Day 9 started with me trying to figure out what these tracks were, as something clearly found the inside of the Jeep intriguing enough to explore with its muddy paws during the night.
I was about to bust out the guide to footprints to figure out what it was when I realized that we have no wifi, no cell reception, no connection to the outside world. I explained what I had found to Kimberly, and she said "Oh yeah, they said they have a pretty bad raccoon problem here." That made a lot more sense when we walked up to throw away our trash and recycling. Open trash bags, food, etc laying everywhere.
The people running this place were very, very nice. That said, it is a comical caricature of something out of Uncle Buck, Summer Rental, or some other terrible 80s movie. I'm sure they mean well, so I will leave it at this picturesque image and try to remember it as such.
Our first day trip from here was to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, something we had discovered during our trip research and was at the top of Jordan's list.
I will try to limit the pics as I'm sure you realize the animals were all cute. It started with the giraffe feeding,
progressed to this extremely expressive and disinterested meerkat,
and led to Jordan's current obsession, birds. Her own bird Rio is back home (thanks Hayley!), so she was thrilled to see more budgies and cockatiels, like this one that took quite a liking to her.
One thing that was missing a bit from our experience was the view. Normally this would be a spectacular view of Colorado Springs and the surrounding area, instead today it was smoke.
This zoo was definitely well equipped to handle the big boys - elephants, hippos, rhinos, etc. The elephant exhibit was impressive,
and definitely gave off some strong Jurassic Park vibes. The indoor elephant care center just needed Samuel L,
Newman,
and the guy that gets eaten on the toilet.
We also learned an interesting tidbit about the African penguins.
The zoo was an amazing experience, something we would love to visit again when the air is a bit clearer.
We stopped in town to grab a quick dinner, then headed over to check out Garden of the Gods around dusk. What a fantastic decision.
If you haven't been here, its really hard to describe. Imagine having a miniature national park in the middle of your city. That's Garden of the Gods. We could have spent many, many hours here.
The twilight made for some fantastic visuals, and it also brought out all manner of wildlife. The backdrop everywhere we looked was straight out of a postcard.
We did a few short hikes, soaked in the experience, and headed back to the campground. Once we got into the bigger truck, things got very quiet very quickly.
Tomorrow, I have a morning bike ride planned to let the female contingent sleep, and we explore Colorado Springs a bit more.
Day 8 would be mostly a travel day, and it started out with some pretty fortunate and comforting news. After scaling Monarch Pass a few days ago, the Bigger Truck developed a check engine light about 15 minutes after we reached the bottom. Now, grant you this was much better than the last time we came down Monarch Pass, but with this being the maiden voyage we were a bit nervous.
We stopped at the local NAPA and asked for them to do an OBD code read for us. The woman that helped us out was a saint, she boarded the Bigger Truck, read the code, and while I explained that I had checked all fluids and vital signs, she said "oh, did you come over Monarch Pass? That can throw an O2 sensor code now and then, we see it quite a bit." She cleared the code, and we headed back up the mountain with a renewed confidence.
At the top, we paused for a bit, opened the hood and let the ol' girl cool off, and stopped in the moutaintop gift shop.
This was also a good reminder to not open any packaged food or drink item at 11k'+ altitude. I had opened a ketchup container at about 9k feet and covered the entire counter with it, and this granola mix was definitely trying to send me a warning message
Now - I must digress, while looking up Monarch Pass for this blog I was thrilled - no, elated - no, embarrassed to have not already known this, but I discovered that a portion of Fast & Furious 7 was filmed right here at Monarch Pass. Now if you are not a fan of this franchise, you may as well close this link, delete any other possible connection to this blog, and go sit in the corner and think about all the things that went wrong in your life to not allow you to connect emotionally with Dom Toretto and la Familia.
Note the first minute and a half, where the crew attempts a ridiculous rescue attempt of Ramsey, mostly occurring on Monarch Pass with a few shots happening at Pikes Peak (blog foreshadowing at its finest).
I will allow you as much time as you need to either watch a few more Fast & Furious youtube clips or perhaps binge the entire franchise (including the tour de force that is Hobbs & Shaw).
