Great Sand Dunes

Eric's mom had put together a family camping trip for the 4th of July weekend. Of course, Eric and I were much more interested in exploring than anyone else, so we often ran off to find some adventures.

July 2
The first day we drove to 11 Mile Reservoir and set up the tents. I was rather unimpressed with the reservoir itself, but the area around it is definitely worth exploring. Eric and I hurried off as soon as we could to do just that. Along Tarryall road we stopped at Colorado's first geocache, then drove down some dirt trails to an old mine shaft.

ATV trails south of Tarryall

Circling the reservoir, we found our way into 11 Mile Canyon and a cache brought us on top of an old train tunnel for some magnificent views. Back at the reservoir again, we found the scenic Midland Trail for a sunset hike.

Old railroad tunnels in the canyon

The *very* scenic part of the reservoir

July 3
We all headed to Colorado Gators in the morning. Apparently the main use for the gators are as garbage disposals for the fish farm, but there sure are a lot of gators just for that. It's interesting they don't tape the gators mouths shut when handing them to tourists like they do in Australia.

At Colorado Gators with Eric's family

Don't worry, I held one too

At the Sand Dunes we set up tents, then Eric and I ran off to the dune field with the metal detector! Mostly we found bobby pins, but there were also some rusty screws.

Metal detecting on the Sand Dunes

A very rusted nail

Eric on the Dunes at sunset

July 4
Eric and I set out early for the short hike to Zapata Falls. You do have to wade a bit to see the falls itself. We also went up the trail quite a ways for some views of the dunes.

Zapata Falls - copyright Michael Carlson Photography

View of the Dunes and Sangre De Cristo mountain range

For the midday heat, we geocached in Alamosa, and drove through the wildlife refuge. There were some incredible dust devils in the area, and I never knew they got so strong or went so high! We found a network of dirt roads for an abandoned or never-built neighborhood, and went dust devil chasing. There were more vortices than I've seen all storm chase season, and we even went for a few intercepts.

Now that is one strong dust devil

Alamosa Fireworks for the 4th of July

July 5
Instead of going directly back to I-25 in the morning, our sights were set on the ghost town of St Elmo, west of Buena Vista. We drove just a little ways up the easy part of Tincup Pass for a geocache and some scenery.

St. Elmo ghost town

Tincup Pass