Obligatory, Gratuitous Wildflower pics

We are doing this blog at the request for friends and family, but we are also using it as a personal journal to document our trip. Since I sometimes need a roadmap to get home, this will serve as a memory jogger in the future. Since we are also captivated by the diversity of wildflowers out here, we will continue to record pics of them. If the narrative, subject matter, or anything else becomes boring, please fast-forward to a topic that might be more interesting to you.

Back to Gunnison to recharge

July 15, 2010 After 5 days in this campground, it is time to go into town to shower, do laundry, wash the truck, charge the batteries of all the technological toys, charge our batteries, and chart our next destination – not to mention, updating the blog. We decided to re-visit the Island Acres motel to get all this done. The folks here are super nice and we just appreciate the feel of this 50s era rest stop. While waiting on clothes to finish at the Laundromat, we took the opportunity to visit a little coffee shack and treat ourselves to a fresh huckleberry smoothie – well worth the $5 price tag! We did get a couple of photos on the road into town.

Tin Cup, Colorado

July 14, 2010 The East and Taylor rivers converge in the tiny town of Almont, Colorado to form the Gunnison River. Since I had fished two of the three, I wanted to get some angling time in the East River. After about 45 minutes of swatting at a mosquito air force, and watching a storm roll in, I wrapped it up after catching just one small fish. I did manage some more time on the Taylor, and hooked a few nice fish only to lose them. I’ve got the cast, the drift, the right fly, and now I’ve got to improve the hook-set. We did take the afternoon to make a trip up to Tin Cup, Colorado. Tin Cup was a gold and silver mining town in the mid-1800’s and had a reputation as one of the wildest towns in Colorado. For a time it was actually run by a gambling mob that hired lawmen to give the appearance of a law-abiding town, only to later fleece the belongings from those who stayed. After the mining operations dried up, Tin Cup was considered a ghost town, after once having a population of 6,000, and the home of 20 saloons. Today, all of the old cabins have been restored to their original condition and are inhabited full-time by some, and part-time by many. There is actually a small store and café that remain open. To us, the most fascinating place to visit is the cemetery, which sits in a beautiful meadow nestled among the mountains. Spread out around the small stream/beaver ponds are various burial knolls: Jewish, Protestant, Catholic, and Boot Hill. In addition, back in the woods, and not in a knoll, is one solitary grave marker of a black woman cook. The Protestant knoll is by far the largest and the graves are scattered seemingly randomly through the pine trees. Markers range from the very old to some very recent. Most are identified by outlines of native stones, some with faded wooden markers, and some fenced with logs or ornamental metal. We’re not for sure the significance of Boot Hill, which is mostly associated with the final resting place of gunslingers and/or paupers – which did not seem to apply to those markers we viewed. We could spend considerably more time in this area as there are so many more features and places to explore – hopefully we will be back and stay longer. For the meantime, we have booked one more night before heading back to town.

July 13, 2010 Well, the folks with the high-decibel generator cranked ‘er up at 7:00 a.m., followed by idling of the loudest diesel pick-up I have ever heard, tossing of left-over firewood into the back of the truck and all other kinds of banging and clanging and loud conversation. Much to our delight, they pulled the huge RV out and headed to another place and as they pulled away we couldn’t help but notice the auto tags were from Texas – ‘nuff said. Actually that’s not quite fair – we have met many nice folks from Texas on our trip. Very chilly this morning – I woke up early but didn’t get much done for awhile other than put a pot of coffee on. After it warmed up we headed up to the prime fishing water where I was able to fish for a couple of hours while Charlcie headed for the top of the mountain to get a cell signal and catch up on a few things. Although I didn’t catch any of the huge trout that populate this river, I was able to catch a handful of brilliantly colored rainbows in the 6”-12” range. When fishing got slow, I decided to take a snapshot of the trout that were underfoot. A little experimentation with my Olympus waterproof camera. The water is so clear and the fish so close, that I actually took this snapshot by just holding the camera under water and snapping on auto setting. After reading my operations manual for this camera, I discovered, duh, that I can actually take photos or movies underwater with several available settings. For the future – perhaps with enhanced quality. After lunch, we were able to grab some hammock time. A little breeze gently sways the hammock and rustles the pines which produce a nice soothing sound and the aroma that signals you are truly in the great outdoors and a relaxing nap is the end result. We did make an attempt at post-nap fishing, but was ill-fated due to one of those typical afternoon storms that pop up out here. It continued to rain, so we had to alter our plans. I now know why Charlcie was not too keen on my suggestion to procure a dining tarp to put over the picnic table at our campsites. She had been hinting all day about wanting to drive over the mountain to eat at a restaurant – and guess what? Not wanting to prepare dinner in the rain, we ended up dining at The Nugget in Taylor Park.

