Day 5, Pueblo to Cortez, Colorado

 We knew this would be a long day of driving, through lots of mountainous country, so we got an early start. To be honest, there wasn’t much action on Day 5; it mostly consisted of driving and filling up with gas! However, we drove through such beautiful country, that even though I don’t have much activity to report, I have lots of photos to show of the amazing scenery we enjoyed, which changed moment by moment. As you look through the following photos, notice how the landscape and vegetation change. We started out with the mountains in the distance, and lots of deciduous trees on the roadside. It gradually changed to rocky areas with exposed outcropping and lots of scrub brush, and then to snow-capped mountains with mostly evergreen trees. Colorado is one amazing state, and we saw only one tiny strip of it, in the southern part. Though we’ve explored much of Colorado in the past, there is so much more to see, and we can’t wait to return for more.

As you look through the photos, you can click or tap each one to enlarge it and see more detail. 

 

Now we’re getting into the higher snow country.

Snow fences alongside the road prevent huge drifts from blowing across the highway and blocking traffic during high winds in the winter.

I love the carpet of wildflowers!

And the first aspen trees we’ve seen on this trip; one of the prettiest trees ever, especially in the fall!

One lovely town we passed through was Walseenburg, Colorado. Besides having a charming little downtown, the area is known for the annual gathering of sandhill cranes in the nearby Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve. Every corner in the downtown area is decorated with a colorful sandhill crane sculpture. I caught a few of them as we drove through town:

Now we’re really seeing why these are called the Rocky Mountains!

And we not only drive over the mountains, but sometimes THROUGH them as well!

I love this scenic farm we passed. Can you imagine managing a small family farm in this rugged country?

And as we got closer to our destination of Cortez, we saw the first foretaste of the amazing rock formations we’ll encounter in a couple of days. 

We arrived at our campsite near Cortez, Colorado in the early evening, exhausted from the long drive, but happy to have made it over the mountains pulling Lucy with our little 6 cylinder Toyota Tacoma! We discovered once we got there that although the RV park did have wi-fi as they promised, it didn’t reach out  as far as our campsite, which was way on the outer edge. So I’m a little behind in posting this blog. 

Here’s Roxanne, our camp host. She was AMAZING on the phone last night, when we changed our route at the last minute. Looking at our original plans of going through some of Colorado’s most mountainous and twisting roads, we realized that we would be pushing the limits of our little truck to pull Lucy over them. So we decided to travel farther south, where the mountain passes were lower: More miles, but less drastic elevation changes. I called every RV park I could find, in and around Durango and Cortez, and not surprisingly, heard “no vacancy” time after time. Roxanne stayed in the office late and worked her magic with the reservation system. She called me back later to say she had worked out a site for us on the edge of the Ancient Cedars RV Park. We’re so grateful for people who go the extra mile to help others!

Day 6 was a day of exploring Mesa Verde National Park, and I’ll show you some amazing photos of that next. But for now, it’s time to turn in. These long days of driving…whew! We’ll be happy when we get to Boise/Garden Valley in a couple of days, and we can stay put for a while!