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| