While we had a beautiful day with David and Katie and Peter, the day before, in Denver and then a quiet late afternoon up in the hills, we knew a fairly major storm front was moving through the area. Of course it was. Cold air temps, non stop drizzling rain, periodic hard rain, and as the temps dipped into the 30’s that evening, stuff that looked suspiciously like sleet, hail, and snow. With weather like that coming down on us, Ann was in for some rough sailing on our final day in Denver. So, it was with limited other options that Sunday was declared an inside day at the Central City campground. Ben fiddled around with indoor maintenance projects that are just an accepted part of traveling across miles of highway in a thin metal tube. Ann ventured outside of the camper exactly once, and then, like Punxsutawny Phil, saw the weather conditions, felt the 40 degree air, and quickly retreated back inside the cozy Airstream with a mildly reproachful glare directed at Ben.
The nice thing about being in a camper is that if you don’t like the weather around you, you can just pick up and move somewhere else, and that is exactly what we did the next morning.
The next day dawned with clearer skies but very brisk temps, with 34 degrees showing on the weather app. After an expedited teardown, a brief conversation with Nosey Nora, as Chuck ran through his own teardown procedures next door, we stopped to refill the depleted propane tanks, and headed out towards Rawlins, WY.
We almost made it all the way out of the campground before someone’s tummy signaled distress. So, once again, we stopped, turned on the onboard water pump, and made use of the bathroom that we take with us wherever we go. Not mentioning names of course. Keeping it classy and discrete. As a side note, Ann is loving the grey puffer coat she borrowed from the Noni.
Mission accomplished, we headed back on to I-70 and started the journey north!
We crossed the continental divide at Berthoud Pass at 11,306′. Ann was able to be coaxed out of the warm truck for a photo, and then it was back in for the trek through Colorado by way of Fraser (Winter Park, where Ben and David have skied for years), Granby, and up Colorado 125 through the Arapahoe National Forest. Actually, I just found out that we did the entire 125, from its southern start just outside of Granby, all the way to its northern end, just after it crosses the Wyoming state line.
I told Ann, “Hey this is pretty neat!”
She said “ok”, clearly not impressed.
To which I replied, “Well, how many highways have we driven end to end? It’s not that common. Have you driven I-80 end to end? Noooo. I-40? Noooo. Have you driven I-75 end to end? Noooactuallyyeeeeeesssss. Yes, I guess we did”
I guess it is not as rare as I thought, but I still think its neat.
Anyway, the road was absolutely beautiful, with pine covered rolling hills with surprises around every corner. Unique houses, farm animals, old barns, new barns, and next to us for most of the way, the very rivers and streams that carved the canyon through which we were driving.
And there was nobody on it.
We had no one pressing on us from the back. We weren’t stuck behind Ma and Pa from Kansas going 20 under either. It was just wide open and the only thing that kept taking us to the side of the road was Ann’s gastrointestinal woes. Probably more like WHOAS, if you ask me. But since she’s still in recovery mode from the Denver area, I’ll let it go, for now. Trust me, there will be many more times to make fun of her GI issues, when she finally thaws out.
The most exciting folks we encountered weren’t people at all, but rather it was two mountain goats standing on the white line on the inside of a sharpish curve. We just barely missed them and still stayed in our lane, but it was close. We think they were mid-mountain-goat-coitus and we definitely interrupted the mood. They were just as surprised to see us as we were them.
As we popped out of the top of 125, we headed just about 20 miles east to our home for the evening, Rawlins, WY. Population 8000. Had a very convenient Walmart right close by, so we grabbed a refill on groceries and topped off the fuel, as we knew were soon headed in the National Park land, where things are way more spread out and far more expensive.
Since we got into the campground right at check in time, we were pretty much the first to even be settled in, but we knew many more were coming. We decided to get ahead of the crowd and get started on laundry. Things were getting a bit funky in our little camper, so we were due. We gathered everything up, including the very Duluth Trading gear we had been wearing since we bought it, and we were very reluctantly removing it so we could wear it again later, and hauled it down to the little laundry room.
To be fair, for a little campground, this place had four newish SpeedQueen washers and four newish dryers. It was a nice little setup. After a very intense but also very brief internal debate, Ann bought every quarter the campground had on hand and decided to load three out of the four machines. Just as she got them coined up, started, and tried to sneak out for the 25 minutes the loads would take, in walked Mary from Indiana with an equally large armload. Mary glanced at the three machines in operation, then down at her double armload of wrinkled bloomers, inside-out socks, and wadded up t-shirts, and then finally back up at Ann. AWKWARD! If you’re ever at a campground laundry with Ann, watch your back. And if you’re a sweet little lady from the Midwest, especially watch out. She’ll get you every time and she’s learned how to smile while she’s doing it!
So,
Once laundry was wrapped up, however awkwardly, dinner was done, and we had a few hours before hitting the sack. So, we opened up the windows and turned on the fans, and really hammered some fresh air through the airstream, as it had been mostly closed up since we left Florida due to outside temps and lots of rain. The fresh air, pleasant temps, and very sunny afternoon was great after the complete lock down the day prior.
While the weather was almost perfect that afternoon, we did have a bit of a noisy evening as our specific campsite was situated as legally close to I-80 as it could get. So, when the big semis would roll by headed west into the setting sun, the wind from the fast moving trucks would ruffle our hair. Our site was also directly adjacent to the end of a major drag through town that let people get on to I-80 from there. We are fairly certain that each and every one of the 8000 residents of Rawlins took a turn right next to our campsite that evening, each with varying volumes of stereo systems and taste in music, engine horsepower, deferred brake maintenance, power-steering leaks, and quite a few ineffective or absent exhaust systems. At some point that night, we heard and felt every one of them.
Thankfully, the airstream has a really good fan system and it does a great job drowning out most outside noises. So with that kicked on, we called it a night. On to Grand Teton in the morning!
TaterTotTales 