mining for BINGO

In Mora we stopped at an Alpaca ranch at the beginning of our day. I got some really great yarn and got to see a new born Alpaca. There were lots of pretty woven woolen things, but mostly I just bought yarn. The Alpacas were really cool. We noticed that they chomped on the grass in such a way that they trimmed it down like a putting green. When they sit in the grass they almost look like swans. I can wait to finish my road crochet project. Of course I don’t really know what its going to be, because I just chained a random number of stitches and got down to business, no pattern at all.
Beyond Mora we drove up 518 through the Carson National Forest. It was a gray day, but the forest and the valley were some of the best country yet. We got to Taos around lunchtime, starving of course. I had some yummy blueberry pancakes and lots of coffee to help thaw the chill from intermittent showers and high altitude mountain passes. We went to a tiny casino on the reservation in Taos. It’s not well marked, or advertised, its actually probably smaller than the house we’re staying in in Telluride with lots of slot machines. I was sad to hear Taos had sold out, but felt much better after Tiger won big (he’s so lucky, sometimes I just can’t stand it!) I also learned how to play multiple lines on a slot machine, so I can lose even more money, even faster.
Outside of Taos we stopped at the Rio Grande Gorge. It’s a really big, really deep gorge, it was actually just as big as I remembered.
The rolling hills beyond Taos were beautiful and mystical. Lightning danced across the sky and it felt like the landscape was locked in a beautiful embrace with the sky, each applying equal force upon the other creating an energy unlike anything else I’ve felt before.
In Antonito we stopped to take pictures of old time steam engines and the galloping goose We crossed in to Colorado and caught more storms. We stopped to rest at the San Luis Brewery. I had a beer sampler while we waited out the rain. Absolutely every beer they had was delicious. If we had any idea what lay in store for us we probably would have stayed right there, but we had a hotel reservation in Creede, so we pressed on.
This last leg of our journey was the toughest yet. It was still raining and now it was getting dark. The country became more desolate, and some of the gas stations that were few and far between were out of gas. We rode hard through a mean rain with some hail thrown in for good measure. We drove up a river valley on the Silver Thread Scenic Byway past many cottages along the river. The wet road twisted and turned gaining elevation the whole way. Tiger was champ and took it all in stride, but it was a scary journey through dark, desolate back country on wet roads. It was also kind of disappointing because I bet it’s really pretty in there in the day time.
We finally arrived in Creede about 11 pm. About a 10 hour day of travel, but the Creede hotel was adorable and the saloon across the street was still open when we got there. Even though we were exhausted our adrenaline was still on high and we stayed up late singing the Carne Seca song and drinking beer.
The next morning we had a delicious breakfast at the hotel, got some coffee and some internet across the street.
Creede is a tiny town, reathat dead ends at a mine. They’ve drilled in to the mountain and created the Creede Mining Museum and Community Center. We took an audio tour (usually I hate those things) and it was really good. I learned a good deal about mining and we had fun taking pictures down there too. It’s pretty cool that the town’s community center is bored in to the side of a mountain and they have bingo on Monday nights at 7 pm. We seriously considered staying another night, just so we could brag that we played bingo in a cave. But we didn’t. We left to get rained on some more.
When we were getting ready to take a cruise when the moto refused to start. After some coaxing and a jump, Tiger got it working and we were ready to roll. We decided to check out some geological sites. We tried to find some florescent calcite but never found the turnoff, so we went further back where we had been the night before to a Forest Service Rd. named “Pool Table.” We didn’t go all the way to the top so I’m still left to wonder if there’s a pool table up there. We drove up the winding road about 4 miles and stopped to look for rocks. My roadside geo guide said we should find jasper and agate there. Tiger, who is far more interested in Geology asked me what agate was, so I guess you can say we didn’t really know what we were looking for. The mountain was peaceful and the vistas were the best yet, so I was sad to leave when the temperature dropped and we started our descent.
Just as we had done in the darkness the night before, we found ourselves heading in to Creede in the pouring rain. We pulled in to the first place that looked warm and had coffee and plotted our next move. Basically, I wasn’t moving until I got some rain pants. We were generally lethargic and didn’t get back on the road to leave Creede until about 3 pm.
Driving out of town, still on the Silver Thread Senic byway we followed the fast flowing river (I’m guessing the Rio Grande) and looped around several grassy hills, calderas, indicators of volcanos. Then we started climbing to the Continental Divide.