Back From A Rocky Mountain High
I’m back from camping for six days in the Roosevelt National Forest in Colorado. I loved it there! And I have so much to show and tell! But I’m going to skip right away to the best part of the trip.
I was able to meet a couple of my favorite Coloradan bloggers — Sue from Dream Valley Ranch and Roxanne and Lilly from Champion of My Heart.
We took a bit of a hike with Lilly and the Brew Babes. I was a little worried that Java was never going to leave Sue’s side.
Our time together was way too brief but I feel very fortunate that Sue, Roxanne, and Lilly were able to get away for awhile and spend some time with this Minnesota girl. Can you tell how happy it made me?
The drive to Colorado was a long one for the Brew Babes (well, and for us humans too). The girls had a nice hammock in the back seat and were clipped to the seat belts so they couldn’t get too crazy back there. Yeah, they got a bit bored. But Latte entertained herself by practicing rolling her tongue.
While Java wondered why Latte was on her side of the seat. Can you see the bubble above Java’s head saying, “Mom! She’s touching me!”
We saw so many lovely sites on the way to Colorado. For example, there was the Dismal River.
I have to point out that the Dismal River looked like this on one side of the bridge. We weren’t quite sure about the cause of the bubbling in the lower right corner of the photo.
But the river looked like this on the other side of the bridge, where the sun glittered on the water and the birds swooped gracefully through the air catching river bugs.
Don’t make me go into some philosophical rambling about how much like life that is, you know, how things can look dismal or radiant, depending on how much light you can shine on the situation?
I think this boat was trying to find its way to Dismal River. Don’t you?
On the drive, I passed the time by trying to take photos of the clouds out the truck window. Most of the resulting blurry, bug spattered windshield, glare photos are now in my computer trash basket but a few were worth keeping.
Then there was the drive by the modern windmills, the ones that help generate electricity.
And the windmills that pump water, mainly to livestock that grazed in the pastures.
[On a side note, if you’ve ever driven by a feedlot, you will never, ever eat your standard grocery store beef again. No photos as we had to close the vents and speed by as quickly as possible.]
We spent our first night at the Best Western in Murdo, South Dakota.
This was also where our last shower for the week occurred. There were still the spit and shine wash downs in the tent overhang thingy majig so we weren’t totally disgusting.
I sure wish we’d been at the Rusty Spur on May 14th so we could have seen Johnny Lunch Meat.
And too bad we had the dogs or we could have gone inside for karoake and played some beer pong.
And if we’d only seen this place first, we definitely would have stayed there instead of the BW.
That’s it for now. I have about a billion photos to go through. Don’t worry, I won’t post all of them but the next post, I’ll show highlights of our first day of hiking. Believe me, walking the dogs around where I live will never be the same. I so miss the challenge and beauty of the mountain trails and I’m sure the Brew Babes do too.
Your trip looks just like what the Doctor ordered. Yep, that’s the same picture I have of of you, Sue and Roxanne. That must have been such a great meeting. Look forward to more photos.
What a great trip, and getting to meet your online pals in person is pretty cool! 🙂
Awesome trip! Love Love Colorado! And it’s great that they’ve had a wet winter and Spring because everything looks so green and the river is full, so they don’t have to stress about wildfires and close all the National Forests and camping areas, like we have here in New Mexico.
We had such big plans for camping all summer, but now we’re stuck at home due to all the fires burning in our state.
Your photos turned out great and the photos of your new friends made me smile. Love how Lily is straddling Java, both of them stuck together like velcro. awww!
Cool motel and restaurant, too. I love visiting and staying in local places over the brand name cookie cutter establishments.
Looking forward to reading more.
~Lisa
That part of the country you drove through is like another world. You have to learn to adjust the filter on your lens (so to speak) to really see the beauty. I’m so happy your trip went well. It must be fun to meet your friends already knowing that you share so much and know them through their words. Very cool:-)
Lisa – I think they still worry about fire because of the pine beetle destruction there are so many dead trees. It’s pretty sad but your right, at least the forests weren’t closed. Here in MN, the state parks are closed because of an unbalanced budget but that’s a whole other sad story.
Murdo was interesting. I do like the character of small towns and I actually do like karaoke but not beer pong.
Maery-
It was soooo fun having you visit. I wish you lived closer-I would overcome my hermity ways to see you and the Brew Babes and company 🙂 Thank you so much for coming to visit us and spending half of your day with us! We miss you!!!
xoxo
We lived for the first 5 years or our 37 1/2 years of marriage in colorful colorado, our only child was born in boulder county on a november day in 1977 that broke all heat records, it snowed the night before, gold weather the day she was born, happy happy baby and happy happy young lady, we have missed colorful colorado for almost the entire time we have lived in washington state, in order to hike here we are at the wrong end of the state and it has been cloudy, raining and nasty for almost 305 days straight broke all kinds of records, depressing when the heat starts up here it is humid and hot and not pleasant, I love your blog, and think if only we could retired to colorful colorado and climb and stay outdoors most of the year, oh, my goodness, most of the people are the fittest in all of USA, it is because the weather & the beauty of the land calls to its citizens and people seem nicer because of the lovely climate and mountains etc. Keep up the great blog!mja
I was so sorry to miss you but so glad that you had fun and liked our little neck of the woods!
Yes, you look very happy in that photo!