We went for a family reunion on my side of the family. In addition to spending a lot of time at camp sitting around a fire visiting with family, we also had a lot of time for our little family to explore, sightsee, and enjoy the outdoors.
We stayed at Lake Vallecito about an hour outside of Durango. My parents stayed in their fifth-wheel camper and the rest of our family stayed in cabins. We "roughed" it in our tent! Most of our friends were shocked to hear that we would choose to spend 6 nights in a tent...in July. But, the average daily temperature the week we were there was in the lower 60s! One night it was so cold that we could see our breath. We were in our flannel pajama pants, sleeping bags, and blankets. I felt like quite the pioneer woman when it came to using an outdoor kitchen. I cooked on a propane stove (I know, not so pioneer-ish!) and boiled water to wash my dishes. The boys enjoyed S'mores on the campfire most evenings. Here is a picture of our set-up:
In front of our tent Grant made a little shelter area. This is where I cooked and where we hung out when it rained. Naturally, we brought along four-wheelers and Grant's new dirt bike. The first day we were at camp the people next to us were gone. We met them the next day and enjoyed camping next to them for the remainder of the week. They asked where we were from and we told them Oklahoma...which is where they were from! Small world! Even smaller when they found out we were from Skiatook and they were from Tulsa! Actually, the guy was from Prue...a really small down about 5 miles or so (I am directionally challenged) from Skiatook. He even went to highschool with a guy from our church and he rides dirt bikes. He and Grant became instant friends!
This is a picture of the boys at SanJuan Pass, I believe. This was one of our many stops on our day drive to Ouray. GORGEOUS!!!
We rode the Durango-Silverton Narrowgauge Railway. It was a long trip but the boys were troopers and loved riding on the train. The scenery was amazing and breath taking. God's creation is SPLENDID! The pictures don't do it justice.
Here we are on one of our many little jaunts on the four-wheelers. This is up Middle Mountain Road. It was a half-day trip up the mountain and back down. We were in t-shirts at the bottom and hoodies at the top!
The place we stayed was on a lake. The tent sites were along the river...so peaceful! There were little chipmunks EVERYWHERE and they were not very timid. Garrett bought a bag of peanuts at the general store and, as you can see here, he would sit and feed the chipmunks. They would eat right out of your hand! There was also a bear in camp a few nights. Eek! I didn't get any pictures, but my cousin did. They all saw the bear after a family dinner. It ransacked a tent site up the hill from ours that night. Apparently they didn't have their food put away!
This is Grant and the boys up the river about 4 camping sites from where we were. This bridge is what everyone crossed to get to the place we were staying. Look at that amazing view! We had a wonderful week with family and cannot wait to go back to Colorado again!
No comments:
Post a Comment