Day Eighteen - Tuesday, 8 July - Part III

Now, what makes Mesa Verde so cool? It was the home of some ancient people called the Anasazi's, ancestors of the modern Puebloes.


They were cliff dwellers, though no one knows exactly why or what happened to them. It is believed that they farmed the land on top of the mesas, but didn't find it safe to live there. Very curious. They obviously didn't mind heights, or maybe there was just a natural selection process involved, huh?


I think Cliff Palace and Balcony House are great names for a home. I believe this is Balcony House here. Click on the link above for a little education and views of the awesome Cliff Palace.


(I don't see a tail, but I believe this is a rock squirrel, the main carrier of plague -- yes, black death -- in the Four Corners area. We used to catch, anesthetize and comb these lovely little critters when doing plague investigations. I used to wonder if after they woke up and ran away, did they tell their family and friends they'd been captured by aliens?)

Those were all Simon's pictures. I'm sure you recognised his style.

Did I mention that by now we all had a fine collection of bug bites? Some itchy, some not. Bob won the grand prize for numbers -- I counted at least 65, thankfully not all of them terribly itchy ones. I took this picture not to blog, but to show him his own back. He was amazed, and I'm afraid he may have itched a bit more for having seen it!


The man who showed us where to park pointed out we had a nice view of the Sleeping Ute . I thought an absence of telephone wires would have improved the view, but there you go. The Sleeping Ute's head is at the right, then his folded arms. You can imagine his knees and just barely see the little peak they say is his toes.


I never did make out what was the purpose of the teepee in the car park, but the Brits found it mildly interesting, particularly as the youngsters were going to sleep in one the next night -- oh, yes, they were.


The local jack rabbits seemed to like cutting across the car park. Perhaps they found munchies there around the charcoal grills.

Day Eighteen - Tuesday, 8 July - Part II

So, after we did the Black Canyon thing, Bill, Bob and I returned to the RV and carried on down to Mesa Verde. This was the third or fourth time I'd been here, can't remember if it was the second or third time for Bill. This should tell you what an amazing place it is.

But first we had to get there.


Through some more mountain passes.


Bill was driving, Bob was praying

and I tried to snap some pictures to capture just how much I hated those roads.

But we did get to Mesa Verde, in the late afternoon. In fact we arrived at the Visitors' center just in time to be told we couldn't do a guided tour as they were all booked up for the rest of the day. I think Bob may have been a little relieved as there was ladder climbing involved and since Bill and I had seen it before it wasn't an awful disappointment. Fortunately, we later learned, The Tourists were able to get there sooner and do the whole dash (Simon's pictures will follow). While we were there, I tried to take pictures of this magnificent mountain lion, but the glass case defeated me.



I love the part of the part where they say "If you are fortunate enough to see a mountain lion, please respect its space". (Click on the picture for a readable view.)

Given that he's about a third bigger than me, and very well armed, I don't think I'd have any problem doing that.


We left the Visitors' Centre and drove the 15 miles down to the museum to look at what was on offer at that stage. As soon as we arrived, Bill realised he'd misplaced his video camera and was visibly shaken about it. I was fighting down panic. I don't think Bob could even believe it.

I suggested Bill ask someone at the desk to phone the Visitors' Center to see if it had been turned in, and do it soon as it was close to 5pm when I was certain the Center would shut. The staff were sympathetic, but no it hadn't been turned in. They sent Bill to the Park Rangers' office to file a report. Meantime, Bob and I went down to the Spruce Tree House as instructed, but my heart wasn't in it.


We were all tired. Bob said if it was all the same to me, he wasn't bothered about walking all the way down, as we would just have to walk all the way up again. I was grieving for all of Bill's filming he'd done the last two weeks. We went back up to the RV and turned it inside out, just in case. We found Bill's still camera which had been missing for the majority holiday, so there was at least that positive. I was beginning to get annoyed, seeing as how I'd bought both the still and the video cameras as birthday or Christmas gifts and now that I'd retired was less in a position to replace them, though fortunately, they probably would be covered by insurance. I tried to reassure myself that people who have the money to go to Mesa Verde might already have video cameras and perhaps more likely to turn it in as lost.

Bill came back from the Park Rangers' office looking really depressed. He wanted to drive back to the Visitors' Center to check the mens' toilet; he thought that might have been where he left it. I was frantic to get there, thinking now that the Visitors' Center was closed, it would be harder for someone to turn the camera in. I was thinking that Bill might at least have copies of the videos Bob had taken and Bill remarked that he still had the whole first tape, and would have only lost a portion of a second tape. We were trying to find some comfort; when Bill came back with his camera and a BIG smile we all shouted with joy and relief!

