I left at 6:30am this morning, after a wonderful night of hanging out with my crew and other E-Corps people. Many laughs and beers were shared. It feels as if in another 5 days we’ll all be back together and going on spike again. But alas, we are all going our separate ways.
On the drive out of the city I looked for some hole-in-the-wall breakfast taco place. Last one. I had to have it, one last time. Proper taco and caffeinated beverage in hand I drove out West. By late morning I had passed through the beautiful Texas hill country and was getting into the edges of Southern Plains. I’ve been reading Timothy Egan’s The Wrost Hard Time, which recollects some of the stories of the survivors of the Dust Bowl. Now the names of places I was driving through had history behind them – Dalhart, TX, Boise City, OK and Baca Country, CO. I tried to imagine massive dust clouds rolling over the open plains. The fields laying naked, stripped of the grass, waiting for nature to pick up the dirt and carry it off with the wind. Made the drive way more interesting.
By mid-afternoon I finally made it out of Texas, crossed over the 30-mile panhandle of Oklahoma and crossed into Colorado with a big cheer. This will be my home for the next 2 years! My destination was a trail in Comanche National Grassland that allowed free, dispersed camping. 16 miles over a dirt road and I’m there. Picture Canyon. With about an hour of sunlight left I decided to go stretch my legs and check out this trail. In the first 0.5 miles of the trail I saw at least two warning signs about respecting American Heritage. As you may have guessed the canyon walls have Native American drawings on them. But surely, with so many warnings they would be in top shape. WRONG. People have carved their own names into the same walls, sometimes right NEXT to these ancient drawings. So disappointing!
Fact: I can no longer look at a rock formation without assessing it for climbing potential. Same goes for trails, can’t look at one without thinking about its qualityand how it can be fixed.
I ended up camping next to a nice woman from Estes Park, CO named Libby. There was also a father and his adorably talkative 8-year-old daughter Morgan. She came up and talked my ear off as I was setting up my tent, then ran over to Libby to continued talking to her for the rest of the night. I'm sure it was a welcome break for her dad.
Asleep before sunset.
No comments:
Post a Comment