Enjoying San Juan National Forest

May 22-23, 2012

Tuesday -  This morning the river was running cloudy.   We were initially excited, because usually when a river turns cloudy it means it is rising, either from rain or snowmelt.   So while there was definitely no rain, we assumed some leftover snow was melting and raising the river.    However, after checking our reference rocks, it was clear the river didn’t rise.   Hmmm.  We were perplexed about what caused the cloudiness.   There’s a ranch a few miles upstream, so our guesses are that either the rancher put something into the river, or perhaps there was a landslide.   Either way, it makes it horrible fishing conditions so perhaps the fishermen will stay away and we can maintain some privacy.  :-)

Today we groomed the dogs.   Even though they weren’t stinky yet, we gave them each a bath.   I furminated Cassie, and Missy gave Buddy his summer cut.   They are both now quite adorable.

Wednesday -  This morning we climbed up the cliffs that face our campgrounds.   It was an incredible experience, very awe-inspiring!    We started at 8 when it was still cool, so we wouldn’t be overheated in our long sleeves and jeans.   We both also wore work gloves.   It was fun scrambling up the mountainside, planning the best possible route to the top.   I never understood the lure of mountain climbing before, but now I think I get it.   It was a lot of fun moving in a mostly vertical manner.    Missy and I picked different routes up the mountain, ending up on different peaks.  I had the water backpack, and soon Missy was begging me to come over to her side so she could share the water.   I found a game trail connecting the 2 peaks and headed over.  On the way, I scared a hawk out of its tree.  It was only like 20 feet away!   As it so happens, it flew right by Missy, so she got to see it too.    

After refreshing herself, we both made our way back to my peak.   We took some pictures and enjoyed the view.  I made a video so that hopeful people could get a sense of how high up we were.  I tossed a rock over the edge, and it seemed to take forever for it to fall to the ground.   (I should have taken a video of the rock falling).   After spending some time up top, we made our way down on the far side.   It was fun to slide down the steep hillside.    I really just enjoyed this hike so much.   It’s amazing that this activity is available to me right outside my door.

After our hike, we got our laundry gathered and sorted.   It’s been perhaps a month since we last did laundry, and there’s a lot of it.    We went to town after lunch and went to the Laundromat.    We pretty much had the place to ourselves.    We brought the computers, so we used 3G to get some internetting done.    I was on Facebook and saw that Mom was online (Hi mom!), so I tried seeing if she was there for a chat.  She was!   It was great to get the chance to chat with her for a while.

After doing laundry, we stopped at the park pavilion to get some water.   We discovered on our kayaking day that the city has super tasty water, so we took advantage of being in town to get our water jugs filled.   Then we headed back to camp, where we endured 700 mph winds for the rest of the day.    The gusts rocked the fitty like crazy, and we were concerned about a bendy tree being blown onto the rig.   The crazy winds kept up until almost midnight.