Moose, Dinosaurs, and Aspen
We left Ridgway State Park on Friday, right after work. 6PM is an odd time to leave a campground, I agree, but the benefit was that we got to drive 90 miles to Grand Junction that evening, cutting our Saturday drive in half. All we needed was a place to stay… and one phone call was all it took.
We arrived well after dark, at the Grand Junction Moose Lodge, where they have RV spaces behind the building. After settling in, we swaggered our way through the doors and into the bar area. Inside, the weekly dance was in full swing, complete with live music and 50 or so folks having a great time. Ignoring the fact that we were likely half the age of everyone else in there and not locals to the lodge, many came up to say their hello’s. The bartender – a nice gal but not accustomed to serving anything more than beer – kept us company as we drank our bottled beer and a who-knows-what-that-is cocktail she made up for Kerri. The bar was out backrest as we watched the dance unfold, without partaking ourselves.
We were gone early the next morning. Another few hours of driving was planned for the day to arrive at a place I have long wished to visit but never have; Dinosaur National Monument (my 83rd National Park). We arrived in the early afternoon to the Canyon Visitor’s Center where we dropped the trailer (and the dogs) and set out for an auto-tour of the Harper’s Corner Road. Harper’s Corner Road guided us 24 miles into the park, atop the hills and buttes where vast overlooks of the canyons sprinkle the path, climaxing at Harper’s Corner which offers a huge view of Echo Canyon.
On our way back we drove down the steep and twisted 12 mile long gravel road to Echo Canyon which offered some of the coolest and most unexpected places along the way. The old Chew Ranch, which we explored, brought back urges to homestead in the rough country. Then to Whispering Cave which simply blew my mind. The cave is large enough to stand in once inside, but the amazing part was that the slab of rock above my head was not affixed to anything. Imagine stepping inside a guillotine, in the slot of the inner workings. The blade that slides down and does the chopping is the slab of rock above me with walls at both sides as I stand in the cave. You can see dozens of feet up either side of this free-hanging slab until the darkness keeps it’s secret of how it got there. This slab had already slid down and is resting on the sandy surface on both ends, with the center arched enough to form this cave. It seemed that at any moment the slab could drop the final seven feet and squish both Kerri and I with no hope of survival. It was crazy amazing.
Another mile down the road brought us to our final destination; Echo Park, where the Green River from the North and Yampa River from the East collide and become one. We hung around long enough to get a feel for he small tent-only campground and say hello to Steamboat Rock before heading back up that gritty gravel road and to the trailer.
Originally, the plan was to stay at the campground at the Quarry side of the National Monument, but the crowds and the time of day convinced us to simply keep on driving towards our next destination. Again, we cut some time off the following day’s drive, and as luck would have it, we found a great spot to call home for a night in Ashley National Forest. Just South of the Flaming Gorge area is a simple Forest Road. Here we pulled off, nestled up to an Aspen grove, and let the dogs loose for a cool evening of fun and relaxation. A meal and a few cocktails later, the day was complete and we tucked in for a good night’s sleep.
