This was another one of our amazing
days, I think! We woke up as planned, a bit early, because we knew we
had a long day ahead of us. We just didn’t realize HOW long it
would be!
Our first stop was, of course, the
visitor’s center at Dinosaur National Monument. We first watched a
12-minute video about the dinosaurs and natural impact of the Green
River Valley in that area. The reason there are so many dinosaur
bones here is because the “ancestral Green River” washed a lot of
bones into one spot. But as we learned, the site is misleading,
because all the bones here are of huge dinosaurs-- the smaller bones
were washed away or otherwise decayed before they ended up in the
“dinosaur bone jam” in this particular location.
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| Wall entirely embedded with fossilized dinosaur bones |
Then we hopped onto the tram which took
us up through layers of earth to the viewing center. The building is
fantastic-- it is built right against the original wall of fossils
which were excavated in the first decades of the 20th century. You
can’t help but go WOW when you first walk in and see the wall of
bones still embedded into the rock.
There are excellent displays to help
get oriented to what we saw. The large wall in front of us was
originally about 3 times larger-- the areas above it and to the right
and left were excavated earlier, as I said. The fossilized bones
which were removed are now in museums all over the country, with
three complete skeletons in the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh-- now
on Joe’s and my list for a long weekend visit so we can see them.
(Other bone are also closer-- in NYC and even one in a museum in
Newark, DE, if I recall correctly!)
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| Allosaurus in rock |
For $1.00 we purchased a brochure which
helped us identify individual sections of the wall and better “see”
the bones and how they belonged together (if, in fact, they actually
did-- a number are just stray individual bones.) So we looked at them
carefully, and Joe pointed out some specific bones which he could
identify from his knowledge of anatomy. There were also a lot of
panels with photos explaining how the bones were originally
excavated, wrapped in burlap and then plaster, then put into boxes
and pulled on skids down the mountain to wagons, and hence to the
nearest railroad depot where they were shipped back east. The entire
area was absolutely fascinating, and we spent at least an hour there.
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| Placement of bones in wall and reconstructed skeleton in NYC |
We left the monument just about noon,
and had to stop at an RV park in Jensen to dump our tanks, fill up
with fresh water, and buy a bag of ice. Then we finally headed toward
central Colorado, where we were meeting Ben and Miriam. I had already
gotten a number of texts from Ben, and he was going to send us more
info after they found a nice campground for us to meet up at.
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| Camarasaurus skull |
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| Joe points to corresponding place on his hip |
We headed east, crossed into Colorado,
and stopped at the Welcome Center in Dinosaur, Colorado, to pick up
some info. I chatted briefly with the two people working there, and
pointed out the route I was planning to take-- it seemed like the
most direct route--through Aspen and down toward Salida, which was
the general area Ben was heading for. All they said was, “Well,
that sure will be a pretty drive!” And then we continued on.
We stopped in Rangely for a lunch
break, and then kept going. My plan included picking up I-70 at a
town called Rifle, heading east to Glenwood Falls, and stopping there
for a Walmart stop before continuing on. That looked to me like the
exit to go south on my planned route, but my GPS kept telling me to
go farther along I-70 before heading south, and I decided maybe that
was a better idea, although it looked like more miles to me. But the
GPS was calculating the fastest route, so I figured I’d trust it.
As we got on the interstate at Rifle,
there I saw a Walmart! But it was too late, so we continued with the
original plan to stop at the Glenwood Falls Walmart. This was only
about 30 miles or so down the interstate, and we got off there. I
quickly discovered that Glenwood Falls was actually a resort city,
with a large hot springs hotel and pool there, and that the exit from
the interstate put us right in the center of a charming but very busy
downtown, full of cute looking businesses and restaurants and
historical buildings. There was no sight of a Walmart anywhere, which
we have come to expect when we use Next Exit to tell us what exits
have Walmart. So we had to hastily look for a GPS guide to Walmart.
