Sandy Beaches and Concrete Jungles

Just a quick heads up-- I did not have a chance to go through and edit this post before posting so hopefully you can pardon any mistakes or difficult sections to read, it's just time for us to get going now. 

We did eventually leave Justin and the two Matts and made our way down into the oven mitt part of Michigan. Sure it was several days later on the 25^th of September, but we did keep going. We left at around noon and headed down towards one of the more remarkable bridges in the entirety of the U.S. and out towards Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore. Now everyone in the mitt part of Michigan refers to their location of the state by displaying their right hand palm upwards and pointing to which part of the state they lived in. Using this representation, Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore would be at the tip of the pinky. For those of you who might struggle pulling up that image in your own brain that is the most Western point on the northern shore of the main mitt of Michigan. Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore is actually considered a National Park and usually one would have to pay to get into the park, but somehow we always manage to show up after the main gate has already been abandoned, so we were able to go hiking around on these dunes (the day after we had spent a full day at the other dunes mind you) without having to pay the entrance fee. This also meant that we hiked back to our cars in the dark, but that was no issue for us. We have before and since done much later night hikes.

Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes are about twice the size of the Sable Sand Dunes, though the Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes do have a lot more traffic. Even with us arriving as the sun was sinking below the horizon and the sky threatening the possibility of rain we still ran into several people on the trail out to the coast of Lake Michigan. It was a beautiful hike though, and the sunset really added to the aesthetic. The best part of all though was the color and look of the lake at the end of the hike. Somehow the water there right by the shore had taken on this turquoise glow. It was too beautiful to just look at, we had to take a dip in the water as well (for me it also meant finally bagging Lake Michigan). I mean look at it! You can’t tell me that you would not have wanted to go for a swim as well.

After hiking back to the cars we took a moment to fix some dinner there at the foot of the first dune before we went about trying to find a place to sleep. This involved quite a bit of driving around. Ultimately we realized that there was no decent National Forest nearby for us to set up camp, which meant we resorted to one of our more desperate means of setting up camp. We found a roadside pull off that had a picnic table and set up our tent right next to the picnic table and I tried to mostly block the view of our tent from the road with my car. It was not exactly the greatest location for privacy, but we were tired so we fell right to sleep.

Next morning we awoke to our tent being soaked once again. It had rained that night, and my sleeping pad had collected a decent amount of water within it since I was on the lowest part of the incline of the slight hill we had set our tent up on. This made me a little bit grumpy from the get go that morning. But thankfully Eric and Tweedy did not have to suffer through my mood since Tweedy had just switched to riding in Eric’s car the day before.

Our first stop was William Mitchell State Park where the boys made breakfast and I just continued in my moodiness. I did not manage to get out of my moody state of mind until we stopped at another little park a couple hours later. Bay City State Recreation Area was a park that butted right up to the shallowest part of Lake Eerie. We probably walked out into the lake about a hundred yards and still the water never got higher than my waist- it never even reached the waists of the other two though (darn those tall people). It was quite chilly that morning, which meant that I was happy it couldn’t get any higher than my waist, and even being waist deep was a bit too much at times. Still it was a great looking beach. During the summer I’m sure it’s packed.

After enjoying that bit of nature it was time to dive into another city. We drove into Detroit in the afternoon and parked our cars on the side of the street in Greek Town before beginning our self-guided tour through the city. For some reason Detroit gets a bad rap, and perhaps a couple years ago there was a reason for it (I remember seeing the pictures on the news of all the abandoned high rises and trashed demolition sites), but for me it ranks up there with Chicago, though it was nowhere near as bustling as Chicago. I think that will change over the next few years though as well as more people come to the realization that Detroit is really a beautiful city. We began our walk with wandering through the streets on the northern side of the city. This part of the city is full of older architecture. If I had to hazard a guess (which I do because I didn’t do any research about the city—sorry about that) I would say that most of those store fronts date back to the late 1800’s.

