Part 3: Camping in the Rockies!

So here's the last part of our Mega Vacation! GOB drove up to Gunnison, CO and joined us for the week with our camper and quads. (I think I may have forgotten to mention that GOB only spent the week in MN with us and he had to fly home to work.) Anyhow, back to the vacation details. We also met up with our friends C & G who live near Grand Junction, CO. They spend a week in the same area of the Rockies every year with several other families. So altogether I think there were about 12-15 other families with their campers. We had a great time riding the quads all over the countryside. I discovered that my quad isn't exactly comfortable to ride in that neck of the woods. I could really use a 4x4 for the next time we go up there! Thankfully, there is always an abundance of quads parked around and people just kinda share them. The boys didn't ride theirs much because "they wouldn't go fast enough"! The elevation we were at combined with the cheap Chinese carburetors in their quads, made for slow riding according to the boys. LOB did mange to flip his quad however so therefore it really could go fast enough! He did not get hurt but it scared the crap out of himself and Grandpa . So below are a few of the pictures I snapped...

The boys are chomping at the bit to leave the campground in Gunnison and head out to the wilderness!

We saw this old gold or silver mine on our first quading trip. There were several in the area. It's amazing to see how good they still look after 100 years.

This was a house near the mine.

The boys are standing in front of the ice box where they must have stored their food.

Here's a pretty picture. I'm pretty sure we were on top of that mountain way up there too at some point.

This one kinda looks like a postcard. Not too bad for a cell phone pic if I do say so myself.

I can't remember what exactly this is but what amazed me was how they could have possibly got it up there! On this quad ride, I made myself sick! I swear we were climbing over boulders and could have flipped a couple times-me and my zero bit of experience! Thankfully our friend G let me ride his 4x4 beast back down the mountain and he rode my made-for-flat-terrain-and-dirt-quad!

DVB didn't get to go on this ride. He stayed at camp and flirted with all the teenage girls!

Im not too sure what Grandpa is thinking about in the picture...maybe that he thinks he needs a 4x4 quad too?

This was the sign that greeted you in a nearby town to our camp. It was a cute, old, little town in the middle of nowhere.

This was another quad adventure. Each day we went on one long ride. This one was to St.Elmo, CO. It was about a 2 hour trip in the rain! Next time, we are bringing proper rain attire with us! I was soaked and cold! But these cute little chipmunks made up for it. It's the main attraction of the town, also in the middle of nowhere. There were about 20-30 of these little guys and they would come right up and eat sunflower seeds right out of our hands.

See that brown creature? It's called a Whistle pig. It kinda looks like a beaver/ground hog/wood chuck.

This was the only deer we saw. I'm surprised we didn't see more wildlife.

This was the last trip we took and this time we took the truck. And thank goodness we did because that would have been a very very long quad ride! And thank goodness Grandpa drove cause it was scary enough to be the passenger on this steep and very twisty road. This was a train station back in the early 1900's. It was a passenger train that wound it's way up the same path we took and then cut through a mountain and ended up in Denver on the other side.

They were checking out the turntable. Mr. DVB is heavily addicted to Thomas the Train so he was in heaven seeing the actual train stuff!

This is what the terrain looked like way up there above the trees!

And this is the last picture I took as we had to go back to reality!

We sure had a great time on this leg of the trip too! The boys had a blast digging, cutting down trees, and being in the great outdoors! I forgot to mention the nice cool weather! I could have done without some of the rain but we didn't let it ruin anything! Thanks to C & G for the hospitality and we hope you'll let us join you again sometime!