July 31, 2014 Creede, Colorado

We drove the Silver Thread Highway between Gunnison , through Lake City to Creede today. Beautiful drive.

View north from Slumgullion Pass (12, 500) . There are 5 14ers in this area, I have climbed all 5. At Spring Creek Pass we passed the Continental Divide again.  John said when he was in college he decided to skateboard down Spring Creek pass. He lost control of the board, and landed on his head. He had bad road rash and a concussion, he spent the night in the Gunnison Hospital that night.

The headwaters of the Rio Grande are up this valley. It is one of the prettiest valley’s I have ever seen. The map shows were we are, the you are here is this valley.

We drove right into a huge thunderstorm toward Creede. The Rio Grand is running down this huge green valley.

Cliffs north of Creede, on the 17 mile loop drive of the mines in the area. Downtown Creede. When the mines were active 10,000 people lived here. Now there are about 400.

The Dog House serves hot dogs that will curl your tail! We stopped at the San Juan Sports store (see all the boots hanging on their sign?). John bought me a new compass for my birthday. Historic building on main street in Creede.

The Creede fire station is in a cave! It was built in 1976. We are camped at Marshal Park on the Rio Grande River, 5 mile north of Creede. I fished here this afternoon. I think the fishes mouths are not big enough to get around a hook here. The river is only ankle deep. It was the same size in Big Bend Texas when we were there. There are so many dams between here and there it does not reach the gulf of Mexico hardly ever now.

The rest of the campground from our site, the best one, last one at the end, very private and quiet.

July 30, 2014 Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Colorado

We headed west in the opposite direction today from Gunnison than yesterday.

Blue Mesa Reservoir in front of Dillon Point. The first of the dams on the Gunnison River and the the beginning of the Black Canyon.

A model of the Black Canyon in the visitors center. The view from the visitors center.  The canyon is 43 miles long and about half a mile deep. It is one of the narrowest canyons in the United States.

Here where the canyon is narrower you can’t see the bottom from the south side. It is around 1000 feet from rim to rim here and it narrows to 40 feet wide down at the river.

If you lean way, way over at this view point you can see the river  2, 500 feet below. John says the river is class IV-VI rapids in the canyon. There are places the water just disappears into  rock sieves- some where you do not want to go in a boat, so there is about a 2 mile portage around the unrunnable  stuff. You can barely see the river in the second photo, way, way down.

Twisted rocks. The view up canyon to the West Elk mountains. That is where we were yesterday viewing high altitude flowers.  There is a Utah juniper tree in the foreground.

The canyon  widens some here in front of the painted wall. This sign is pretty funny. Actually John is a fabulous driver, this is what would happen if I drove!

Between the national park and Blue Mesa reservoir there are three dams on the river. This is the second dam, Morrow point dam. Blue Mesa, behind the third dam is really blue in the afternoon light on the way back.

Some buttes right outside of Gunnison on the way back. At Gunnison this is the play park on the Gunnison river.

The mountain mahogany seeds in the park are really curly. When we got back I took John to the Gunnison Brewery for dinner.  Each wall of the place had a different theme. The food and the beer were good.

July 28-29, 2014 Crested Butte and Gunnison Colorado

We wanted to go up by Crested Butte and view the wildflowers, but there was no room for anything the size of our bus up there, so we stayed in Gunnison.

After leaving Salida we drove past Monarch Ski area over the continental divide at Monarch Pass.  We are staying at the Palisades Senior RV resort. No one under the age of 55. I loved that on their t-shirts they say ‘We’re all here because we’re not all there’. The resort is right next to the assisted living and nursing home too. Very handy. It is very quiet. It is not near a highway  and is between a canal and a pasture.  Here is the bus at Palisades.

For my birthday we drove up past Crested Butte to Skofield pass to see the wildflowers.  Crested Butte claims to be the wildflower capital of Colorado.The areas snowfall, soil, and unusual orientation and sun exposure of its mountains (many of which are stand alone peaks) conspire to create a rare profusion of flowers. There is a wildflower festival in early July, but the flowers can be magnificent well into August. It was raining and cloudy. The wild flowers were spectacular. This second photo has 4 bucks in it. The flowers are so deep you can only see their backs and heads.

Field of sunflowers. The old town of Gothic is now the site of the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory. It was founded in 1928. It utilizes many of the historic cabins here.

This cabin is named Paradise. Aptly named since it appears to be in paradise. There are supposed to be some great views of high peaks here, but they are covered in clouds today.

Fireweed, cow parsnip and sunflowers.  John and I in an alpine meadow of flowers.

Waterfall at treeline. This snow is avalanche debris, you can tell because there are full grown trees that were brought down by the snow.

Queen Anne’s lace in front of a pond near the pass. Queen Anne’s lace, larkspur, geraniums, senicio, chiming bells, green gentian flowers.

Green gentian, indian paint brush, larkspur, sun flowers, and more . We had lunch at this lake. John reserved a table for us. . . We had to hike to the lake, the road was a four wheel drive road, and was too rough for the Subaru.

Birthday girl in the flowers. On the way back we saw the East River meandering in the valley near Crested Butte ski area.

This is a view of the ski area. It has some very, very steep runs at the top. The bowl in the middle is called Outer Limits and you can hike into it. John is at the Eldo brewery over looking main street Crested Butte. It is a sunny place for Shady people it says on it’s sign. John did not care for the beer and he watered the plants with most of it.

Seems when you reach a certain age you are not just a princess, but a historic princess. . . John on a chrome bumper seat on main street.

Back in Gunnison John took me to Mario’s an Italian restaurant for my birthday dinner. What a great birthday.

Sky rockets, sign in the outhouse in Gothic- Save a Marmot, Close the lid and latch the door, chiming bells, queen anne’s lace, chiming bells and larkspur, yellow flowers, Caution falling snow and ice-maybe in the winter, sneeze weed and fireweed.