This was where the shopping district part of the town was located, which was not exactly up our alley as budget travelers, so after taking some time to enjoy the architecture we started to wander South towards the board walk part of town that follows along the Detroit River. This part of the city is absolutely gorgeous. It is lined with monuments and little art installments of the three-dimensional variety. Across the river you can see the southernmost part of Canada. It’s a random peninsula that dips below the rest of the country, pretty much a Canadian Florida. Believe the place looked like it was a resort town too, at least from where we stood on the other side of the river.

After that we wandered into the Renaissance Center. This is a conglomeration of five buildings that were built by GM, though they contain about fifty different companies. The buildings are set up with one center building that was taller than the rest and four satellite skyscrapers around it. We first wandered into the one owned by the Hilton and snuck into one of the elevators and rode it to the top floor of the hotel. Unfortunately, there were no windows that could be seen on that top floor. You had to have a room to get the view. We still wandered around in there for a minute with the hope of finding some way to access the view, but ultimately failing in our quest. Next we managed to get to the base of the center building. After asking several people where we could find access to find the elevator that went to the top floor we were able to find it. It was owned by Coach (a restaurant that was located on that top floor). The hostess there on the main floor was kind enough to just let us in so we could take the ride and see the view at the top. I’m pretty sure it has to be the best free elevator in the world. It is glass so you get to witness the view change and the rest of the world diminish right before your eyes before you arrive at the breathtaking view afforded there at the seventy-second floor.

Once we got to see that view the only thing left to do was get back to our cars and figure out a place to sleep. Fortunately we managed to find a walking path that goes right through what I’m pretty sure used to be the ugly looking part of Detroit that I saw those pictures of all those years ago. Now it is beautiful though, and is pretty much an outdoor art gallery for some amazing urban painters. I’m going to include a few specimens for you all to appreciate.

(I know, quite a lot of pictures in succession, but one of my little sisters was rather disgruntled with the fact that my last post did not have enough pictures, so I’m trying to make up for it this go round.)

That night Eric managed to find us a home to stay in since our tent was soaking wet and we did not feel too inclined to sleep by the side of the road again in a soaking wet tent. Helen and Steve let us into their home despite the fact that we were all complete strangers to them, they just happened to know someone that knew Eric and trusted her to not refer complete ruffians to stay with them. They were honestly some of the sweetest people I have ever met. A dinner of spaghetti and meatballs was waiting for us when we arrived along with a side salad and a desert of ice cream sundaes. That was the most satisfied my stomach has been on the trip thus far (though the Chicago style pizza that Matt’s parents provided for us is a very close second). After a delightful dinner we watched a less delightful display with the first presidential debate. It was quite the storm. Neither one of those two candidates looked good, though I enjoyed watching it because what I studied in school (rhetoric) translates perfectly to analyzing debates. Ultimately though I think that the entire country should just say “screw them” to the main political parties and instead only vote for the less well represented parties or write in a candidate. Because if we are all honest with ourselves we’ll all realize that not a single one of us wants another Republican or Democrat as a president.

Anyway, we still slept well and I managed not to have any nightmares waking me up in the middle of the night. The next day we were served pancakes for breakfast and chatted with Helen and Steve before we headed out right around noon. It was hard to say goodbye to those beautiful people. I might have to go back to Detroit just so I can see Steve and Helen again.

But it was time to head on out. That night there was a dance to be a part of in Indianapolis, so we took to the road and in a couple hours we were telling Michigan goodbye after a nice long stay.

Don’t forget to check out Tweedy’s and Eric’s Youtube channels for the video documentation of the trip. 

Blues Bars and Mega Malls

First and foremost I must apologize for my severe lack of updates over the past couple of weeks, I'll try to remedy that over the next few days, but for now here is the tale of our wanderings through Minnesota (and a bit of lower Wisconsin).

We have a knack for showing up on doorsteps late at night, and the night we rolled into lower Wisconsin was no different. It was around ten o’ clock when we knocked on the door of Tweedy’s uncle's home (getting in as many apostrophes in a single go as I can manage). I don't know how, but Tweedy seems to have family scattered all over the country. They had been there for us in previous states and we have stayed with other family members of his since. All of my family lives out West, so you probably won’t hear any mention of the three of us staying with my extended family until we end up on the other side of the country. Just had to get that out there because it will sound like I’m riding the coattails of the other two for the next couple months, but don’t worry, my family will eventually make an appearance.

