we were pretty much smoked out all day yesterday from a large wildfire just north of Lake City, Colorado. When the smoke got really bad we fled to higher ground - up and over Wolf Creek Pass towards Pagosa Springs. Still lots of smoke, but this view from an overlook to the west was pretty good (middle photo), especially with all the interesting rock formations. By evening the smoke had begun to receed (upper photo), and by this morning (lower photo) the smoke had cleared at our spot and backed out into the mountains to the north. With so many wildfires right now and no rainfall in sight, we epect many more days like this. HAPPY FRIDAY TO YOU!

 

 

Colorado Camp 9,033' August 5 - a nice colorful sky at dawn with a temp in the 50's. That color is from wildfire smoke drifting over from a bit one in Utah. HAPPY TUESDAY TO YOU!

Colorado Camp 9,033' August 4 - sunrise along my drive home this morning, looking across the San Louis Valley towards the Sangri de Cristo Mountains.

I made a quick trip yesterday to meet up in Leadville, Colorado with some long-lost friends that I had not seen since 1982 (L-R - Tim, Tish, Tim, John, Sharon). Oh my how time FLIES! We were all part of a group of hikers that backpacked from The Pacific coast (California) to the Atlantic coast (Delaware) in 1980-81. It was an EPIC journey called "HiKaNation" (see more info here). Two of the folks in this photo below did the ENTIRE trip on foot (John and Sharon), while three of us hiked less. (There were several hundred hikers who joined the group for a few days, weeks, or months. I was with the group for several months of the 13-month journey, including leading them across Arkansas.)

hikers above: Tim, Tish, ME, John, Sharon

hikers below: is a photo I took just before we crossed the Missippi River in 1981 (I'm on the far right)

Colorado Camp 9,033' August 3 - after an 880-mile grueling two-day trip across the frying pan that is the Oklahoma Panhandle Dustbowl (temps 100-107 all day), we have arrived at our camp in the Southeast part of the San Juan Mountains in Colorado. This is the view from our 21-acre campsite, which includes the wildflower meadow/cow pasture, and the granite volcano plug with the ponderosa pines on top. All the other green trees are aspens - we have hundreds of them surrounding our little cozy camp spot, many of them are 30-50 feet tall.

We've been gone a month but it seems our blood-oxygen levels remain high in that the altitude does not seem to bother us - YEA! (Pam and Mia just did their normal mile+loop hike at a prettty good clip and only had to stop once for a passing truck.) I'm leaving here in a few minutes to visit Cottonwood Pass to check on a possible Milky Way photo spot, and I bet the 12,000' altitude there might knock me down a bit.

WILSON and MIA are both happy campers, although it is really HOT during midday and they prefer to lounge around inside our camper instead of chase chipmunks. HAPPY MONDAY TO YOU!