Colorado Day Five - Explorations

Day Five: Friday, September 5, 2014

We took advantage of the really nice morning and the low laying clouds to drive over to Lake San Cristobal to look for wildlife and chase the clouds before they retreated back up the mountainside. All three of my boys think clouds are really neat.

We drove for a few miles down the Cinnamon Pass road and stopped at a picnic turnoff to look around. 

With proper perspective.

Aaron does exactly what my brother and I used to do as kids... when the vehicle comes to a stop, bail out and run up the nearest small mountain...

Can you spot Aaron?

I thought it might be too hard, so here's a zoomed in version of the above photo.

He was quite pleased with himself.

There was a trail that led down to Henson Creek and it didn't look too treacherous, so we went down to look around and Alan wanted to “throw a line in.” Hiking with Adam still requires a lot of concentration and attention. He listens well, but his reactions and choices under duress are still not safe enough for him to move around by himself. Thankfully we got quite a bit of rain yesterday, so the trail was not dusty and had some grip.

The area around the creek at the bottom of that trail was gorgeous. I took a bunch of pictures, the boys threw rocks in the water and Alan fished for a little while. The temperature reading in the car said 43 degrees but with the mountain sun coming up and bearing down already, it was warm enough to take off our jackets. Eventually Adam found a stick and starting pretend fly fishing, doing exactly what Alan was… which was so precious. I think I managed to get a little bit of it on video. 

Stick hunting.

My favorite place to be... watching Alan fly fish a mountain stream.

Proud of his stick.

 (Documentation of our morning outing)

Back up the trail.

Another Sequoia ad.

After thirty minutes or so of playing around near the creek, we headed back toward town to see if my parents were stirring yet. On our way we stopped by the Highlander RV Resort to reserve a rental Jeep for pickup later that day. 

We dropped the car off at the cabin and walked over to the campground. Alan started helping dad solve a motorhome issue and the boys got into whatever they could.

While the guys were trouble shooting, Grandma, the boys and I walked into town.

My favorite ice cream place, ever.

Town park.

The giant lawn part of town park. It is here that they have field day games on the Fourth of July.

The boys love this playground. Endless sources for imaginative play.

Including this weird thing... which they are quite fond of. Grandma was invited to ride (I believe at the time it was a spaceship).

After lunch at the Packer Saloon, we drove back to pick up our rental Jeep while my parents closed up shop, for they would leave for home in the morning. 


We decided to go down the Nellie Creek Road turn off that leads to the Uncompahgre trai head. Since we could pick the Jeep up at 3:30, we left at about 4pm. Mom and Dad followed us in their Jeep. 

Nellie Creek is about twenty minutes down the Engineer Pass road. It’s a four mile 4wd road through beautiful aspen forests and has one of the most spectacular waterfalls around.

I got out periodically to video dad driving through water crossings. He recently got this Jeep and he’s quite proud of it, so I thought he would like a video or two of it in action in the mountains.

One of my favorite waterfalls. It hides in the back of an aspen forest in the middle of nowhere. Beautiful.

Once we finally made it to the end of the road we got out and let the boys run around for a while. The last time I was there was probably in early high school, with my parents and siblings. It was one of our first attempts at climbing a “fourteener.” We were so inexperienced though, we didn't have any water or snacks and paid no attention to the weather report or incoming storm clouds. We never made it to the peak because it started thundering and lightning. I remember it being a fairly straightforward hike and truly beautiful. 

While we were standing there my dad announced that next year he wants to hike to that peak. He wanted to do it before he got “too decrepit” was what he said. He told mom that she could stay back and watch all of the kids and that we could go hike this fourteener. Sounds good to me, but who knows what next year will bring.

The boys played around up there for twenty minutes or so picking flowers and blowing dandelions. We take pride and pleasure in knowing our boys don’t really need anything to entertain themselves. They go right into their “play” mode and start pretending and making up games. I could sit and watch them play for a long time. 

Here's the only worthwhile video of Dad driving, a clip of the Nellie Creek waterfall, and a hilarious and classic Adam video...

Adam frolicking through the field.

Boys and their toys.

Once the sun slipped down behind the mountain we headed back down. Being on one of those 4wd roads would not be fun in the dark. Plus, my parents had an early departure in the morning and wanted to get on with things. 

Our rental and Dad's Jeep.

My Dad's latest Jeep.

The sun and mountains casting beautiful shadows over a mining camp.

We got back at about 7pm and I threw the boys in the shower and to bed. I got the remainder of our things together for the next day’s ride to Silvertain. My parents made their supper and brought it over to hang out, tell stories and say their goodbyes.