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Return To The San Juans, Colorado
I had been planning to earn 7 more state stickers for the map on the side of our RV as we zigzagged across the middle of the country back to NC but Michael just wanted to stay in Colorado. We compromised and stayed until mid-October. Much later there could be snow on the high mountain passes. We should still be able to earn 5 stickers, visiting 2 states for the first time. Ridgway State Park gave us easy access to the San Juan Mountains in southwest Colorado. There are multiple campgrounds and I was able to get us a full hookup site at Pa-Ca-Chu-Puk on the Uncompaghre River. Ridgway was…
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Rocky Mountain National Park
A few months ago we were lamenting our mistake of skipping over Rocky Mountain National Park, all because of one closed campground that we wanted to stay at. From Taos, NM to Jasper, AB, this has been the year of the Rocky Mountains and we didn’t even visit the namesake National Park. So, we returned to Colorado and stayed at Lavern M. Johnson Park during the last week of September. This city park is in the teeny tiny town of Lyons, about 30 minutes east of Rocky. The small campground was just a parking lot but it had full hookups and was within walking distance of everything the adorable town…
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Twin Lakes To Dillon Lake, CO
After our stay in Colorado Springs, we moved back into the mountains just ~35 miles north of where we’d been previously near Buena Vista. I found a boondocking spot overlooking Twin Lakes that is going to be hard to beat. This was free dispersed camping in the San Isabel National Forest off county road 24 at an elevation of 9,700ft! We had unbelievable views of the lakes and the highest peak in Colorado, Mount Elbert (14,439ft). The flip side was this was the worst spur road we’ve ever taken the trailer on and I spent the week wondering how we were going to get out. But of course, Michael maneuvered…
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Colorado Springs, CO
I had read many accolades of the campground at Cheyenne Mountain State Park in Colorado Springs so when trying to decide where to make reservations for a holiday weekend, we thought it’d be a great choice. This is a relatively new state park, built above the city on the side of Cheyenne Mountain, the former headquarters of NORAD. It overlooks Fort Carson, so close that you can hear the bugle calls. The park is huge and feels like you are in the middle of nature, yet you are 5 minutes from anything and everything you would need in a city. There are a ton of things to do in Colorado…
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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…
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Great Sand Dunes National Park
We’re planning to be in Colorado for at least a month this year and other than the week of Memorial Day, we don’t have reservations because we wanted to do some boondocking and first come first serve camping. Our first stop was San Luis State Wildlife Area near Great Sand Dunes National Park. The San Luis Valley is a large rural valley with elevations starting at 7500ft in south-central Colorado. The Sangre de Cristo Range is to the east and the San Juan Mountains are to the west. With a Colorado State Parks pass, this first come first serve campground is free and has electric hookups and a dump station!…
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Finding Fall In Southwest Colorado
Visiting Mesa Verde National Park, located in the southwest corner of Colorado, was a last-minute idea. I’d been researching our 2023 route, which may include a late spring visit to Colorado, and realized the ranger-led tours of the cliff dwellings would not yet be open for the season. We found a great boondocking spot on Forest Rd 316 in the San Juan National Forest, halfway between Mesa Verde NP and Durango. It was the first week of October and the little oak trees around us were turning colors and we could see snowy peaks out in the distance. Unfortunately, it rained almost the entire week, which kept us stuck inside…
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Heading East: Carbondale, CO & Saint Peters, MO
In mid-May, it was time to leave the southwest and start a 2-week trek back to NC to see our family! We drove way too much on the weekends but our workweek stops were great! The first stop was in the mountains of Colorado and the other right outside of St. Louis, Missouri. Our intense driving schedule was slightly complicated by picking up our new kayaks! We knew the particular kayaks that we wanted after trying out our friend’s Pungos by Wilderness Systems. After trying unsuccessfully to find 2 of them used, we decided to start calling stores that were along our route. Turns out, they were also hard to…