Ok - back to the road trip. We had nothing but miles to cover, and what should have been spectacular scenery was pretty much this.
The smoke from the Dixie Fire and several others has obscured the skyline for most of our trip, and with the winds really picking up in the past 24 hours,
there isn't much to see and it also makes for an interesting drive of this giant loaf of bread.
Fast forward to Lone Duck campground. I will show you all of the good things about this campground in the below series of photos.
That's right. Complete disaster. We rolled in after 4 days completely off the grid, somewhat excited to be near Pikes Peak, Colorado Springs, and wifi. We immediately discovered that there was no wifi, our site was comically small and nearly inaccessible for our rig, and the neighboring campsite had 14 cars and was bumping Dr Dre at full volume at 4pm.
We were basically camping next to myself and my friends from 20 years ago at Ivan's Campground in Baldwin, MI. Only this time, I was the old guy trying to get some sleep.
We decided to circle the wagons, make the best of it for the night, and evaluate the situation in the morning.
Tomorrow - try not to be the 'get off my lawn' guy and explore Co Springs.
Day 7 started with an incredibly winding drive up route 92 to the north side of Black Canyon of the Gunnison. At one of the turnouts Jordan gave us about a 75% Jordan pose.
Fast forward about 700 curves and 1000 scenic views and we found the only gas station in about 50 miles. These 4 dudes were from Maryland. Brought back some memories for me - those trips are what inspired these cross country family trips.
In Crawford, CO we found this quaint little breakfast joint and admired the eclectic decor.
On the way out of town, this beauty absolutely stopped me in my tracks. Kim and Jordan were scared, and we had a brief life lesson about how to run immediately in the opposite direction from a rig like this, but after that we just sat and admired its majesty. I would love to know who thought a medieval warrior princess deserved to ride into battle on a rabid polar bear, but I will not question their judgement. The interestingly positioned teardrop window is just the icing on the cake. Put this thing on Bring a Trailer and start counting your money.
After a series of backwoods gravel road, we reached the glamorous north entrance of Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. 10 years ago we came out here on the very first Big Truck trip and went to the south side of the canyon. Fitting that we should see the other side a decade later.
We had agreed to keep the hikes a bit more manageable this year after me getting a bit too aggressive in previous years, and today's plan was to hike the 3ish mile out & back to Exclamation Point.
It was hot. 90 degrees and full sun hot, and it was only about 11am. Luckily, Jordan was a trooper and didn't complain a bit. (Narrator - nope. Teenage years are coming on fast, and displeasure with this situation was made abundantly clear).
When we did reach the aptly name Exclamation Point, the views were quite spectacular.
Kimberly was extremely disappointed that I caught my hat when the wind nearly sent it to the bottom of the canyon. One of these trips she will successfully destroy it, but not today.
The little loop at the overlook provides many different vantage points into the canyon, and really makes you wonder why more people don't come here. Until you realize that it is almost as much in the middle of nowhere as Great Basin National Park.
I gave my phone to Jordan to take some pics as she's been showing more interest in photography lately. I got it back with 7 pictures of her shoes.
Once we finished the hike, we headed down the North Rim road to check out the rest of the overlooks. I will save you the 50 different photos we took, and if we ever get somewhere with enough bandwidth, I will post a video tracing the path of the river from one end of the canyon to the other. It was windy enough to feel like a hair dryer was pointed at your face, so that was fun.
After retracing our path back down 92, a mere hour & a half later we were back at base camp. We decided Jordan could use some teenage angst time (thank God she wasn't in this phase when Fallout Boy and Panic! at the Disco were a thing - were they a thing?), so we hopped back in the Jeep to grab some takeout pizza back in Gunnison.
We had seen a brewery/pizza joint while passing through, and it had great reviews from what we could find with our rabbit ears-worthy cell signal, so we were excited.
Dang. They had even posted 5 hours earlier that everyone needed to come down and taste their delicious pizza. We tried.
Luckily we found another joint right up the street, creatively named Gunnison Pizza Company. It did everything we needed it to do. Great pie, lawnmower-grade beers, and a dog-friendly patio featuring a Dalmatian sitting human style in a chair.
