September 16, 2015 – Day 1 of the Mountain Man Campout
This is the second year I've attended this campout with
friends up in the high country of Colorado.
Last year we camped near Taylor Lake and had a great time. I nearly ruined my wife's new Toyota Highlander
on an ill-advised but totally awesome drive through the back country.
This year we headed for the Ghost Town of Hancock, near St
Elmo in the collegiate peaks.
I don't have a quad ATV to ride, and I can't bring myself to
pay $400 to rent one for a day, so I planned to hang out around camp, or go on
a few short hikes. DaveB who organizes
these trips also said that we'd be camping on a really rough road, so I asked
another friend DaveW if I could ride with him.
DaveW recently injured his shoulder and had to have
reconstructive surgery. I didn't know
it, but he sold his ATVs and bought a Can-Am side by side UTV instead. So it turned out I could ride with him on the
various trails and excursions.
I met DaveW at his house around 4:30 in the morning. We loaded the last of my things in his
Mountaineer and head to meet up with everyone else. This was the first time he'd had the UTV on
his new trailer, hitched to the Mountaineer and loaded with gear. It looked like a lazy V with a pronounced sag
at the rear end of the truck. Several
people offered to offload some of our stuff, but DaveW thought he'd be fine so
long as he kept it slow.
We had a prayer, then loaded up and headed out about 5:10
am. The Mountaineer was a little squirly
and you could feel the bounce over any large bumps, but soon enough Dave
thought it would be OK.
We took I-25 South to highway 24 and turned West. There's a beautiful canyon just West of
Colorado Springs that leads up past Pike's Peak to the town of Woodland
Park. It was still pretty dark as we
headed up the canyon, but there was no traffic and it was very peaceful, other
than the lugging engine of the poor Mountaineer.
We drove through Woodland Park and on West through several
other small towns. We crossed over
Wilkerson Pass and dropped down onto what I call the Buffalo Plains. There are often small herds of buffalo in the
fields that line highway 24. I didn't
see any this time.
We finally arrived in the town of Buena Vista at about 7:00
where we met up with the others at Jan's Restaurant. It's a small café in the middle of town that
is a tradition for the Mountain Man.
It's good basic breakfast fare. I
got a couple eggs over easy, hash browns, and bacon. I was pretty hungry by the time the food came
and it didn't take long to finish my plate off.
After breakfast we headed to the City Market for some last
minute shopping. I had realized about
half way here that I'd left a whole bag of groceries in my refrigerator. I guess waking up at 4:00 am isn't conducive
to clear thinking.
I ran into the store to buy bacon, ice, and a few munchies
to snack on. Then DaveW and I drove over
to a gas station to top off his tank. I
guess the Mountaineer was really sucking the gas with it's load. While DaveW gassed up, I ran in to look for
my favorite beef jerky, Old Trader. I
can't seem to find it in large cities, I only see it in gas stations in small
towns.
When he finished gassing up we checked all the tiedowns on
the UTV and drove back to the City Market.
No one was there.
So we headed for camp, even though neither of us was sure
exactly where camp was, we figured we'd run into the others somewhere along the
way.
We drove South along the highway to the town of Nathrop,
then turned West toward the mountains.
This set of mountains is often referred as the Collegiate peaks because
it has Mt Princeton and Mt Yale. 6 miles
in toward the mountains, right at the base of Mt Princeton is a set of hot
springs. I've always wanted to visit
these hot springs but never taken the time.
At least I got to see them.
As it turns out, I was so busy looking at the hot springs
that I didn't notice the others in our group pulled off the road and waiting
for us. We blew right past them and kept
going.
Another 12 miles into the mountains we arrived at the town
of St Elmo. We didn't see our group
there (obviously), so we back tracked a bit and took the road south toward
Hancock Ghost Town. We had been on
pavement until the hot springs, then well maintained dirt until St Elmo, and
now the road began to narrow and to have a few wash boards and pot holes. We had to pull over to squeeze past a few
other vehicles now and then, but still not bad.
We also began to see allot of fall colors.
The Aspens were bright yellow with a few deep orange. Some leaves were just beginning to fall, and
the mountains around us had whole carpets of aspens in various shades of
colors. It was beautiful.
7 miles south of St Elmo we reached the remains of
Hancock. There are just a few
foundations left from the original town.
The road kind of stopped here, but rough trails lead south and
west. We took the south road/trail over
some rough rocks.
The road was very narrow and rocks 4 and 5 inches high were
all over the place. A few 8 and 10 inch
rocks stuck up here and there causing Dave to drive very slow and careful. We had gone about 2 miles from Hancock when
the road got even worse. I suggested
that DaveW offload his UTV and take it to search for our group rather than
driving the Mountaineer up that nasty stretch.
