One of Our Favorite Highways

Today we are on one of our favorite highways, highway 50 through Nevada.  I like it because there aren't many cars and no trucks and the scenery is beautiful.  It was cloudy today with scattered showers perfect for driving.  I didn't take many pictures but here are a few.  Since the last time we were on this road they have built a wind farm.  Needless to say it is windy right here.

Detail of above tree.

The last picture is of the Highway 50 Shoe Tree between Cold Springs and Fallon, NV.

We should have stayed in Cold Springs but we pushed on to Fallon where we checked into the Fallon RV park west of town.  On paper this park looks good BUT I guess the girl didn't like me because she put me in a spot that was over run with ants and I'm pretty sure she knew that.  When I drove back to the office to ask for another spot before I could even ask (see she knew) she said she couldn't move me and there wasn't anything she could do.  "How about a refund" says I and she said "no refunds".  That's ok I'll leave anyway and I will give your rv park a scathing review and write a letter to the Good Sam club and tell them all about you and I'll go on the internet to the Facebook page RVTips and tell the RVing community all about you. So we are down the street and I'm sitting at my computer.....

Thanks for reading my rantings.

A BIt of a Bummer

News flash.  My camera bit the dust and two days later so did my computer. 

We have had some wonderful days traveling and picture taking, but most of those pictures are on the crashed computer.  If I had known it was going to crash I wouldn't have tried so hard to get the pictures off the broken camera.  But there you have it, such is life.

But I was able to get a new camera, Sony Cyber-shot  DSC-H300, in Montrose, CO.  and am learning how to use this one.  So today I have only two decent pictures to share with you. 

Isn't this just the cutest thing you've ever seen? In the KOA in Montrose, CO.

It's dandelion season in Colorado. Photo taken on Lizard Back highway.

Apricot Mallow, lookin a bit dark orange in this pic.

We stopped for a walk-about with Rose and found this guy sunning himself.

We spent two days in a BLM recreation area along the Green River outside of Green River UT.  I had read about this place on RVSue's blog .  We loved it there, we arrived early on wednesday May 21st and left really early May 23 as the Memorial weekend crowd was already coming in and when we woke up on the 23rd it was raining and to get to this campground you have to drive through a 'wash', and I didn't want to do that if the wash had much water running through it.  But all was ok, rain was soaking in not running off.

View of Green River from camp spot.

Our neighbors rafting down the river.

When we left Green River this morning we saw this mountain goat with 

two females on their way to the river for a drink.

We are in Beaver UT tonight and tomorrow we will continue our way west.

Camera review.  I don't like this new camera.  The on/off switch is in an inconvenient place, it has a hard time focusing.  Today in the rain I took some pictures through the windshield and it insisted on focusing on the raindrops on the windshield.  Yet when I try to take a picture of a flower it can't seem to find it and not focus on anything at all in the frame.  You can get an idea about that by looking at the pic of the two mountain goats drinking.  What part of that is in focus I ask?  And it isn't that i'm not giving it enough time to focus.  I'm giving it all the time it wants.  It will zoom in and out and in and out again.  

Until next time.  Thanks for reading.

Highway of Legends

We left Denver and headed south to Trinidad, Co. where we then took hwy. 12 west.  This road is called the Highway of Legends.  We had picked up a booklet about this road somewhere along the way and decided that we needed to drive it.

This highway is one of the many scenic highways in Colorado and for good reason.  The booklet tells all about the Indian legends and history along the road.  

Coke ovens near Cokedale, CO.  This was a big coal mining area.

We spent the next night in Stonewall CO.  I didn't get a picture, sorry, but the stonewall rises 250 feet above the valley floor, we were the only rvers in the very small park and we were lucky they were open as it is a little early in the season and many places are still closed for the winter.

Looking back at where we had been, the mountains not the dirt road. 

 Those are The Spanish Peaks we drove around then on hwy 12.

From Stonewall we headed towards highway 160 going west and spent the night in Alamosa but not before going to see The Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.

There they are.  Under the cloud-shadows.

 If you would like to learn about this little known National Park click here.

I'm going to leave you with these two pictures of what I call 'grass circles'.  I don't know why it grows like this but it looks cool.

foot note

This blog website gave me nothing but problems today.  I just couldn't get it to format right.  Things that should be justified aren't and some text is blue, it lost a picture and on and on.  Sorry.

My new Truckers antenna.  It is supposed to boost cell signals.  

Don't know if is does yet as it isn't plugged into the booster thing. 

 I need more cable.

Yes, it's at an angle.  Only place to put it right now.

It's Snowing in Denver

I have read many books and journals written by women who traveled west in wagon trains.  Those were hardy women.  Many trains stopped at Bents Fort in southern Colorado.  Now Bents Fort is just off of highway 50 so we went on over to see it.

Just a taste of the plains.  But this picture is special, why you wonder?

There are no phone/power poles alone this road.

I can picture covered wagons and freight wagons and tepees and such all around.

A nice man took our picture.

Evie on left Joy on right.

After Fort Bent we headed to Limon, CO.  It was very windy there as it is on the plains.  Mom and I talked things over and decided that with this big storm coming in, and on the plains it is very windy, and we hate wind, that we would rather be in snow not wind.  So we got up really early and drove like mad towards Denver where we have a cousin.  We thought if we were going to be stranded somewhere we wanted it to be Denver.  Well things worked according to plan, we got to Denver as the snow started to fall and it didn't stop for 36 hours.  But that was ok as we were in the county fairgrounds and plugged in.

