Two Leos' Wanderings: August 2017

After spending May through July with friends at Mogote Meadow, in the Conejos River valley of southern Colorado, the Leos decided it was time to use our travel trailer for its intended purpose. We hooked up, headed north and west to new scenery in South Fork, Colorado. We're staying at the newly opened Peacock Meadow Riverside RV Park. We arrived on August 1.

The park is well situated on the banks of the Rio Grand River and within easy driving distance of Monte Vista, Del Norte and Creede and is 17 miles from Wolfe Creek Ski area (not that we will be here when the snow falls). Due to the newness of the park, it lacks the "community" feel of Mogote Meadows (no weekly potluck dinner). This is offset by the variety of events occurring during the summer. The first weekend we were here, a three day music festival, Rhythms on The Rio, was held about a mile away. Unfortunately it was challenged with frequent thunder storms. The same weekend Covered Wagon Days were held in Del Norte.

Beginning our second week here, The Trusty Companion was attacked by a vicious foxtail awn between the toes of his front paw. Foxtails are grasses with seed awns that are extremely dangerous to dogs. Foxtail awns are barbed, razor-sharp needles, designed to burrow into the ground with the seed.

This caused Leo to begin constantly licking his paw, limping and the toe began to swell and become inflamed. I took him to the Creede Veterinary Clinic, where Dr. Howard diagnosed the issue, explained its serious nature and began his treatment. Over the last week we have been back to the Vet for three visits and I'm pleased that yesterday Dr. Howard determined the awn had worked its way out into the wrapping on Leo's paw and he is now on back on all four.

To celebrate having The Trusty Companion on the mend, I decided to continue on the Silver Thread Scenic Byway for a day trip. The Silver Thread runs between South Fork, Creede, Lake City and Gunnison Colorado. Since we were already on the corner of Zen and Nirvana in Creede with a full tank of fuel, turning left instead of right seemed like a good idea.

In Creede Colorado all is well.

We took a few side runs off the Scenic Byway route to see where some of the unpaved road took us.

Clear Creek Road outside Creede

Trailhead at the end of Miner's Creek Road outside Creede

Wagon Wheel Gap

From Creede to Lake City is 54 miles. With stops for pictures and exploration it took us a little over two hours to make this leg of the Silver Thread. The scenery lives up to its designation as a Scenic Byway. Here are samples:

Overlook view toward the Weminuche Wilderness. The Weminuche Wilderness is a 499,771-acre wilderness area established by Congress in 1975. It is Colorado's largest wilderness.

In the video above, notice the two people walking across the plateau in the top left of the scene. This will give an idea of the size of the falls.

After crossing the Continental Divide, I expected to be headed downhill. I was wrong.

More climb awaited.

But from here on it was downhill all the way.

Overlook view from Windy Point

We rolled into Lake City a little before 2:00 pm and dropped in at the first eating establishment I saw. It was Poker Alice Pizza and I shared an excellent calzone with The Trusty Companion. But he didn't get any of my beer. By the time we finished lunch it was raining and getting close to 3:00 pm, so I decided to head back to South Fork. Next time we'll start earlier so we can make the run all the way to Gunnison. I'm thinking in about a month this trip should be spectacular when the leaves are turning.