The GPS worked, although it first took
us to a tiny road which was closed. We could at least see the Walmart
from there, however, and used our own eyes to get us there. It turned
out to be an older store, not a Super Center, and as such it 1) had a
very small parking lot; 2) was relatively difficult to get to; and 3)
did not have fresh veggies and fruits. However, we were able to get
almost everything we wanted, with the exception of sufficient bottled
water. The plus side was, it was a smallish store, so it didn’t
take us a full hour to get through it.
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| My first inkling that this was a mistake |
And then, we plugged our destination
back in-- by now, we knew Ben was at Cascade Campground a little
south of a town called Buena Vista. I found it on my map. And now the
GPS told me to go MY original route-- keep heading south through
Aspen, in almost a direct line to Buena Vista. So I figured, ok--
we’ll switch back to that route again.
Well! It was only about 10 minutes
before I was having serious misgivings. Even though the road was a
divided highway with 2 lanes each way, we were steadily rising, and I
was having a very anxious feeling that we should have gone back to
the interstate and use the GPS’s original suggestion. Soon enough,
we got to Aspen-- and negotiated carefully through the center of
town. And then the road was 2 lanes, and fairly narrow. But okay,
this is Colorado, and we were going through the mountains, going up
still. But it did seem narrower than I would have preferred, for
sure.
Uh oh. The road didn’t have much in
the way of a shoulder or a railing. There were a lot of hiking trails
around, though. It seemed like a very SMALL road, although it was the
only road there was! Unless we turned around and went all the way
back to Glenwood Springs, that is.
Double uh oh!! We passed a sign that
said, “Lights will flash automatically if vehicle oversized.” But
they weren’t flashing, so.... we kept going. And a little further:
“Turn around for over-sized vehicles,” with a pull-out. At least
there was now a sign-- vehicles over 35' forbidden to proceed. We are
under 30 feet. But man, that was NOT reassuring! What WERE we heading
for, anyway?
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| Hairpin turn |
We passed several forest service
campground areas and a LOT of trail heads. Not much else. The road
was not very wide. Whenever we passed ANYONE I had a small anxiety
attack. And then a sign: “road narrows.” I said, “narrower than
THIS??” And now suddenly the double yellow line disappeared-- the
road was so narrow that if they’d put in a line, the space on
either side would not have been wide enough! And, did I mention, we
were on the OUTSIDE of the road, i.e. looking DOWN as we went around
the side of the mountains? We came to at least three of these
“narrow” sections. They were just terrifying, because they BARELY
wide enough for two cars, but a car and an RV? They were NOT WIDE
ENOUGH. And every single one went around the mountain, so we couldn’t
see if anything was coming, although it usually was. At one point, we
stopped JUST as the road narrowed, because I yelled STOP! to Joe. I
could see that if we did not, we’d be face to face with a car and
no room for either of us to pass. We waited until 4 cars went past
us, then prayed as we went through ourselves.
By this time, I had my eyes closed at
least half the time. The speed limit was 20 mph most of the time,
sometimes only 15 and on some particularly sharp turns, 10mph. I was
having a real panic attack, and practically ready to cry. Joe,
meanwhile was doing GREAT. He drove the whole way in 1st gear most of
the time, I think, and he was calm as could be. (I was also worrying
because it was getting so late-- almost 7pm--and I thought he needed
to eat soon! And also, my GPS kept telling me
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| Drop off on the right. No guardrail. |
that the time between
us and our destination was getting LONGER each time I checked!)
Finally, FINALLY, we came to the top--
beyond the tree line, to find a big pullout area and a sign that
said, Continental Divide, 12,095 feet. Well, no WONDER I was
panicking-- I was oxygen deprived! (Joe pointed out that airplane
cabins are pressurized for 10,000 feet-- and that our oxygen masks
would have dropped 2,000 feet earlier!) There were a number of people
parked up there, with some information panels and even pit
“restrooms.” Clearly, this was a “destination,” which is why
we had so many cars passing us. I found out from the panels that
this was Independence Pass, and it is the highest paved road in North
American!!! Another panel mentioned that “the Narrows,” as they
are called, have been panic-inducing since the pass was first used.