Day Eighteen - Tuesday, 8 July - Part I

Bill’s Road Book
July 8, 204 miles, 5 hours, Note 6
US 50: 66 miles to Montrose, turn left onto Hwy 550

Hwy 550: 55 miles to Red Mountain Pass – south; 10 miles to Molas Divide (11,000 feet); 10 miles to Coal Bank Hill (11,000 feet); 30 miles to Pass (10,650 feet), 33 miles to Durango – turn right onto Hwy 160
Hwy 160: Mesa Verde

Note 6 Mesa Verde
There is a huge campsite at Mesa Verde and they say you don’t have to book as it never gets full. I don’t know how long it will take us to get there over the three 11000 ft high passes from Montrose. Hope to make it in time to have a look around one of the Pueblos before they close at 17:30. We might not get there or we may be able to get a bit further that day

Right, before we head to Mesa Verde, I need to show you around Gunnison. Well, actually around the Black Canyon, which is near Gunnison, the town. Even before that it has to be said that we were well impressed with the RV park and the cabin,


complete with fishing pond and fountain,


fireplace,


library and laundry.



To be fair most RV parks had good showers and laundry facilities, but this is the only place I washed clothes and read magazines! It was wonderfully relaxing, isn't that bizarre?

Now to the scenery.



The main thing I recall about this day was that we were up and at it looking around a bit sharpish as we needed to be in a car and Martin and Helen were anxious to get said car to Las Vegas, because they needed to get a wedding license and Martin needed a new shirt. We'd been carrying Helen's wedding dress around in one of the RV closets, so she was all set. This trip was supposed to have been about celebrating Bill's 60th year in the world, not about them getting married, but you know how youngsters are these days...


I'd been to Black Canyon years ago -- 1983, I believe, for a family reunion when I was married to first husband. I run across those pictures occasionally and if you're lucky I will share some one day just to prove I really was young once. Anyhow, I didn't really mind not spending ages looking around, though the views were just as stunning as they were *cough* 25 years ago.


And we can't leave without showing you some of Simon's wildlife shots:

And, I think a rather interesting photo of Simon himself, taken the day before.

Day Seventeen - Monday, 7 July - Part II

I’m finding it’s a challenge to re-create the holiday at this time distance. Using the pictures to remind me has worked well up until now. However, I’ve discovered that while I can tell on what date Simon and I took the photos, neither of us changed the time setting on our cameras and so I’ve run into pictures and dates that don’t make sense. I think I’ve figured it out – maybe.

This leads me tell you about part II of the 7^th of July, where the Tourists visited Crested Butte. A ski resort town with a mining history, which describes a lot of Colorado. Again, it is fun to see what caught Simon’s eye.

Brits don’t say people have ‘red’ hair, they call it ‘ginger’, so I gather every time Simon sees this word, Helen has to have her picture taken.

Apparently they found some sort of music festival as well.

In the evening, I snapped a few photos.

I'm pretty sure Chris posed for this one.

We had dinner in the RV, but the youngsters decided they needed to have Chinese take out.

Martin says it was the worst he’d ever eaten. I figured it served them right for turning their noses up at my cooking!

Post number 100!!

Day Seventeen - Monday, 7 July - Part I

Bill’s Road Book

Day 15: 7 July 150 miles, 4 hours

US 50: 30 miles to Canon City, 10 miles to Royal Gorge, 43 miles to Salida – keep left on US50; 5 miles to Poncha Springs – cross Hwy 285; 17 miles to Monarch Pass (11,300 feet); 11 miles to Sargents; 32 miles to Gunnison

As I mentioned sometime before, the contrast between the scenery in Colorado and that in Kansas is striking.

Even though I’ve seen it many times before, I found myself taking pictures of the mountains.


Everyone did.

I tried a bit of wildlife photography, but now I can’t see the lizard I was trying to snap. In part it was a technical problem with my eyesight and the camera: if I could see the lizard without the camera, then I couldn’t see well enough close up to spot it with the camera. So, if I put on my reading glasses to see with the camera, then I couldn’t figure out where he’d gone. Don’t laugh – you’ll be old one day. I’ll spare you the pictures of the grass, though perhaps these cacti are vaguely interesting.

Then again, maybe not...

I did snap this bug, following him all the way across a road, dodging the occasional car. I wanted to put my foot next to the bug to show how big it was, but everytime I got close enough, he would stop and lift his hind end like he was getting ready to do something defensive and I wasn’t sure how bad that might be. He didn’t act like he was particularly scared of me, so I ended up chickening out. Trust me, he was too big to step on.

The heat in Colorado is just as fierce as elsewhere we had been, though perhaps a bit more arid. It also seems more tolerable when you can look at snow capped mountains

or rushing springs.

There’s no denying that Colorado is a beautiful place. I kept asking myself why I never wanted to live there. In part I think the cost of living is higher than in the Midwest, but also the thing that makes it lovely is the thing that makes it a bit difficult.

You might notice the words ‘gorge’ and ‘pass’ and 11,000 feet in Bill’s instructions. This is the day we drove through some more mountains. Bob was driving that day. He had white knuckles and Bill was sitting in the passenger side going “Would you look how far it is down there”…”That’s a heckuva drop, I’ll tell you”…and similar. I was on the couch in the kitchen doing my best to sleep through most of it. I didn’t care for the height of the RV in this mountain area any more than Bob did. Bill was just having a blast capturing it all with his video camera.