Road Trip 2016 - Night 2 & 3: Colorado
Woke up at 445 am. I couldn't sleep. Since we were literally right of the highway, the constant sound of semis wasn't helping. Plus I was very excited to get to Colorado! I woke up Jess and we packed up and hit the road.
As we set out, we realized that it was daylight savings time and it was actually just after 5 but the car was showing that it was just after 4! We changed the clock to only have to change it back again a couple hours later when we got to mountain standard time.
We stopped at the Ogallala Park and let the dogs out and gave em some grub. It was pretty interesting, it was located right next to a gas station and was right off the highway. (Kinda a theme going on here).
Finally we made it to Colorado, a small town called Golden.
We stopped at the little historic museum there to use the restroom and potty the dogs and found that it's a really nice place! We walked the paths around the river and had a lot of fun letting the mutts splash around. It was Birch's first time in a river! He loves the water so he fit right in.
The color of the water threw me for a loop. It's a mix of light grey aqua blue/green. It was beautiful. I expected crystal clear water and at first thought it was dirty!
Golden is also home to Coors Brewery and boasts over 1 million visitors to it's tiny town every year. It used to be the capital of Colorado until Denver stole the crown back in the 19th century. It was a great small town with the bustling feel of Hudson or Stillwater.
After we toured around Golden we headed south to Chatfield State Park where we planned on camping out for the next two nights. As we got to the park, you see Chatfield Lake. To the left is the look outs, fishing, and dog park. To the right are the camping and horse camping. Little did we know that it wrapped around the South side of the lake and takes about 5 miles to get to the sites!
Thankfully I made reservations so we had a site. After we got checked in we pitched our tent and then drove down to the dog park, another 6 miles back the way we came! The dog park was huge! There were at least 50 dogs there. The dog park is 65 acres and full of trails and a couple ponds. We spent a ton of time there, we walked over 3 miles! Little Birch had his first water experience and found a snake friend!!!
The next day we got up early and decided we needed some hot coffee... so we cheated on Dunn Bros and found a Starbucks. ;) After that we headed up to the hills for some sweet climbing through Deer Creek Canyon. It was great! The views were awesome, looking out over the homes to the East that were spectacularly tucked in between the large rocks.
The first climb was up Meadowlark Trail, it sets you out on the North side of a large hill that seemed like a mountain. We were layered up and it started to get hot as the Sun was out in full force. Then as we circled back South, then turned East up Plymouth Creek Trail, we were in the shadow of the mountain and it was cool and breezy. There was even hard packed snow and ice throughout the trail. We took a break really close to the top and snacked and drank our fill with the pups.
I thought the ascent would be the harder part of our hike, but the descent was definitely more than I expected. It was very steep and it's quite the chore to stay a foot while trying to keep the dog from pulling you over. On the way down we also continued down the Plymouth Creek Trail which brings you down further West and then turns you North to the parking lot. It's got a steeper grade and was much rockier instead of the finer gravel that we had on the way up.
After we got down off the mountain, we decided to hike over some flat ground for a change and take in the beautiful rock formations and colors. Coyote Song Trail is just a short drive from Deer Creek Canyon, winds you through the massive red rocks bursting out of the ground.
We read that the rocks are formed from when an earthquake caused two tectonic plates to plow into each other, one jutting up and the other down. The red rocks that we saw are the from the plate that burst up. As we walked through the trails we saw, in addition to the beautiful rocks, a coyote, some bird nests, and a gorgeous blue bird.
When we got back to camp we walked around the park to catch the sunset. It was a great ending to our last day in Colorado.
