Hanging Around Denver

With an eye on the news reports regarding the High Park Fire, we kicked back for a couple of relaxing days at Cherry Creek State Park on the east side of the Denver metroplex. The Cherry Creek Reservoir was busy with boaters and swimmers.


Yesterday we waited until after morning rush hour to hop on the freeway for a 30-mile travel day to the southwest side of town.


We've driven by Chatfield State Park many times. But, until yesterday we had never stopped. We had reservations for here last Summer, but we had to cancel when our travels were rerouted due to air conditioning issues. As soon as we landed in our pull-through site with a mountain view, we declared Chatfield our new favorite Colorado state park.


Our new locale put us within a short 15-minute drive of the home of my brother and his family. Last night, we drove down to Castle Rock to meet them for dinner. Afterwards, they followed us back to Chatfield for their first-ever tour of the moose. Along the way, we could see smoke from the High Park Fire obscuring the sunset.  The fire had grown to nearly 45,000 acres and was only 10 percent contained. The Larimer County Sheriff estimated that full containment would come sometime in July. Air quality in and around Fort Collins was poor. With that, we decided not to return to the town we had looked so forward to exploring, but instead only got to taste. We made other plans.


This morning we pointed Bullwinkle toward the mountains and a bit south. We climbed Monarch Pass with ease. By early afternoon we had arrived at our very favorite place.


Greetings from Gunnison! We spent six wonderful weeks here last summer. So, when we started looking for an alternative to Fort Collins, the answer came quickly. We're planning to be here until after July 4th. We're so grateful to have landed in a beautiful place with clear skies. Our thoughts and prayers continue to be with those affected by the devastating High Park Fire.