Durango. Came Saw Ate Went.

Thursday 10th May
Morning: I didn’t realise that writing a blog would be hard work. Somehow I imagined the ideas would flow without intervention on to the page. Doesn’t work like that, so today I am playing catch up. We are in Durango in Southern Colorado, sitting in Starbucks sucking up the good vibes and there are lots of them here. The day is bright, very bright (no sunglasses, no see) clear and full of promise.
What did we do yesterday? If I had written an entry for Tuesday (note: Tuesday is the day before yesterday-well who said this would be logical or orderly, you would know we got snowed in (Yes that is snowed in as in lots of snow, no drive) in Cripple creek.



Being brave souls we decided to get out the next morning on the scenic route which is on a dirt road along the so called Shelf. High up, narrow and not for the faint hearted . The view was breath taking, but I had to keep stopping the car to see it, since I didn’t dare take my eyes off the road, which was a car wide and kept disappearing from in front of the wheels to the left and right in mad swerving curves like it was trying to get away from me.


Did I mention the flooded river? No? Well, we arrived at a melted snow swollen river flowing over the road with warning signs “if flooded do not cross!!”. Remember we are on a dirt track, 4WD vehicles recommend. What to do? Go back? No, no going back. The problem was: How deep is the water and will it swamp the car. It we get stuck it is a 10 mile walk back to cripple creek (up hill).

The wife put on sandals and waded across bare foot to see how it deep it was expecting at any moment to sink up to her knees, a great idea that (wish it had been mine), see pictures of my intrepid wife, wading where no Man has waded before (they all had wives- well I mean what are wives for?), she got to the other side, without disappearing or being swept away, feet blue with the cold, and I mean blue. Great now I knew I could drive across without getting swamped. Had to stop a mile up the road and go back for the wife. She was mad as hell!!


So that obstacle out of the way we headed off on the dirt track away from Cripple Creek and our temporary imprisonment.
Eventually this dirt track appeared out of the mountains and we found ourselves o n a normal road and headed off to Salida. Had lunch, guess what we had? Leaving Salida we headed off to Alamosa. Alamosa was about 100 miles away and the road is straight as a die, and if you don’t believe me check it out on Google maps. Stayed in Alamosa and found this amazing micro-brewery that made fantastic beer. They had a really good stout but I decided on an Amber Ale. Wow it was good, reminded me of a good English Ale. The master brewer came out to talk to us and sat down and talked about beer and brewing and the good things in life, but then her husband got jealous of me and she had to go :-)
The next day we left Alamosa and headed off to Great Sand Dunes National park. That is such a mad place. Looks like the Sahara Desert with great big mad mountains of sand piled up to the sky. Me being a mountain man I decided to climb up to the top. Which I did and staggered down again unattended. The guys at the visitor centre said they were real glad of the opportunity to practice their resuscitation techniques.
Leaving Great Sands I was so tired I fell asleep in the car (the missus was driving) and woke up in Durango, where we spent the night which brings me to today the morning after we arrived in Durango, no I mean the day before yesterday because it is no longer today rather the day after tomorrow, follow? Like I said this is not going to be orderly. :-)