How would you like to spend over a week with us in the Colorado high country observing amazing wildlife, enjoying unlimited vistas and driving challenging 4x4 roads? On this trip I returned to some of the places outlined in my previous adventure :
Colorado Expedition: Wildflowers in the High Country!
Once again we camped at our favorite alpine lake which positioned us to easily access the backcountry or drop into town to purchase gasoline or other essentials. The campground features very nice pullouts either away from the lake...
For accessing a number of trails we passed through Silverton which hosted a modest number of tourists and off roaders, helping the local economy to hang on.
Eureka Gulch is a nice up-and-back and it has one of my favorite mining tramway structures, nestled high (and safe from vandals) on the opposite side of the canyon. Be sure to read about how at the Sunnyside Mine they found Lake Emma had disappeared on Jun 4th, 1978. It's a great story!
A cool cabin near the Animas River
As we headed up along the Animas River we spotted the remains of this year's avalanche that deposited thousands of cubic yards of snow and debris across the road and the river. The river had cut underneath the snow to form an interesting cave which collapsed a few days later.
Soon after Norm and I stopped to inspect the log jam we had wound our way up into Picayne Gulch and spotted this lofty vacation cabin as we crossed over into Placer Gulch.
As we were driving out of Placer Gulch, Norm had noticed a new noise emanating from under his Sequoia 4x4. Soon we located the source: a missing retention bolt for the rear axle's lower control arm!
A complete disaster had been averted but how would we get clear of the trail without that bolt? We had come up with a workable but temporary solution when a couple of folks on a quad rolled up and asked if we had lost a bolt. After reviewing what had happened to the truck they volunteered to go back and retrieve the bolt for us! They were back in a very short time and it was indeed the missing bolt. The nut was missing and the bolt's threads were damaged but that was no problem. We used a ratcheting cargo strap to align the axle, slipped the bolt back into place and used a small hose clamp over the bolt threads to hold things in place. The next morning we drove to Durango and the Wondrous ACE Hardware Store with their awesome supply of metric hardware. Soon we set up shop in the parking lot and installed the new bolt.
We quickly left town and before long had arrived at Clear Lake!
This turned out to be my favorite spot for wildlife pictures! The American Pikas were the cutest with their big ears and high speed antics. I also grabbed some good photos of marmots too!
The next day we drove to Yankee Boy Basin, then over Imogene Pass and finally back across Ophir Pass to return to camp.
Yankee Boy was an easy drive and had some really nice waterfalls but no wildflowers..
California Pass, Hurricane Pass and Corkscrew Gulch
Thanks for coming along on this latest adventure. I plan to return to this area soon and obtain closer looks at more of the mining history as well as visit new areas such as Creede.
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