Four States in One

Four States, lunch with the Mayor, plenty of Mesa's, fighting a Buck and yes, Ian got bogged again.

   We said farewell to Wyoming and crossed into Colorado on the 125. We saw what we believe was our first wild bald eagle. It had a white head and white tail and was scavenging with some crows alongside the highway. We continued through Walden all the way to Granby then cutting West to Kremmling and found a camping spot just South near Heeney. A lovely drive through the rocky's, but the best was still to come.

   The next day took us to Silverthorne, we were able to catch up on some wifi and ended up spending three hours getting a lot of stuff in order. A short drive followed through Copper Mountain to Leadville and we camped in a valley beside Granite with some impressive mountain peaks overlooking us.

   A special apology needs to be made to our Mother's. After finishing our meals at night, we have found that licking the plates clean not only is fun, but makes washing up after easier. We promise not to do it when we are in public at a restaurant.

   The following day gave us a scenic drive through Highway 82, crossing the continental divide for the hundredth time. Some fantastic peak look outs and glorious to watch the Autumn colours progress down the mountain sides. We made our way through the trendy Aspen village, a little too trendy for us. Then on to Carbondale where we ducked into a laundry for some heavy washing and grabbed delicious Mexican lunch at the restaurant alongside. After the chores we opted for a paid campground with showers and chose a KAO on the edge of town. Booking in, we were recommended the same Mexican restaurant we had just been to. We agreed it was the best Mexican in town.

   On Sunday, Carbondale celebrated its 109th Potato Festival. So we chose to join them in celebration. A town parade turned into a market and lunch in the park. An important voting period seemed to be upon the States, as many people wore slogans and carried signs to elect a certain somebody. More importantly, the lunch was a slow cooked beef and roasted potatoes. Beneath some loose bark in the town park they had burried two very large metal containers. Turns out they remain there all year and are only used for this one festival. Hot coals are dropped in early in the morning along with bags of meat and trays of potatoes. Outstanding, they also had a giant cauldron of brewing hot coffee that was free. Ian had five cups while Jamie said one was enough. As we queued up and paid our $10, we slowly made our way to the smorgasboard of food and polite helpers serving. Having a yarn as we said yes to anything they offered we discovered the Mayor was serving the meat. It would seem voting was definitely upon them. Ian got a little confused and started up a conversation with another gentleman who he thought was the Mayor and turns out wasn't, he also became very confused, while Jamie laughed behind Ian and told him later who the actual Mayor was. So we count that as lunch with the Mayor of Carbondale. We had a fantastic time sitting on the grass, eating lunch which included dessert from local schools for fundraising. Listening to folk music and soaking up the sun. Thank you Carbondale for celebrating Potatoes.

   Sad to leave a lovely town, in the afternoon we drove down to McClure Pass and found a nice campsite to relax and let our belly's settle. The next day we continued South through Delta and Montrose and made it to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. With 20 vista look-outs and short trails, we can confirm, everyone of them is sensational. A dramatic steep cut canyon gives extraordinary views and nervous overlooks as we wiggled our way along the top ridge South side. A special site were the Juniper trees which were the first we were seeing on our travels, and now, we realise are everywhere in the South. Those, and the Pinyon trees took our fancy.

   That evening we chose to camp in the National Park campsite, as we prepared dinner a small drift of snow came down so we hastily packed up and got cozy inside. The next morning was quite chilly with some slush snow about and still falling. We drove the East Point down to the bottom of the canyon on the river. A nice 16% gradient made us give our thanks to Big Bird again and down the bottom it was much warmer and dry.
   During our time at Black Canyon we were recommended a visit to Ouray, which we had not heard of. According to these people it was the 'Swiss Alps' of America. So we set forth to Ouray only to be turned away by roadworks. Bad timing meant the Red Mountain Pass was closed to roadworks, so instead we took the scenic 145 and made it all the way around to Mancos. Finding a dispersed camp site and a plan for Mesa Verde the next day. That evening we enjoyed another campfire prepared by the Firestarter Jamie and Woodgatherer Ian. There we carried on the Carbondale tradition by roasting some potatoes by the fire. To our excitement these were purple potatoes and tasted just as yummy as their creamy relatives.

   Mesa Verde was fantastic, despite the temperature being 2 degrees celsius we still enjoyed the views, cliff dwellings and petroglyph hike. When the sun came out it warmed to a lovely 6 degrees. We don't know why folks back home complain about 16 degrees. We spent the whole day at the Park and in the evening used their laundry and shower services before driving across the highway to another dispersed campsite.

