May 31, 2018 Happy Anniversary

Thursday, May 31

Happy Anniversary!  We are in Mountain time, so wake early and make our way down the hellish road and back into the park where we hit the dunes. It is tough walking at times but we hike around, up and down this amazing landscape!

The dunes don't look very impressive from far away, but when you are IN them, it's marvelous!

It is an odd confluence of wind and water that built these dunes and continues to replenish them. It is quite windy and cold this morning, but the sand thankfully stays at ground level.  At some spots you can see it skittering and filling in the footprints of previous visitors.  Usually there is a stream that runs nearby in Spring and early Summer, fed by mountain snow melt.  We are surrounded by mountains but learn that they had only a fraction of their usual snowpack, so…no stream this year.  

Lots of deer out and about too. And so polite! Crossing at the crosswalk.

We have breakfast of eggs, muffins and Canadian bacon in the parking lot of the welcome center, watch a film and chat a bit with the rangers.  The elevation at the Visitor’s Center is 8,170’  - no wonder hiking up those dunes left us 30’ dwellers a little winded!  (That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!) 

 We head out – onward and upward since we want to reach Banff/Jasper area in Canada and be back at Montana’s Glacier Park for a Roadtrek Photography get-together June 18-22.

We are heading north and decide to do a detour over Independence Pass to Aspen and Maroon Bells.  This is an amazingly beautiful and wild road, with no guard rails, many steep ascents and descents, switchbacks and more.  But oh so beautiful! 

 We stop at the Continental Divide and then head into Aspen and out to Maroon Bells. Maroon Bells refers to three large peaks that are often reflected in a gorgeous lake.

We stop at Silver Bells campground and are looking at the self-register board when Beth asks a guy there whether he is camping and if there are available sites.  He explains that he had made a reservation but found an open site he likes better, so is moving and we can have his reservation! How cool!  We give him something for the site and settle in briefly before deciding to drive out to the lake for a look.  It is windy and chilly but still breathtakingly beautiful!  We want to be there for sunrise tomorrow.

Back at our site, Greg talks to two women who have shown up only to find that their reserved site has apparently been double booked!  Since there is an area for a tent at our site, Greg tells them to stay here.  Kind of karma after our sharing last night!

The two women are sisters - one lives in Bolivia and the other in California and they are traveling and doing camping and back-country camping around the west.

When we went to make dinner, we discovered that the generator was dead.  Hmmmm.  This is yet another new issue!  We’ll call Michael tomorrow. 

Traffic in Aspen was crazy, along with road construction, so we opt not to drive back there for an Anniversary dinner, deciding instead to heat up chicken ‘n’ dumplings from a can. When you are hungry, the oddest things taste great!  

We are in Mountain time and it is staying daylight till 9:30 or so, so we pull the shades and say an early good-night.