The drive back featured yet another ridiculous sunset over the mesa, which somehow made the pizza taste even better.
There was not much interest in enjoying a campfire from the female contingent, but I was more than content to enjoy our final night in nowheresville in this setting.
It was then that I realized that one (or all, it is Colorado) of our neighbors was smoking ALL of the weed, and I just sat back and listened to the weed accent conversation wafting over the tumbleweeds. It was like listening to Shia LaBeouf give Matthew McConaughey a pep talk, except they both gave up halfway through.
At that point it all started to make sense - no wonder there was no cell signal or wifi anywhere in this state, they spent so much money on weed and dispensaries there was nothing left over for infrastructure.
Either way, it made for an entertaining final night in a campground that turned out to be a highlight of the trip.
Tomorrow - back up and over Monarch Pass towards Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak. Cheers!
Day 6 started with a bomb into Gunnison (about 20 min east), then another half hour or so north to Crested Butte. Beautiful drive, even with the smoke blanketing all of the mountain views.
We rolled in not really knowing what to expect. I knew it was a mountain biking mecca (and my bike was back at the campground - today was a family Jeep day), and after about 5 minutes in the downtown I knew I was home.
We grabbed some pizza for lunch at a fantastic local joint called Secret Stash, and watched as a steady parade of well equipped off road rigs loaded up with all manner of outdoor toys cruised through town.
We mapped out a plan, bought some bracelets (unfortunately not from Deb)
from some local kids, and hopped back in the Jeep.
I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. It was absolutely stunning, and after 10ish miles or so, we got to the tricky part. I had done enough research to know that going all the way to Crystal and possibly the Devil's Punchbowl was probably too risky since we were solo.
We actually chose reason over risk (shocking development), and just went a little ways toward Crystal before turning around and heading back toward Emerald Lake.
Since we had passed it on the way up, we sort of knew what we were in for, but seeing the lake from this angle almost looked fake.
Of course photos don't do this justice, as the road is a bit precarious up along the ridge overlooking the lake. It is a single lane wide with a couple of sketchy turnouts in case you meet oncoming traffic. Kim was not down with my plan to park the Jeep on the side for a few pics.
When we got to the tiny parking lot, you could tell it was a great backcountry spot to visit and chill.
Multiple people had brought SUPs out to the lake, and we did our customary family shot only to hear "want us to take your picture?"
We are usually doing our own thing and don't get a lot of these, so this was a bit of a treat. And yes, Jordan can stop getting older anytime now. I keep looking over expecting to see the little girl we know and see this teenager. Crazy times, but it make these moments that much more valuable.
The drive out was a challenge to Kim's patience, as it was just too picturesque for me to pass up.
We had seen a few of these choppers (you knew it was coming) earlier in the day, and Jordan snagged my phone and grabbed this shot of them just overhead. I will admit, being that far out into the wild and seeing/hearing those had me make a Red Dawn reference, which Kim and Jordan just nodded to as they do to all my pop culture mentions. Ok, sure Dad.
With the Jeep trails complete, we slowly backtracked to camp, stopping one more time in downtown Crested Butte to say our farewell. I can see us spending more time here in the future, it's like they created a town specifically for me (except I didn't see RAD playing nonstop anywhere). The only thing missing for us is proximity to water, so this may be an extended visit kind of location. Either way, we'll be back.
When we got to the campground, I was still a bit restless and the female contingent was cashed, so I set out to a nearby hike called Dillon Pinnacles. I swear, these things are named as some sort of a long running joke being played on me. The references are too blatant.
Just as I heard some rustling in the bushes along the trail, I started questioning the wisdom of setting out on a hike at dusk in the middle of nowhere, without any cell coverage, solo, when I stumbled upon this omen to assure me I had used good judgement.
The payoff was this vista just as the sun was setting.
I did end up making it back to the campsite uneaten by whatever was out there, and would highly recommend that hike at dusk. No one for miles, and it feels like you're in an old western. Or Blazing Saddles.
Tomorrow - Black Canyon of the Gunnison, the even less visited side. Cheers!