Tweedy’s uncle lived in lower Wisconsin—Mt Horeb to be exact. He and Tweedy’s grandfather were kind enough to share with us the leftovers from the dinner that was prepared earlier that day while we sat around and chatted for a while before setting up our beds in the basement. The amount of driving that we had done that day left our legs a little restless, so after we set up our beds we got back up and went outside to go on a late night walk. It’s funny how a person can feel so tired and yet remain awake for several more hours just in order to take advantage of the chance to stretch out the body. And stretch we did. In all honesty we took stretching to the next level by doing a little bit of a workout routine/set of childish challenges on a playground that was built by the side of a little lake. (I don’t know if it was technically a lake, but it was one of those bodies of water that is much bigger than a Coloradan is used to seeing, in other words to me it was a lake even if the locals thought of it more like a pond.) These little challenges involved muscle-ups on the cross bar holding the swings and creating new and difficult ways to cross the playground equipment. It took nearly two hours but then the wiggles were out and we were able to fall asleep with no difficulty.

  

The next morning we awoke and were treated to a breakfast by Tweedy’s uncle. On top of the breakfast his uncle also sent us off with some more food to hold us over until we encountered another gracious family or we broke down and bought some food ourselves (as it is we’ve only had to purchase food very rarely, in fact the only food we ever “have to” buy are fresh loaves of bread—people are pretty awesome and giving). After a little bit of conversation we were back on the road.

I had heard from one of my good friends and dance partners from back in Denver that there was a good blues dancing scene in Minneapolis that had weekly blues dancing every Tuesday night, and it just so happened that it was a Tuesday and it was time for us to head into Minnesota, but not until we enjoyed a little bit of what lower Wisconsin has to offer. This meant stopping off at a little state park on our way up to Minneapolis. We found a beautiful hike at this park that culminated in a picturesque view of the Mississippi from atop a bluff that bordered it.

It was a beautiful view, but we did not linger for very long. The mosquitoes were out and were waging a war against us. I rolled down my sleeves, popped my collar, and pulled my hat down as far as I could and still they found ways in and just kept feasting on me. Tweedy and Eric also collected quite a few battle wounds. I launched an offensive against them as well, but it was not enough, even when I got over 20 swatted. Their numbers were just too great, so we retreated to the cars and drove from the swarm, next stop was Minneapolis.

There needs to be a little insert here. See I am just going to call all the city activities that we engaged in during the next couple of days as happening in Minneapolis. The truth is that Minneapolis is just one of two cities that make up a rather large and sprawling metro area. The other city is St Paul and together with Minneapolis they make up the Twin Cities area. Still I’m just going to call it Minneapolis. Hopefully the mentioning of St Paul will keep locals from getting too angry at me though. Not like everyone reading this will be able to tell that some of the places I mention are actually in the St Paul area, but I thought I would tread on the safe side just in case.

Another little note I need to make before I go into the details of the rest of the night though, otherwise the night won’t seem as incredible as it was to me. I mentioned in earlier posts that I’m a blues dancer. There is this funny thing that happens among blues dancing communities—most of the time the dancers have no idea about the local blues music scene and the local blues music scene has no idea that there is a blues dancing scene. Denver does its best to remedy this by inviting blues bands (often locals) to perform at the weekly blues dance at least once a month, but most blues dancing scenes aren't quite so lucky. I rolled up to the location where the local blues dancers meet to dance in Minneapolis expecting this scene to be separate from the blues music scene as well, but almost immediately I began to question my original assumption.