July 12, 2010 After an early breakfast of pancakes with fresh blueberries, we took the Forest Service cut-off over to Crested Butte. It is your typical Colorado ski/tourist town with the colorful historic homes and shops set in beautiful mountain environment. However, we were not as impressed as we were with Durango, Frisco, Lake City, and some of the other places we have visited. We also didn’t find a suitable place for wi-fi, so we headed back down to Gunnison. Luckily, the Public Library here is very accommodating to tourista wanting to use their wi-fi. We are enjoying the campground. For the most part it is very quiet and the few neighbors we have are nice and considerate. That was spoiled a little this evening when one of the RVers cranked up the loudest generator I have ever heard – luckily he shut it off by 9:30. And we did find a pile of dog doody a few feet from the tent, thanks to a violation of the leash rule. Some folks just don’t seem to realize that common courtesy is a virtue.

July 11, 2010 Today was mostly a day of rest. We slept in pretty late – partly because we were tired, and partly because it was so chilly this morning we hesitated to leave the comfort of the double-wide sleeping bag. We did do some auto sight-seeing around the area, and scouted for suitable places to fish. We observed the fly-fishers targeting the monster rainbows and actually saw a few hooked, and one monster landed. I can’t wait to give it a try! After a suitable time relaxing in the hammocks after lunch, we went downstream and found a pastoral setting along the Taylor River. I fished for awhile, and Charlcie worked on her journal. We had to hustle back and get dinner ready due to incoming clouds – we actually had to finish our meal in the tent, a no-no in bear country. It rained most of the night, but we were high and dry in our truck/tent and conditions were just perfect for slumber.

From Alamosa to Taylor Canyon

July 10, 2010 We’re headed today for the Taylor Dam, north of Gunnison and Almont, Colorado. Taylor Dam is renowned for its massive rainbow trout. These trout get huge feeding on gazillions of freshwater mysis shrimp that are flushed from the lake through the dam. After seeing magazine articles and DVDs about this place, we had to make it a destination. Most of the day was spent enroute and then trying to locate a suitable camping spot. A campsite for us must have a level place to park the truck (our bedroom) and have room enough behind to pitch our 10x10 tent. Even though this is made tougher on the week-end, we were able to secure a perfect campsite in a National Forest campground near the dam. The Lottis Creek campground is forested with lodgepole pine, and aspen, and also is home to a nice assortment of wildflowers. The camp hosts are very cordial and keep the place in tip-top shape. So we will end up staying here four days in all. The temps at night are in the high 30s, so we are in fleece morning and evening. We are entertained day and night by countless birds and chipmunks scurrying around. The bird pictured is a gray jay – most people we asked didn’t know the real name, but rather by its commonly used title, the “camp robber”. They move from site to site looking for food to pilfer. It is so dark out here, that on a night like tonight, you can be entertained for hours just watching the infinite display of stars on display – Charlcie witnessed the first shooting star of the trip. The day began ominously enough due to another dunderhead moment by me – I left my cell phone at the Cliff’s and had to retrace about 20 miles – thanks to Tom, Jennifer, and the boys for coming to our rescue!