Our neighbor.  The camera insisted on focusing on window drops but you get the idea.

A good pic of drops on window though.

All is well and the storm has passed and we will leave in the morning.  See you in a couple of days and hopefully it will be warm wherever we end up going.

Evie and her mom

Rocks and Wind

We arrived in Raton NM Wednesday afternoon and had an early dinner of Mexican food.  Then we went looking for the RV park that we had decided to stay in for the night.  The RV park app on my iPhone said it was just outside of town, no problem and away we go.  I should tell you that the wind in NM has been blowing rather strong lately and Wednesday as we later learn it is blowing around 45 mph.  Rather stiff and no fun trying to drive an RV in.  But no problem as we only have 3 miles to go.  HA! after 7 miles and we hadn't found it yet we turn around and go back into town and pull into the KOA for the night.  As it turns out that other RV park is on a completely different road in another direction.  Good thing we turned around when we did or we could have found ourselves in Kansas.

On our way into Raton we passed this,  NRA Whittington Center.  We didn't know what this was so of course we pulled to the side of the road and did what anyone would do, we Googled it.

NRA Whittington Center  The center is everything outdoors, and all about fire arms.

We went back to the Whittington Center Thursday morning to see one of the reasons we were in Raton in the first place.  The Santa Fe Trail.

Wagon ruts along the Santa Fe Trail.  The trails west weren't always one lane.  

Mostly they were wide super highways like you can see in this pic.  

Here you can see it was 4 lanes wide.

The other reason we came this way was to see this.

The word Capulin is Spanish for chokecherry.

View from highway 64.  See the road going up and around the side?

We drove to the top but to do that they stopped all traffic coming down the volcano to allow us(we are 30' long) to go up as part of the road is narrow and curvy. Thank goodness there weren't many cars that day.  The drive view is spectacular. 

View from top.  See those other volcanoes?  Northern NM is all about volcanoes.

Looking down into the crater.  See red Indian Paintbrushes blooming?

There are several trails, one down into the crater one around the crater plus several around the base.  

Onward through

To 

These are the highlights.

Wind farm in Colorado.

This is Gobbler Knob. 

"These prominent formations are an outcropping of Dakota Sandstone, 

which geologists believe are about 100 to 140 million years old".

Here's Rose doing what she does best, checking things out.

Whenever we stop Rose is at the door wanting to go out to see where we are.  She waits while I put her harness on and then eases out the door onto the step where she looks around then jumps down to the ground and then it is "let's go here mom, how about over there, what is that bush, boy big rocks, ouch there is a sand spur in my paw".  I just hold the leash and follow her around giving gentle guidance and nudges.  Today was the first time she was ready to get back to RV before me, and I could hardly keep up with her, she was dashing home. 

Good night from Lamar, Colorado

Out of the Mountains and onto the Plains

After Bandelier it was on towards Taos where we spent the night.  To get here we drove through the Rio Grande Gorge which is beautiful.   

The next day we drove over to see the bridge over the Rio Grande Gorge.  If you would like to learn about the Rio Grande Bridge click the link.

Down way down.

The next bit is just pictures we took along the way to Raton, NM.

A small herd of goats along the road.

We have left the Sangre de Cristo Mountains behind. Now onto the plains.

These antelope were very far away. 

 This big boy was right along the road, see the pavement?

Antelope also know as Prong Horns.

Good night all.  Thanks for following us.

Three Days in Albuquerque and We're Out of There

After three days in Albuquerque visiting family and eating at the best Mexican food restaurant,
Papa Felipe's, it was time to move on along our way. 

Flower pics for my flower friends.

Rose and I got our toes wet. And when I turned around mom was getting her toes wet too.

We headed north west on NM 550 towards Cuba but turned off on NM 4 towards Jemez Springs. This highway is a trip through time  You are surrounded by geologic formations on all sides. 

We had our books with us and mom was busy reading about the area that we were driving through. We had seen a TV show on NOVA last year about the Valles Caldera National Preserve and that's where we were headed.  It didn't disappoint us.

                                                Closed.  We've been seeing a lot of this.  

 We are to early for the season.

Coming down into the caldera.

                                             

In the heart of the caldera.

                                                  
If you'd like to read more about the caldera here is a link.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valles_Caldera_National_Preserve

Then it was on to Bandelier National Monument.  We had seen many pictures of this place but they don't do it justice.  After driving down into the park yesterday in the afternoon we decided to camp in the Juniper campground for the night. The campground is in the park but about 3 miles from the ruins. This morning we were back in the park even before the rangers were at work.  We wanted to walk to the lower ruins before it got to warm.  Our timing was perfect, not only was it cool but we were the only people on the trail.  We spent about an hour walking the trail which is a lot for mom, we stopped several times to on our way up to the ruins, to rest but the way back was down hill and there was no stopping for rests then.

Devastating forest fires here a few years ago.

 Outside of caldera on way to Bandelier.

Mom sitting among the ruins.

We did not walk up there.

Need I say more?

Thanks for reading our blog and see you in a few days.

Couldn't resist this one.

Evie and Joy