The name of the joint was Wilebski’s Blues Saloon. People standing outside the bar looked more like bar regulars than dancers (not to say bar regulars have a certain look, but dancers are usually pretty easy to make out, they usually move in groups or—after some dancing—pairs, and they have this happy glow and tendency to be laughing/singing/moving almost constantly). Inside there was a live blues band playing, people gathered around the bar in an adjacent room to the music, and then an empty floor in front of the band. I looked around with a bit of confusion. I was expecting there to be nothing but dancers inside, but instead there was no dancing even happening at the moment, and a live band playing some killer music. Turns out it was the weekly blues jam night. A jam is when visiting artists can sign up to play together with other locals. They don’t have to bring a band, just their own instrument, and then most of the songs are just improvised. For about thirty minutes we just sat and listened while I waited for the dancers to reveal themselves, and soon enough they did so. It started with them conglomerating at a booth and then after some chatting they started to take to the floor.

After getting a decent idea as to who were the dancers I began to ask different girls to dance and continued to dance until about 10:45, at which point most of the dancers left. This was a much shorter period of dancing than I am used to. Back in Colorado the shortest dance was three hours, and usually I personally try to get in four hours of dancing if I'm going out dancing for the night. But this was just a small group, and so once they had all danced with each other a couple times they would just head out and get some sleep so they could function at their jobs the next day. (Why one needs sleep more than dancing is something I will never understand) Since I was dancing I didn’t get any pictures, but Eric has already posted a video that contains a short clip of me dancing.

That night we didn’t have a place to stay. This being the case we had to do some improvising, which began with making dinner on our camping stove in the parking lot back behind the blues bar. To this day that was still the most unique situation in which I have ever prepared a dinner. After eating we headed to a nearby state park that had a campground and snuck into a campsite that one usually needs to pay for. Thankfully no one would ever think someone would roll in to a campsite at 1:00 in the morning on a Wednesday, so we managed to get away with a free night of sleep before breaking camp and driving back into town to check out The Mall of America the next day. We figured you can’t be in Minneapolis and not see The Mall of America. It lives up to the legend of being a giant mall. Though it is just a mall and none of us were in the mood to spend money since we have such a tight budget. We did spring to pay for riding one of the roller coasters though. That’s a rare enough experience that it could legitimize spending seven dollars.

After the mall it was time to get out of the city and back into nature, so we drove up to northern Minnesota to camp for the night in a national forest. We then woke up and drove into Voyageurs National Park. I have a feeling that most people have not heard of this park because I had never heard of it and it is free to get into, and only the not-so-well-known parks have free admission. Here's a brief history of the park based on the short video that we watched in the visitor's center. It is part of a water system that runs through lakes both in Canada and the United States and was part of a trade route run by French fur traders in the 16-1700’s. These fur traders were known as Voyageurs, hence the name of the park. It is best accessed by boat—the same way the Voyageurs accessed the area—most of it is either islands or the water surrounding the islands and they build no roads between the islands for land lubbers like ourselves. We had to be satisfied with hiking around on the coast while admiring the islands from afar.

Almost more remarkable than all the islands were all the mushrooms. There were so many that it would take a slideshow to show all of them rather than just post four pages worth of mushroom pictures. Thankfully Eric already has a slideshow of all the mushrooms up on his Youtube channel so I can focus on the writing. (If you clicked on the earlier link you've already seen them)

There in Voyageurs National Park was also the first time we tried foraging for food, and what we found the most of was a lichen known as rock tripe. This lichen is quite dry during the fall season, but after being boiled in water it takes on a texture like a mushroom and doesn’t have much taste, so nothing to complain about or write home about (just enough to make a mention of in a blog). We also tried out the roots of lily pads and roots and stalks of cattails. Those were not near as satisfying or easy to prepare so we didn’t use them any more afterwards, but that rock tripe we feasted on and included it in the next few editions of our dinner beans. We also came across a random trove of old buried bottles and what appeared to be charcoal based bars of soap. I’ll let you be the judge of what you think those strange black squares wrapped in red and white plastic are.

