Monday, August 4 Colorado and into New Mexico. Driving.

 Monday, August 4

It's 69 degrees at 7AM this morning and the lighting makes the red rocks glow, so we spend a little time at the Monument.

This is Fruita Canyon View, and a balanced rock in the shade.

Beth wants to re-visit the Kebler Pass area as we continue eastward. Traffic is somewhat heavier as we climb some mountains within Gunnison National Forest.  

We come across some stop and go traffic due to road construction - we have run into a fair amount of this, usually one lane for a bit.  We also come across two trucks that are painting yellow lines, but not before we've picked up a bit of yellow paint on the driver side wheel wells <sigh>.

Kebler Pass is 30 miles of unpaved road, but it is good gravel and nice and wide. We've seen deer and moose here in the past and beautiful lakes.  

 

More traffic than we expected.  It is a pretty but uneventful drive and by the time we reach the turn for Lake Irwin, Greg just wants to get off this road, so we continue through Crested Butte (swarming with visitors) and head for home.

We wind our way over to I-25 south and cross Raton Pass into New Mexico. A Quality Inn in Clayton, New Mexico seems a good place to stop.  We need some cool comfort!   It's a small town with not much in the way of restaurants, so we use the room microwave to cook a frozen lasagna from the Trek.  A real gourmet dinner, thank to Stouffers haha.

 Hotel is fine and we get a good night's rest, turning on the TV for the first time in a while!