   A resupply at Cortez the next day, we noticed some residents with blue hankerchiefs hanging out of their back pocket. We thought this was a clever way to dry your hankerchief and demonstrate their unity. So seeing as though Jamie and I are a couple, we have matching hankerchiefs and can also dry them from our back pocket when not being used.
   Our plotted route took us past the American Four Corners, so figured why not and paid the Natives $10 to enter. It was good to see the muddy car park hasn't changed in 27 years. We took the obligatory photo as well as ten more of other people posing. Then on to the Navajo National Monument. We thoroughly enjoyed the changing landscape from Colorado down into Arizona and with Utah North. At Navajo we enjoyed a few more hikes and some more cliff dwellings. Taking it easy again, we relaxed in the afternoon and enjoyed their free campsite. In the morning we made pancakes and also pumpkin soup for later in the day. We left around lunch time and stopped at a very American drive in called Sonic. We parked our car at an ordering booth and had fast food brought out to us. We then sat in Big Bird eating a horrible burger and fries. It was a fun experience though, that we dont need to do again.

   Going North of Kayenta we drove through Monument Valley, breathtaking, with plenty of other tourists taking roadside snaps. In hindsight though, Monument Valley has nothing on its Northern partner Parks. Just after Mexican Hat, we turned North West on the 261 and drove up the Moki Dugway, a twisting nervous crawl up the side of the mesa with patches of gravel and single lanes. Simply stunning. Another big pat for Big Bird and we thoroughly appreciated the views.

   Continuing along the top, we made it to Natural Bridges National Monument. We enjoyed the afternoon hiking to  the Sipapu Bridge, the second highest natural bridge in the world. A lovely Monument where as bad as it sounds, we read the difference between a bridge and an arch. It has to do with water flowing underneath. Makes sense to us now. We camped alongside the Monument at some more dispersed sites. There we sat in awe of the red sunset and enjoyed our pumpkin soup.
   In the morning after toasted bagel with jam, we made our way towards Hanksville. Passing through Glen Canyon and crossing the Colorado we were both in complete awe of the landscape. Dramatic red mesa's and towers followed us all the way to Capitol Reef National Park where once again, we were gobsmacked. The bedrock layers transitioning through oranges to deep red left us in awe and Jamie exclaimed, "I've never seen hundreds of millions of years of rock so visible before."
   Winding through Capitol Reef and walking along the Grand Wash left us constantly speachless. We kept stopping and shaking our heads. Looking at each other in disbelief of what we were witnessing. The colour, scale and shapes we had never seen before and were humbled to be present. We can only imagine that is exactly the same thought and why Butch Cassidy chose this place for one of his hideouts. He was a geologist at heart.

   As we drove out of Capitol Reef we noticed a sign in Fruita for 'Pick Your Own Apples'. We made our way towards the grove and spotted some apple picking skewers, a ladder, plenty of trees and some deer. A dollar a pound, Jamie held the bag while Ian scaled the ladder and used the apple skewer to grasp an apple, twist and catch it in the small bucket. Then lower it down to Jamie for storage. As we slowly did this, Ian would miss and an apple would drop, that is when we discovered the deer and in particular, Buck, true intent. They were thiefs, waiting for just the moment to scoot in and grab the fallen apple before Jamie had a chance to pick it up. These were clearly well practiced deer as they were not shy of Jamie's attempt to 'shoo' or even yell at. We noticed other tourists wanting to collect apples but a little too nervous of the buck and his horns. Maybe they thought we were stupid, but we soon became adept at apple picking and swinging of the bag to scare the thief away.

   Departing Capitol Reef NP as victors, we drove South on the number 12 to find a resting spot. We had seen some lovely desert landscape camp sites and thought this would be good, but chose to go 'a little further' to see what was up the road. Turns out, 'a little further' very rapidly became mountain and snow territory. A little surprised at how quickly it happened, we thought we had best find a spot soon otherwise it was only going to get colder. So just after Grover, we took a forest road East and attempted to settle in to a nice valley. With some snow about, Ian driving, we could feel Big Bird sliding a little on the mud road. Thinking this wasn't a good idea, we attempted to circle around some trees and head back out. Bad move, Big Bird slid sideways, the rear driving wheels spun helplessly, Ian looked to Jamie and said, 'Sorry.'
   So Ian hopped out, Jamie hopped in, Ian walked behind Big Bird and began to push. Slowly we got some momentum up and were able to make it back to some firmer soil, Jamie throttled it and took Big Bird back up to safer ground. Jamie remarked, 'I never thought we were going to get out of there.' Deciding the place was still lovely to camp at, we pulled in alongside the road at the top of the first hill closer to the highway. Both confident of the ground and camping here, we then built a fire and huddled around it, talking through what went wrong and what we should do better next time. Jamie's simple advice, 'Just stop before you do it.'
   Roasted potato, squash and mexican beans for dinner, we voted this the second best meal on our trip. First was the home made souvlaki many, many nights ago. 
   Bryce and Zion will be our next point of call and we hope to spend a few more days exploring those, before we make our way South to the Grand Canyon. Utah, you are awesome.