That night we went back to the same place we camped the night before. The next day we woke up and drove into another national forest where we spent the majority of the evening. We did a little bushwhacking and stumbled across some random animal skulls. One of which we are fairly certain was a beaver skull and the other most likely was a white tail deer skull. We made a strong fire that night and put on some pine needles that filled the surrounding forest with the aroma of rosemary. The next morning we made one of the more ridiculous meals we’ve made on the trip—fried pickles. After the pickles it was back on the road and on into upper Wisconsin.

Cliff Hangers

Now I don’t know how many people have ever woken up inside of a national park, but I would recommend putting it on the bucket list. Up in the mountains it had been a bit too chilly for me. Out there on the edge of the canyon I woke in weather that I felt comfortable going around in a t-shirt with. (That’s really saying something for a guy who needs four layers to go out in 32° weather.) It was a beautiful sight to see and hear in the morning as well: the crashing of the river several hundred feet below with great dark rock rising out of it.

I took the first hour of the day to admire the highly underappreciated canyon before heading on to complete my collection of the four National Parks in Colorado. This meant driving for another four and a half hours down to Mesa Verde National Park. This drive included a winding road that was one of the best drives I have ever taken. If my memory serves me correctly (which, quite honestly, is a long shot—I hardly ever trust my memory myself, so I would encourage you to approach it with the same trepidation) it was Colorado Highway 92. The curves were beautiful hairpins with hills ascending and descending. I got to really slam through all of the gears in my little Honda CR-V. This is a rarity because I am already up into fifth gear by 35 miles per hour. Honestly, there is hardly any horsepower in that little engine. Still love it though.

After the 4.5 hours of driving I managed to pull into the park around 3:30, but I had no idea how huge the park was. It was a 30 mile drive in to get to the hike that I wanted to go on. That was about an hour of driving just to get to the trailhead. Not to mention that I was only 40 miles from hitting 400 miles on my tank, which is much further than I’ve gone on a single take before, but I was not about to turn around and go back five miles down the road to fill up my tank. That would take even more time, and all the sky around the park was already looking dark and ominous. In I drove, taking advantage of every downhill—riding it with my foot on the clutch—which made my approach to some of the hair pin turns a bit faster than they should have been in an SUV. Still, I made it alive and that is all that matters.

Usually Mesa Verde is one of the more crowded parks, so I was expecting a huge crowd of people, but instead there was hardly anyone there when I arrived. One of the park rangers told me that things die down during August for some bizarre reason. Because apparently it all picks back up again in September when a whole bunch of tourist groups start coming by in bus loads. But in August things are slow. So I got two National Parks almost all too myself, at least there were no other people on the trail with me so I got to take my time reading the signs and learning about the different parts of the architecture. Most people think of the cliff dwellings when they hear about Mesa Verde National Park, but before the natives ever lived on the face of the cliffs they just lived on the top of the mesas. Which is what I saw first. The best part are the Kivas.

I can’t help but imagine Native Americans tripping out on something while holding religious rituals inside of these earthen pits. The interesting thing is that they were most common during the older generations and later generations just filled them in, sometimes even using them to dump trash in. There’s one way to really rebel against the faith of your fathers.

After touring the ruins on top of the mesa I went to check out the cliff dwellings, and honestly that is where the real excitement lies.

Look at those places! Who gets it in their head that just living on top of flat ground doesn’t sound exciting anymore. They were probably all sitting in the Kiva passing the peace pipe and one guy just said, “Ever see those holes in the cliffs around here?”

“Yeah man, those look pretty cool.”

“Wouldn’t it be awesome to put one of these Kivas in one of those holes?”

“Dude, that would be sweet! It would be like underground, but also above ground, and then there would be this epic drop right outside of the door. And then only cool people who can climb like bosses could get in there.”

“Totally! We should definitely do that man. Then we wouldn’t have to have around all the old and sick people and the women and children while we were hanging out and smoking the peace pipe.”

And then they made the kiva and then the women, children, and sick people started just busting up the party and then they just decided, “Heck, if everyone is going to keep on coming down here to bug us we might as well build the entire town into the cliff.” There, that is my story of how and why the cliff dwellings came to be. There were no wars or anything like that, just a few guys trying to get some guy time, failing, and then everyone moving in because they all thought it was pretty cool.

