Boondocking In Buena Vista, CO

We spent the workweek before Memorial Day boondocking in a meadow in the San Isabel National Forest. Our spot was on Forest Road 274 between the Arkansas River towns of Salida and Buena Vista. This was an ideal spot because the road was in great condition (in terms of Forest Service Roads), we had an open sky for solar and Starlink, and we were minutes away from hiking trails and cute towns. And until the views that we have at our current spot, these were some of the best views we’ve ever had from a campsite. We could see two snow-capped 14ers, Mount Princeton on one side and Mount Antero on the other.

We bought the PeakVisor App so we now know which mountains we are looking at. It seems to work well.

This area has the highest concentration of 14ers in Colorado. It’s also a major destination for white water rafting on the Arkansas.

We walked around the river park and shops in Salida, the largest of the small towns in the Upper Arkansas River Valley. And went to Elevation Brewery in Poncha Springs.

During the first half of the week, we had a lot of smoke from the wildfires that were burning out of control in Alberta.

The smoky photo below is of Chalk Creek Canyon from the Narrow Gauge Trail. We camped down there for a night on our 2015 Colorado trip! In addition to several waterfront campgrounds best for tent camping, there is also the Mt Princeton Hot Springs Resort and the St. Elmo ghost town down in the canyon.

And did another smoky hike to the Browns Creek waterfall.

Later in the week, the smoke was replaced with daily afternoon storms. Colorado is known for these afternoon storms in the summer, but this year they are occurring in spring. Actually, they were also a daily occurrence last fall so maybe it’s just a year-round thing.

Our final hike of the week was at Browns Canyon National Monument. There were storms all around us but luckily we didn’t get caught in one.

Next up is Colorado Springs!