August 19th – Kentfield and Tahoe, CA: We drove up I-80 to South Lake Tahoe to pick up Hana’s skis (Colorado state law requires ski possession for all incoming students), stopping along the way at the Colorado College student open house for the Bay Area. It was sponsored by a married Alumni couple (Class of ’76), both of whose children also attended CC. Most of the students there were freshmen. We seemed to be the only ones taking a leisurely trip out; everyone else was either planning to fly or make a two-day trip along I-80.
August 20th – 21st – Great Basin National Park: We took Highway 50 across Nevada from Tahoe to Baker. Hana did most of the driving, reconstituted learner’s permit in hand (she had sent it through the laundry the night before we left). It’s a good place to learn highway driving, with almost no traffic across the Basin and Range. It was strange for me to be back on highway 50- the last time I was on this section was coming out to graduate school in 1985. I never expected to make the return trip bringing a child to college.
We stopped and camped at Great Basin National Park near the Utah border. Great Basin is very quiet for a national park; it’s five hours from Salt Lake City or Las Vegas, both of which have more famous parks close at hand. We had our pick of nice campsites in a mixed aspen / conifer forest with stream running through. Despite the obscurity, the place has quite a bit to offer. There are ancient groves of Bristlecone Pines here, similar to White Mountain in California. The world’s oldest living tree (4900 years old) was once here- unfortunately cut down by the forest service in 1964 for sectioning. We hiked up to the top of Wheeler Peak (13,063′), highest point in 200 miles. It’s a fairly easy trip: 8 miles round trip with roughly 3000 feet of vertical gain. There were good views from the top, though prevailing southwesterly winds had brought smoke from the 235,000 acre Zaca fire near Santa Barbara, five hundred miles away.
The park also includes Lehman Caves- several miles of limestone passages and rooms lined with calcite formations. The Park Service runs a nice little tour – much less commercial than Carlsbad. Unfortunately, they had enacted a photography ban a few days before we arrived, so there are no stalactite photos in the galleries.
August 22nd – Arches National Park: After driving across Utah, we stopped at Arches, just outside Moab near the Colorado border. We (along with a horde of others) hiked out to Delicate Arch. It’s a nice 3 mile route across slickrock, with some small side canyons visible along the way. We started early to beat the 95 degree midday heat. Not everyone was that well prepared – on the way back, we passed two women walking barefoot with no water.
August 23rd – Ouray, Colorado and Mount Sneffels: We entered the Paradox Valley in Colorado and drove to Ouray, in the San Juan Mountains. Ouray is in the next valley over from Telluride, 15 miles away by jeep or 50 by paved road. It’s starting to look a bit like Telluride as well, with glass blowing galleries on Main Street and miso encrusted salmon on the menus. Some of the real estate prices we saw posted in windows wouldn’t have been out of place in California.
Our plan was to climb Mount Sneffels (14,150′) via the standard route, which starts from Yankee Boy Basin just outside town. Our guidebook claimed that two wheel drive cars could get within two miles of the trailhead, but being lazy souls we rented a Wrangler. The rental company was run by a couple of old-school types who likely had spent their whole lives in Ouray and who were not particularly happy with its transformation. One requirement of the contract was that we wash and fill the jeep at the ConocoPhillips before returning it.
Renting a high clearance, short wheel base vehicle turned out to be a great move- we would have ripped the bottom out of the minivan within the first few miles. Even the Wrangler scraped bottom in a few places. Guys with longer trucks and SUV’s mostly gave up and stopped before reaching the end. We parked at the trailhead (12,000+ feet) next to a couple of four wheel ATV’s.
There was an interesting collection of people climbing the mountain. One guy brought Guinness, his Labrador Retriever along- Sneffels was the dog’s sixth fourteener. There was a family of five from New Hampshire that climbs Mount Sneffels every year- when their children reach the age of eight, they come along. They had managed to get their rental Suburban up 3/4ths of the way to the final trailhead- quite a challenge given the tight switchbacks.
We climbed Lavender Col up to the southeast couloir. The route was easy to follow- scree was the biggest challenge, plus a little exposure on the couloir’s exit slot near the summit. Were off the mountain by 1:00, with only one rumble of thunder.
On the drive down, we picked up a couple of hitchhikers (they hadn’t rented a jeep). One was a retired geology professor from Arizona State who winters in Phoenix and summers in Durango. He was lamenting not buying a house or two in Ouray for back taxes when he first started coming in the 60’s. He said the same second housification is going on in Durango- all those d****d Californians with their money.
August 24th and 25th – Black Canyon of the Gunnison and Colorado Springs: After getting back on Highway 50, we made a quick stop at the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park before heading into Colorado Springs. The park is quite spectacular – rather like the bottom third of the Grand Canyon, where the Colorado cuts through the Vishnu Schist.
After staying the night in Colorado Springs, we moved all Hana’s stuff into her Colorado College dorm room, Loomis 143. After some introductory sessions, she’s headed out to Paonia in western Colorado to work/play on an organic farm until classes start on Labor Day.