Personally I would not have been one of the cool people who would be capable of making it to the Kiva. Good ol’ Darwin would have snatched me out of that gene pool in a second. I preferred snapping pictures from afar. And after my pictures I managed to get my car back out of the park and to the gas pump without the fuel light coming on. Then I continued driving until I got into Durango and pulled my car over into a Walmart parking lot where I slept the night after spoiling myself and buying some doughnuts, a sandwich, and a Lunchable. That is getting spoiled when compared to just eating packets of salmon or tuna along with a can of beans occasionally.

Next morning I woke up with a text from my Mom telling me that my little sister needed to see me update my blog, so I went and spent the morning getting a blog post written and pictures uploaded at the public library (the Durango library is a bumpin' place) before going and taking a ten-mile hike. This hike started at a random pull off on the side of the road. I saw a sign that said trailhead, and the way I am with constantly craving a hike I decided to pull over and give it a look. Turned out it was supposed to be a mountain biking trail, but I went hiking on it any way. Something tells me that mountain bikers hate having people just hiking on the trails—just an extra obstacle you have to watch out for and all. Still, I didn’t much care, it was a beautiful day that was just begging me to go hiking during it. And so I wandered around for about 4 hours. Found some good lookout points too.

It was a huge system of trails, which made the sign at the foot of the trail a liar, because it claimed that it was just a single loop, but the map up the trail a ways said quite differently. The red is the route I ended up taking.

After the hike it was back to more driving. Right as the sun was setting I ended up just pulling up a random road that claimed to be National Forest access. I found a nice overlook where I could watch the sunset and then I kicked back and smoked a very nice cigar while the sun fell behind the mountains. It was the perfect end to the evening, and almost an end to all of my adventures by myself. The next day I would just end up driving home, but not before waking up and finding giant elk hoof prints going around my car. Apparently something about my car got it’s attention, or maybe I was just snoring way too loud and it showed up to see if it could shut me up. Whatever the case, those were definitely some giant hoof prints.

And so my lonesome wanderings came to an end. Stay tuned for the post going up tomorrow about the beginning of the wanderings of the 3 Men on the Bummel.

Random Things and Hot Springs

I woke up warm and comfortable AND… miracle of miracles, DRY! I cannot tell you just how happy Rachel letting me sleep on her couch made me. Not only that but the angel made me toast and eggs in the morning! That was the most gourmet meal I had during all of my lonesome ramblings, even when I let myself splurge near the end of the week. However, don’t let me get ahead of myself.

At one point I had planned to go and hike to Conundrum Hot Springs, but it was a Saturday and that trail was already known as one that got way too busy. Not to mention that I had driven down to it the night prior and at night the trailhead for a sixteen-mile roundtrip hike was already almost completely full. Sure hot springs sounded excellent after tearing my legs to pieces during the twelve-mile hike that I had done the day prior, but crowded trails weren’t really my cup of tea. I had heard though that on that particular weekend all the National Parks were free because it was the 100^th Birthday of the National Parks on August 25, 2016. Which means that everyone needs to get out to the National Parks this year to celebrate 100 years of National Parks, along with the fact that they are considering putting limits on the number of visitors each park allows in each year. Get in while you still can!

For me there was also another reason to go check out the other National Parks in Colorado. I had already gotten to Rocky Mountain National Park and The Great Sand Dunes National Park earlier this year and now I wanted to complete my collection of the four Colorado National Parks (that’s a pretty high number for a single state too, just in case you didn’t realize—Colorado for the Win!). The closest one was the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, and it looked like I would be able to stop along the way at another ghost town—Marble, CO. I set the course and hit the road. 

