While staying in Aztec, New Mexico, we took a side trip via our Rambling RV Rat Pack Rubicon to Colorado’s San Juan Mining District.
Our first stop was Durango.
Established as a railroad depot in 1881, it is now a busy downtown
entertainment and cultural hub.
Interspersed with the many restaurants, taverns, shops, and galleries
are several historic hotels which provide a glimpse of Durango from its early
years.
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| Durango Train Depot. |
We continued to traverse along the San Juan Skyway Scenic Byway. With road work ongoing, it was highly congested. But the views were wonderful.
Engineer Mountain.
Twilight Peak.
The view from Coal Bank Pass Summit.
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| Molas Pass. |
We arrived in Silverton just before the train passengers disembarked. Though very much a tourist town, “Silver by the Ton” maintains its Old West charm which earns it the designation of a National Historic District. Lunch at Handlebars Restaurant and Saloon was enjoyable, between its hunting cabin décor, delicious elk and bison burgers cooked a perfect medium rare, and excellent service. Fortified with full bellies, we walked along Blair Street, along Silverton’s one-time Red Light District.
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| Silverton Visitor Center exterior... |
...and one of the interior rooms with a lovely fireplace.
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| Interior of... |
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...Handlebars Restaurant and Saloon.
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| ...and along Blair Street... |
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| ...once the location of... |
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| ...Silverton's Red Light District. |
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| A rock art snake in Silverton... |
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| ...and the real deal. |
Then we headed to Ophir Pass Trail for some off-roading to earn a Jeep Badge of Honor. Absolutely spectacular!
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| Chatting it up with a fellow Jeeper at Ophir Pass, Elevation 11,789 feet above sea level. |
The Trail led us to Telluride. Since it was getting late in the day, we did not tour this ski area. Instead, we got onto CO-45 and CO-62 heading to Ouray.
Ouray is known as the “Switzerland of America” due to its alpine climate and environment. After a quick walking tour of downtown Ouray, we got on US-550, known as the Million Dollar Highway. What a long but wonderful day of touring and exploring.
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| One of my rodentia brethren is a successful entrepreneur. |
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Bear Creek Falls.  
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The next morning, we departed Aztec, New Mexico via US-550
and I-25, hitting some VERY rough roads.
The roads were so bumpy and uneven that the faucet of the kitchen sink
opened and poured 17 gallons of water out (birdbrained Mom forgot to turn
the water tank pump off after our earlier potty break.)
Fortunately, we were booked at a full hook up site within Buffalo Loop at the US Corps of Engineers (USACE) Cochiti Recreation Area. Created by the damming of the Rio Grande River, this campground was very quiet and underutilized during our early weekday visit. We had a large pull-through site with an adjacent parking spot for the Jeep. The site also had a canopy-covered picnic table on a concrete pad. Best of all, it cost only $20/night ($10 for seniors with the America the Beautiful Pass), a wonderful bargain!
Cochiti Recreation Area was to be our home base for several
days, because we had lots of places within the area that we wanted to visit.
Our first stop was to the White Rock Visitor Center (which
also serves as an RV Park) to get tourist information for the Manhattan Project Historical Park. We learned from the Visitor Center representative that this Historical Park actually consists
of 3 locations: Los Alamos, New Mexico (bomb
design), Oakridge, Tennessee (enrichment), and Hanford, Washington (plutonium). We specified that we wanted to take the “behind the scenes”
tour at Los Alamos. The representative chuckled at us. Let’s just say that Dad has a better chance
of growing hair and Mom of becoming a swimsuit model than of us getting a
tour. You see, Los Alamos is still an
active work site with super duper security.
Tours are held twice a day for only 6 days/year, 3 days in May and 3 days
in October. Each tour is limited to 30
participants. The Department of Energy
opens a 2-week application process in January (for May dates) and June (for
October dates), whereby you give your whole life history. Applicants must be U.S. Citizens (does a
stuffed rat made overseas but adopted by American parents qualify for
citizenship?). Then a lottery is
held to determine which lucky applicants have won a tour. (I wonder if the
October tour dates will occur now that the government is shutdown.) Oh, well.
We figured we would, at the very least, get to explore the Visitor
Center. Nope—the Visitor Center is only
open on weekends.
We struck out again when we wanted to visit Kasha-Tatuwe
Tent Rocks National Monument, which is operated by the Bureau of Land
Management (BLM). A week before
our arrival, we tried to secure the required on-line tour tickets at a cost of $5/person
(If you have the America the Beautiful Pass, the $5 fee is waived, but you still
must make the on-line reservation).
Tours are not offered on Tuesdays/Wednesdays, and they were sold out already
for Monday/Thursday/Friday. Sadly, we
would be out of the area on Saturday/Sunday, the latter of which was the first
date that tickets were available. But getting
a tour ticket from BLM is only part of the process. An additional ticket from Cochiti Pueblo is
required to access the property at a cost of $20/adult and $10/children 16 and
under. I must admit that I was secretly
relieved we couldn’t get tickets. I
would have thought my parents had rocks in their heads to pay that much cheddar
to see some rocks!
Despite not being able to check off 2 boxes on our
itinerary, we found plenty of other things to do in the area, which I’ll tell
ya about in my next blog. Talk to you
again soon!
