In the Gunnison National Forest near Crawford, CO —
This trip is taking a LOT longer than I planned. I am two months behind schedule, thanks to financial concerns and weather. It looks like I’ll be too late (and poor) for that trip to the Arctic Circle. š And the summer wildfires are starting up again, which is what stopped me from taking this trip last year. Fire season seems to come earlier every year now.
I’m not stopping this time, but I am plodding along. Slowly.
Which is okay. I actually prefer what’s known as slow travel. I like to find a good camp spot like the one I have here, get to know the surrounding area, and just sit tight for a few days… or weeks.
One of the things that threw me off when I first started this vandwelling/travel thing was the feeling of always being off-balance, out of kilter, every time I got to a new place. I didn’t know where anything was—where to buy supplies, where to camp, where to dump my trash, laundromats, showers, all of it—and it was very uncomfortable. It still is, but now at least I know to expect the anxiety. And I’ve learned how to find the things I need, thank Google and chatty convenience store clerks.
But there is still a slight clenching of the stomach before I find those things, especially a place to camp.
I felt it the other day when I was exploring the Crystal Creek area not far from here. After spending several weeks in Taos where I had everything I needed at my fingertips, I was feeling out of my element and a little nervous.
The unknown always does that to me, but isn’t that what travel is about—getting to know new places?
My priority was to find a spot where I could get an internet signal for my new, twice-daily writing sessions with my #WriteDammit group but I wasn’t having much luck, it was getting late, and I was tired after driving all day from Taos.
I stopped on the side of a dirt road, planning to spend the night and look again in the morning, but not having a signal was really making me anxious. The sun was still up so I decided to keep looking. I turned off on another road that led me up the side of a mountain.
After several miles with no sign of a campsite or even a clearing to pull into, I turned around, disappointed, to head back down—when suddenly, my phone pinged. A message had come through, meaning there was a signal here! I slid to a halt and held up my phone to the windshield: 2 bars LTE, woot!
It was getting dark and there was no sign of any other drivers on the road, so I decided to pull over to park right there for the night, and keep exploring in the morning.
I am embarrassed to tell you how happy I was to get on Facebook again
I boiled some water and fixed oatmeal for breakfast in my Thermos while my sleepy pup lounged on our new bed.
Scout woke me up bright and early. After breakfast and a quick potty walk for the dog, we hopped in the van and turned around again.
Up the road we went for another mile or two past a sign saying, “Entering Gunnison National Forest, 14-day camping limit.” Oh, so that’s why I couldn’t find a campsite: all this time, we had been on private land. Dispersed camping, as it’s called—free, but no services like toilets or hookups—is totally fine on most public lands.
I’m still getting the hang of this, it seems
So up, up we went, until we rounded a bend to see a beautiful mountain meadow, ringed by aspen and sprinkled with yellow wildflowers. A no-longer-usable-because-of-fire-danger campfire ring of rocks told me this was an officially sanctioned dispersed campsite.
I stopped and checked my phone for a signal: all good, so I pulled in. Then I looked up and gasped.The view of the green valley below and the Rocky Mountains beyond was spectacular.
Could it be any more perfect? No, it could not.
What’s the hurry? Scout and I are staying put for a while.