It took me nearly thirty minutes to realize I was on the same road I had taken a couple years prior to get to Blues Recess in Paonia, Colorado. I have to throw in a little aside here about how freaking awesome it is to Blues and Fusion dance on the top of a bus in the middle of beautiful mountainous country. (if anyone wants to know what either of those types of dancing are just say in the comments and I'll find someone on my road trip to do a demo of both that I will record and I'll make a post specifically for explaining them). Unfortunately they have since stopped coming through Colorado and I would just like to make my personal plea… PLEASE COME BACK TO COLORADO, RECESS!!!! Now back from my aside—on our way to Recess that year we had stopped at some random, undeveloped hot springs that were just on the side of the road. I began to keep my eyes peeled and my windows rolled down so I could catch the scent of sulfur. Turns out neither of those things were absolutely needed since the pull off had a few cars there already (though I did smell the air for that sulfur scent just to verify that I had found the place).

I descended the little path to the side of the river that the springs fed into with the goal in mind of just soaking my feet and calves, which did still ache slightly after the excursion up the peaks the previous day. The big pool had a couple guys hanging out in it and I plopped myself down at a distance that was close enough to hold conversation but not so close as to appear creepy. (At least that was my intent, but wearing a straw fedora and purple rimmed sunglasses might have made the vicinity I had chosen still a little creepy.) Once again I had found people that were not natives and were in fact part of the great post-marijuana legalization migration, though honestly those that stick around in Colorado don’t just do so for the prime herb. As a nearly native individual (I spent the first five years of my life in California *gasp*) I understand that Colorado is just intoxicating and impossible to leave forever. My mom would disagree, but then she hates snow, wind, cold, winter, things losing leaves and dying, hail, lightning storms, and pretty much every part of the year in Colorado aside from June to July (maybe May and August can be thrown in if it is a warm and dry year). But anyway, these individuals came from the Midwest, one from Wisconsin somewhere and the other from Chicago, Illinois. So after either of those places Colorado is just about a perfect paradise. I say this before I’ve spent much time in either place so really it's just me being my generally offensive self.

I chatted with these two for a while and then a somewhat hippie looking girl joined us (my generation has done its best at reviving the hippie aesthetic, and sometimes I think we’ve even done a more complete job of it then the flower children of the seventies). But yeah, eventually the guys left and then the hippie girl asked if I was just going to just sit there and soak my feet or actually get in. It took no more goading, I was soon stripped down to my boxer briefs and into the little rock pool. (It almost always only takes that much encouragement, my older sister would know—just suggest the idea and chances are I’ll do it.) Turns out the hippie girl had a name, Christine, and then we were joined by some people from North Carolina and another hippie type boy who didn’t say much and then a snowboard “jock?” and a couple friends that were visiting him from out of town. The place was a party, beer included, I even got one from the hippie girl. It was a very good Saturday afternoon, but I had a National Park to get to before the sun went down. Eventually I got back on the road  and even maintained the intention of stopping by Marble, CO.

I did indeed get to Marble, but I did not even bother trying to locate the quarry, though I saw lots of beautiful marble sculptures that the residents had created. Still I did not even get out of the car to snap any pictures so… click here to see other people’s pictures of Marble, CO. I know, it’s just as bad as the Trump Campaign using the first picture of a Black Family they found when they Google searched the term, but you have to remember that I had a National Park to get to.

The Black Canyon of the Gunnison is the National Park that apparently hardly anyone knows about, especially the North Rim. So if you want to see a beautiful National Park without having to deal with those pesky things that the world knows as your fellow human beings, then you should definitely check out the Black Canyon. It was just a little after five o’clock when I parked my car and got out to go for the seven-mile round-trip hike that followed the north rim of the canyon. Some people might consider this too late for such a hike, but I’m awesome… and also rather stupid, so I set off, and got back to my car before eight o’clock. And that was with a big old backpack on my back and a big old camera hanging from my neck. I even managed to snap some great pictures for you all.

At the end of the hiking I decided to stay there at the park overnight, though I would not be camping since my tent was still soaked. Still I got to sit down at a park bench to read and do some journaling, and no one looked at me weird as I resituated my car so it could become a sleep-able space.

I did not have very many pictures for you all for this part of the trip. I hope the writing by itself was not too droll, but don’t worry, I should have more pictures for the next post. And don’t forget, not the next post, but the one after, will begin the Bummel of my friends and I.