Durango, Colorodo
September 11, 2022
The San Juan Mountains.
We left Utah for Colorado, where we stayed at a small parking lot at the La Plata county fairgrounds in the town of Durango. This spot was all about the location and nothing about anything else (except for the electric hookups which allowed us to run the air conditioning willy-nilly).
A plain brown and white sign seems somewhat ironic here.
Colorado looks greener than Utah (at least here)!
No sugar coating this site--it's a gravel parking lot.
Technically, we had a mountain view.
There was some kind of maintenance facility behind us, but we didn't mind much, as the location was smack dab in the middle of Durango. We didn't spend a whole lot of time at the camper during the day anyway, and the nights were quiet.
We are not usually the types to do touristy excursion-type things, but for some reason we decided to buy tickets for the Durango-Silverton scenic narrow-gauge railroad. Because we didn't think we'd want to sit on a train for 7 hours roundtrip to Silverton (the train travels slowly), we opted for the shorter, 4-hour roundtrip to Cascade Canyon instead. It was fun riding an old-fashioned train with an original steam engine, complete with all the associated sounds and smells. Plus, the scenery was gorgeous.
The historic Durango depot
Backing the steam engine up to connect to the train
We took our seats in an open-air gondola. The weather was beautiful that day, so this was a great way to travel!
Almost ready to depart
On our way!
Nice scenery, even before reaching the mountains
Our car was toward the back, so we were able to get some shots of the front half of the train.
We passed a pretty lake.
The inside of our car
When we reached Cascade Canyon, we disembarked for an hour to walk around and have a picnic lunch by the Animas River.
Look around at our turnaround point where we had an hour to walk around Cascade Canyon. This is the foot bridge that is available for those that hike here from the road.
We took a closer look at the 1920s steam engine and marveled how it must be a maintenance nightmare to keep it running.
The engine was built in 1923 - almost 100 years old! It had since been converted from coal over to an oil burner - but still steam!
This was our car. Kind of resembles a cattle car, doesn't it?
During our stop, the train turned around--so we got to enjoy different scenery on the way back.
Just a random house we passed
Rick also took a few short videos to capture the sights and sounds more fully. Riding a steam train was quite the experience!
Pulling into an intermediate station - steam whistle and chugging
Pulling out of Cascade Canyon after we turned around - more whistle and chugging
Shortly after leaving Cascade Canyon - no whistle, but nice views of the river
After the ride, we both agreed that it was good we did the short trip instead of going all the way to Silverton. The train ride was not the smoothest (shocker!), and after four hours, our bodies felt like they had enough jostling for one day.
That evening, we went out to Derailed Pour House for their happy hour specials-- margarita for Julie, Colorado beer for Rick, and shared plates of delicious southwest nachos and a chicken bacon quesadilla-yum!
The next day, we did some hiking at Potato Lake (affectionately nicknamed Spud Lake). It was a pleasant 3-mile round trip with only 500 feet of climbing, although it was at 9000+ feet elevation. Fortunately, we have been over a mile high for most of the last few months, and we aren't getting winded as easily as we used to. The hike was pretty mild for us, but Passepartout (our truck) got quite the workout on the rough, three mile gravel road (more accurately-- rock road) to get to the trailhead. Good thing we have 4 wheel drive-- we needed it to get us through one particularly bad section.
It doesn't look so bad in pictures, but the road was really rocky.
At least it was scenic!
There was an attractive pond near the trailhead.
The trail passed through a pretty aspen forest part of the way.
The trail went all around the lake for different vantage points.
As usual, Rick took some photospheres of the lake:
Look around where the trail comes out to Spud lake
Look around from one end of the lake - shows the nice mountain views
After the hike, we decided to go to Silverton since we were much of the way there already. The drive through the San Juan mountains was spectacular. We had been to this area (including Silverton) several years ago. However, it had been early July and cold, rainy, sleety, and a little snowy when we last passed through. By contrast, today's weather was mostly sunny and in the low 70s.
Our first bighorn sheep sighting!
Notice the thin sliver of road that hugs the side of the mountain.
Along the way, we stopped by Andrews lake just for old time sake so that we could see what it looked like on a warm, sunny day, rather than on a cold, sleety one. The area appeared to be a popular fishing spot, and we took a half mile stroll to take some pictures.
A little while later, we made it to Silverton. We took about a 1 mile stroll around town and visited a bunch of shops.
That's Silverton down below.
That's the train from Durango.
Julie was tempted to get this shirt for Rick. Maybe in another 10 or 20 years.
Rick says he wouldn't want to live anywhere where you have to snow-blow your roof.
On our last day in Durango, we rode the Animas River Bike Trail which spans the northern and southern ends of town (17.5 miles total). It was an exceedingly nice trail. Durango looks like it would be a really nice place to live with all its parks, quaint downtown, and proximity to the San Juan mountains.
We passed a tiny home neighborhood.
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