Lake City-Creede

From Wood's Lake in the Telluride area we moved over to Lake City to a private campground with plug-ins to do a small restock, catch up on emails, take a couple of long showers, and some time to scout out our next campground over the pass toward Creede. It was only a 3 night stay. Weather has continued to be fantastic with clear (and cold) mornings followed by increasing clouds and scattered showers in the afternoons. We also had a chance to touch base with our Spicewood friends to see if there had been any improvement with the drought and heat condiditons ... sorry to say nothing had changed ... too bad!!

This is downtown Lake City (and most of the rest of it too). It's a small mountain town catering to tourists and hunters. Actually has a couple of great diners and a rather eclectic population.

We went for a quick tour around the lake and took this picture of Red Mtn. which is just above our campground. We used the time to do laundry, catch up with emails, and do some scouting for our next campground before heading out after three nights. We'll be back for Labor Day weekend.

One of the best pictures in Colorado, looking up a valley toward the headwaters of the Rio Grande River. We went for a hike later over by the Rio Grande Reservoir, about 15 miles down this valley and over the ridge.

See the little white spec on the lower right? That's our 5th wheel in the Bristol Head Campground, about 23 miles NW of Creede. The campground had 16 sites and for the most part, it was just us for 8 days. We were surprised because it was the weekend and week before Labor Day.

From our hike along the Wenimuche River trail. This is looking down at the Rio Grande Reservoir where we started. About 30 minutes after this picture we got pelted with rain and heavy sleet. Lucky we brought our rain parkas.

We typically had late afternoon showers every day. I stepped outside to get a picture of the unusual light and was lucky to catch a lightening bolt hitting the top of the ridge behind our campground.

Cindy's chipmunk buddy. These guys just about drove us nuts while they scampered all over the underside of the trailer, along the risers and I beams, the grill and the large mat that we kept outside.

Crossing a rock field on up the trail. After the sleet, we turned around and headed back. Just as we got to the truck, heavy rain hit and we ended up driving down 15 miles of mud to get out.

Black Beauty doesn't look too good after 3 weeks on dirt and mud roads. This reminded us of our mud trip on the Casiar Highway when we were going to Alaska. It's due for a good bath when we get back to Lake City!

This is North Clear Creek Falls which was only about 4 miles from our campground. There is also a South Clear Creek Falls which we hiked to but didn't offer a good vantage point to take pictures.

An old mine located just above our campground in Lake City. There are hundreds of these old mines, mostly holes in side of mountains, along with deep shafts into the earth. The state is trying to clean this up and putting bars on entrances to prevent accidents. The water coming out of this mine looked pretty toxic though.

Lake San Cristobal outside of Lake City. This is looking up the highway that is the start of the Alpine Loop, a 4 wheel drive road that goes over two high mountain passes and returns to Lake City. If the weather is good on Tuesday after Labor Day, we hope to rent a jeep and go for it. Cindy has severe doubts due to her vertically challenged condition. If we make it, the next page will be devoted to that trip, if not, then you'll be looking at a picture of Taylor Reservoir.