No dinosaur tracks for us!
My bad: I thought Picketwire would be way more bike-able that it turned out to be. We couldn't use the roads that the guided tour uses - they go through a restricted military maneuver area. So, the dinosaur tracks were too far for kid biking and the trail was too narrow and rugged for the Burley. And those "Bikers - Expect Flats" signs didn't reassure us either.
Take-away: book the tour (minimum 3 days before, Saturdays only) if seeing dinosaur tracks with the kids is your plan. From the USFS.gov site:
Reservations are required via www.recreation.gov or call 1 (877) 444 6777. All day tours (8 a.m. to 4 p.m.) are offered on Saturdays in May, June, September, and October. Sign up early because the tours fill up fast! Due to rough roads, visitors will need their own four-wheel drive vehicle.
So what we did do was...
Arrived and found a nice "dispersed camp" at the end of Forest Service road 8127. Lots of big flat spots, very modest amounts of cactus (which we circled with stones to prevent us from walking into them) and only a little glass and bullet shells. We loved that the camp wasn't saddled with a fire ring. We believe in Leave No Trace car-camping so we only use portable campfires.
Fire rings are dead to us.
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| 1st night. happy to be there. no muss, no fuss portable campfire |
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| an actual horny toad in camp |
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| aw |
Short little like with the kids down into Minnie Canyon.
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| flexible. seems like every kid carrier I've ever seen provided no head support. a big, completely breathable pillow would do it but I haven't seen that either yet |
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| a demonstration: the attraction of trees. is that a putter or a driver N? what does one use for a juniper? |
We went looking for scorpions with a UV light but found only one on the last night.
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| storms in the distance (lower left), galactic axis somewhat further. MoonLight tent. |
The trail down into the Purgatoire river canyon was steep and loose but we soon found ourselves on a nice wide single-track. In many places it was lined with Puncturevine (AKA Goathead). The kids managed to mostly stay away from it but if we had brought the Burly it would have been wider than the trail in places so there would have been no chance to avoid flats.
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| we found shade. we stopped. we appreciated. we went back. |
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| bear poop after the bear had been eating the red fruit of the prickly pear cactus. notice the dung beetle working away to dismantle the poop. if only I could teach them to use a Deuce of Spades potty trowel. man would they have some free time. maybe take in a marg and a movie sometime |
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| our trusty umbrella did not disappoint. N, can we get under there too? N? |
We went to Fort Bent on the old Santa Fe trail. It's a re-creation of the fort. More photos coming.
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| a dad-gum gen-u-ine conestoga wagon. yee-haw-howdy! |
The blacksmith bellows
The nature trail outside the fort went off toward the Arkansas river, through mad fields of sunflowers.
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| so...many...sunflowers! must...turn...away! |
Rain greeted us back at camp. We even had a super-localized microburst that damaged our tent because I hadn't attached the fly to the poles with the velcro tabs underneath.
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| rainbow after the rain. we hoped in and out of this more time than a prairie dog on holiday. no, I don't know what that means either. old Kelty sunshade with beefier DAC PL 16.8mm poles |
The kids played well together. It's pretty obvious that they liked the super lightweight chars we brought. They could pick them up really easily...
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| jet fighters! no! X-wing fighters! no! pew pew! the joys of really lightweight chairs. things little boys do |
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| did I mention that Picketwire wasn't far from Oklahoma, tornado central? |
The storm cells were huge and lovely. Lots and lots of lightning too.
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| Oklahoma - right over there... |
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| CanFire goodness! |
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| toasting marshmallows - the trick is to not keep them in the flames. put them next to the flames |
What the heck is up with these inflatable couch things? My facebook feed is stuffed with "Laybags" (defective name BTW). Bought some on Amazon and. holy crud-muffin they're hard to inflate! They all weigh too much for the fabrics to billow easily. Glad I paid $23 and $29 for mine.
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| the kids LOVED this thing but it really needs a brisk wind to inflate it properly |
We did a thorough pick-up of camp micro-trash before we left and dispersed the barely used fire ring that was already there. Brought maybe 3 dozen bullet casings back for recycling. As always, we left the camp cleaner than we found it.
County Road 71 (CR71) from Rocky Ford (home of tainted melons and cattle feedlots) up to Limon was a revelation. This is one of the last remnants of the American frontier as the original pioneers found it. Fremont famously called it the "Great American Desert" on his maps. But most of it's not like that now, not at all. Except for here. Wow!
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| "The Great American Desert" — this is how all of the the Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas area looked like before water diversion and irrigation. no kidding. no trees. no rivers lined with cottonwoods, nada! everything like that is entirely man made - the works |
And so we drove back. Labor day Monday. Roads into and out of the mountains were absolutely choked, bumper to bumper aggravation.
But not here. A whistle and a song and we're home without a delay to speak of. CR71, we salute you! that part of our Picketwire plan worked out brilliantly.
