Our stay in Clifton was simply delightful. Right out the back door was a view of the Grand Mesa (which is the largest flat-top mountain in the world) and a view of several other nearby mountains. We were also blessed by eggs benedict for breakfast featuring fresh eggs from the friendly resident chickens.
Our first stop was Black Canyon of the Gunnison. This was highly recommended by my dad (so I don’t ignore all his advice). The park elevation is over 8000 feet and the Gunnison River is over 1800 feet below the top rim. Despite that distance, you can hear the river roaring below. I can only imagine how loud the river is when hiking lower in the canyon. There were lots of birds flying around the canyon, from little purple dippers near the trail to peregrine falcons out patrolling the canyon gorge. I only wish we’d had more time here; I’d love to come back in the future to camp, hike, and see the stars.
As we headed east towards Manitou Springs, we experienced more of the stunning lush mountain views like we witnessed yesterday. Along the way, we encountered construction on Highway 50. For five miles, we experienced a one lane, hard pack gravel road where we got to see the incredible work that goes into roads that endure harsh winters, flooding runoffs, and rock slides that take roads out with one drop. You should’ve seen Thom’s face when we saw the sign that said “pavement ends”–nothing like off-roading with the Mustang.
While we waited our turn for the one lane section, we got to witness the wild Colorado weather. It was a beautiful, sunny day with a few clouds, but then we watched a big cloud in the distance moving our way and you could see it snowing up high, then raining as it moved towards us and then over us. The temperature dropped from 65 to 48 in a matter of minutes and then we got pea-sized hail for a good five minutes before it turned back to rain…and then the cloud was gone. Ah, the poor car today!
Part of the drive took us around Blue Mesa Reservoir, which looked almost like the ocean with the wind blowing the water into whitecaps and waves. We were going to have a picnic lunch in this beautiful stretch, but it was 45 degrees and the wind was howling. Rain was moving back in and blowing sideways. So, we went to McD’s in Gunnison for Happy Meals & Guardian of the Galaxy toys, but sadly we got the old swap-a-roo and ended up with a Scuttle from the new Little Mermaid. Hmph
The drive along Highway 50, aka the Loneliest Road, was beautiful from Black Canyon onward. I was so mesmerized that I didn’t really take many pictures and just stared out the window as the miles ticked by. After the drive around the expansive reservoir, we went over the continental divide and around Monarch Mountain, in all it’s snow-dotted beauty at 11,300 feet. As we approached the Rockies, we turned on Co 285, which ran right between the snowy Sawatch mountain range and the Rocky mountain range. We were surrounded by majestic mountains as far as the eyes could see, before crossing the Rockies.
After we checked into our B&B in Manitou Springs, we headed over to Castle Rock (the picture explains the name of the town). We were able to meet up with our niece that lives in Denver, who we haven’t seen in years. We had a delightful dinner at a quaint home-cooking place called the Castle Cafe.
Standing Strength 