Colorado Trip Oct. 2011

We went to Colorado a week ago to help my dad out with his cabin.  He needed the trees and brush cleared around the cabin for insurance purposes.  

The picture above shows an elk herd in the meadow next to dad's lot.  There are a LOT of elk in the park.  They are protected and it's obvious that they know it.  A drive from the gate to the cabin site is about 15 minutes and a person is almost guaranteed to see several forms of wildlife in that drive.

The next day it snowed.  Not much, just a couple of inches.  Enough to delay our staring work for a couple of hours.  I just love the aspens in fall!

Dad has a camper parked on the lot for him to stay in but it has no running water.  To visit a toilet we had to drive to the community center about 10 minutes away.  It also has showers and sinks.  A real life saver while camping in an unfinished basement!  The view above was on our way there in the morning.

This picture I took on Koralkoff, the road the lot sits on.  This is about a quarter of a mile from the driveway.

Since the animals are protected they are not as scared as we would have thought.  This doe was just 20 feet from me when I took this picture.

Here is the cabin site with a view of Mt. Mestas in the background.

One of the many things I love about home schooling!  The ability to do school anywhere.

Timmy napping.

Doing what we came to do!

The next night it snowed somewhere between 6 and 9 inches.  As a result Dad and Nathaniel got stuck on their way home from shopping.  Loooong story, one I don't care to recount here.  Ask me if you want to know.

The next day we were snowed in.  We didn't have dad's 4 wheel drive and so we were stuck in the camper.  We had plenty of food, warmth and entertainment and so we just settled in for the day.  Sometime around noon Chad decided to see if he could get the van unstuck.  We were doubting it was possible but we gave it a try just to say we did.  Terry (my dad's friend) had called the snow plow and requested out road be cleared and so if we could make it to the road we had a chance of making it out.

Mika, the only one who enjoyed the snow!

Terry and Chad digging out the van.  I should have taken a picture before they cleaned the snow off the van and then you would really see how much there was.  See the mountain in the background?  See the blizzard moving down towards us?  We were trying hard to beat it but it never got to us.  It just stayed higher up in the mountain.

Pretty, unless you are stuck in it!  This is the same meadow that I took the picture of the elk in.

We got the van out after an hour or two and then made the decision to head for home.  Chad and I had had enough and there was more snow on the way.  The picture shows Chad bringing our stuff out of the basement (where we camped) to the van.  We picked up dad in Alamosa, had dinner, took him back to his car and headed over the mountains to beat the snow to the flat lands.