No-Duh!!
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| "Road narrows". TOO NARROW!! |
There was a short path to an even
higher observation point. I was just unable to walk up it-- I was so
shaky and weak and wobbly when I got out with Cassie, I almost fell
over! There was a nice young man who offered to take my photo in
front of the Continental Divide sign, and he asked which side we’d
come from. I said, Aspen, and he reassured me that the other side was
“much much easier,” that we’d come from the “hard side.”
Honestly, I was VERY glad to hear it-- I didn’t think I could take
much more! (Then he added that there were “only” about 3 more
hairpin turns! And then I heard him tell his friend, “They came up
in that RV!” and I could tell he thought THAT was a bit gutsy! But
we had NO IDEA what we were getting into!!) Meanwhile, while I was
outside, Joe checked his sugar, which was great, and he ate a little
bit anyway so it wouldn’t drop at an inconvenient moment on our way
down. Even Cassie got into the act, placing a “deposit” on the
highest paved highway in North America!
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| Above the tree line |
So I took some deep breaths (as deep as
possible, that is) and we started rolling DOWN the mountain. Although
it had its scary moments (we were still on the “outside”, and I
could look straight down over the edge of the road to the valley
below), it was nothing as bad as coming up had been--the road was
wide enough for double yellow lines all the way, and the speed limit
went all the way up to 35mph! By this time, though, I was worried
about the time. I knew that the campground we were going to was NOT
going to be well lit, and I was anxious about actually finding it.
I’d originally thought we might get there at 7:30, and now it
looked like being 8:30 or even later. We’d had no phone “bars”
pretty much since we’d left Aspen, but when we finally came down
from Independence Pass, they finally came back. I was able to call
Ben, who reassured us that we were almost there and gave us a few
more landmarks to watch for, and then we kept on.
We found our turnoff (after
disregarding GPS’s suggestion of a side road--I’d had enough of
THAT!) but by this time, it was dark. We drove slowly along a county
road, and there was more traffic than I expected. It was entirely
unclear from the map how far along we’d have to go, and we had
trouble seeing some of the road signs. When we saw a sign that said
“National Forest Campgrounds ahead,” we were SO reassured! But
still there was mostly black road and not much else until I realized
there were actually homes on this road, and then the Mount Princeton
Hot Springs Resort, accounting for the oddly mystifying traffic.
After we passed that, I got out our super-high-power flashlight, and
I opened the window, and every time we saw any kind of sign, I held
my arm out the window to illuminate it with the flashlight. And so we
proceeded until, Eureka! The sign for Cascade Campground, and the
turnoff. Then it was a relatively simple matter to make our way
through the campground loop until we came to site 8, which Ben had
reserved for us, and there he was, waving. So Joe got out and guided
me while I backed in. And miraculously, it was flat!
It was 9:00 and pitch black in the
campground, but Ben had the coals of a good fire going, so we sat and
talked to him and Miriam (and Judah-bear, who is 14 months old and
was wide awake). Joe soon went to lie down, and I sat with them just
a little longer before realizing that this long day and all the
adrenaline rushing during the couple of hours we drove over
Independence Pass had really exhausted me as well. So we said
goodnight, and I stumbled across to our campsite. Joe made us some
scrambled eggs (we still hadn’t eaten) and then we passed out in
bed.
Joe was FANTASTIC driving over that
pass. He didn’t seem at all nervous, and he was in total control of
the RV the entire time. I, on the other hand, apparently do not
respond well to 1) heights; 2) lack of oxygen; 3) lack of knowledge
of where I am going. I was a genuine wreck. According to Ben and
Miriam, we have now negotiated the two “worst” (i.e. highest and
scariest) roads in Colorado-- Independence Pass, and Route 550 from
Durango to Ouray, which we did in 2015. But with the latter, we KNEW
what we were getting into, and it was broad daylight. Today’s
adventure was a total surprise, and turns out, I don’t do very well
with those! But Joe was completely unfazed. So now we know whose
nerves are better!