Dave headed up the trail and only a couple minutes later I
heard cars coming up behind us. It was
our group. It also turned out that we'd
unloaded right in the middle of the turnoff to camp. I pulled the mountaineer up a bit to let
everyone pass. DaveW came back shortly
after that and we followed the rest up path to camp.
We camped about 300 yards off the "road" in a
small grass field. We didn't have many
trees around us, but we had some fantastic views. We all set about unloading gear and setting
up tents. Last year I slept in a big
tent with 7 other guys in a massive tent brought by Andrew. It was a huge tent with a wood stove which
Andrew kept running all night. It was
the warmest cold weather camping I'd ever done.
This year I was in my big 12 man (really 5 man) tent. I'd forgotten to bring a pad to put under me,
or an extra blanket to put over me. I
never really got cold, but I felt chilly a few times.
Once camp was setup we headed back down the trail a few
hundred yards to cut some wood. We cut
down 3 trees and chopped them up. While
the others were using the chainsaws, Blake came running down to tell us there
were moose right by our camp, fighting.
I huffed and puffed back to camp, and sure enough, 3 big moose were in a
mud wallow about 50 yards from camp.
By the time we got there they were no longer fighting and
had begun to lay down in the mud. DaveB
hopped on his quad and said he'd go down and spook them so we could get better
pictures. I didn't think it was such a
good idea to anger 1500 pounds of moose on a 300 pound vehicle, but down the
road he went.
He didn't have to go far though and the moose all stood back
up. They didn't stick around long, and
soon we were back down by the tree cutting and loading up the truck.
It was barely past noon and camp was almost set up. We prepped our fire pit, setup the kitchen
area, setup a canopy in case it rained, and generally started to relax.
After we were done, Troy decided to go for a hike. The hill/mountain/ridge just to our East has
several old mines visible well up the slope.
It was a few thousand feet high, but the mines were only half way
up. The rest of us sat around chatting
or working on our own projects.
After 30 minutes someone noticed that Troy was well up the
hillside. I pulled out a small telescope
and mounted it on my tripod. We took
turns watching Troy cross some green stretches and scree fields. As we continued watching, Troy drew near to
one of the mines, but instead of crossing over to it, he continued to
climb. there was another mine above the
first, but he didn't approach that one either.
Eventually we realized that Troy intended to climb to the very top of
the ridge.
Now we took turns keeping an eye on Troy in case something
went wrong, so we'd be able to find him.
As he climbed higher, the slope got steeper. The whole hillside seemed to be one massive
scree field. But through the telescope
the "scree" turned out to be half ton boulders that nearly dwarfed
Troy and he had to scramble on all 4s to climb the last few hundred feet to the
top. It was very cool to see him at the
top of the ridge.
We again watched through the telescope as Troy began his
downward journey. He seemed to take it
much slower and more deliberate than his climb up. The sun was close to setting by the time he
reached camp and it was time for dinner.
DaveB made fried chicken for dinner and it was
delicious. He also made homemade ice
cream for desert.
We sat around the fire eating dinner and enjoying the
beautiful sunset around us. With
mountain ranges to the east and west of us we had a very long twilight and
could watch the shadows slowly climb the east ridge. Then once the sun truly set we sat watching satellites
and falling stars.
Sitting around a camp fire is one of my favorite things in
the world. We told lots of stories and
jokes. We solved most of the world’s
problems if only the leaders would have been there to hear us.
One by one we began to yawn and head for sleep. I managed to stay up until 9:30 before left the radiant warmth of the camp fire and crawled into my cold sleeping bag. I fell asleep within minutes.
4:30 am we met up to start the trip
Breadfast at Jan's
360 Photo at Jan's Restaurant
Having breakfast at Jan's restaurant in Buena Vista Colorado. September 2015 on our way to a 4 day "Mountain Man" camp out with friends. - Spherical Image - RICOH THETA
Driving into camp. The trees started out green
Then they began to turn yellow
Until they became almost a dark orange
The hills around us also started to show allot of color
We setup camp in a clearing with beautiful views.
We were just below tree line. OVer 11,500 feet
Our camp with some of the view around us
DaveW's view from his tent
Cutting fire wood
He cut down that tree with that battery powered chain saw
Moose visiting our camp
The ridge above our camp
Troy climbing but still near the bottom
Troy at the top of the ridge
Troys view of our camp from the top of the ridge
DaveB making homemade ice cream
DaveB making dinner
Sitting around the camp fire
Eating dinner around the campfire
Having fried chicken dinner around the camp fire high up in the mountains of Colorado. The sun hasn't set, but it's dropped behind the western ridge and dropped us into shadow. The temperature dropped very quickly once it did. - Spherical Image - RICOH THETA
A video I produced for day 1 of the campout - Youtube
Slideshow of all photos
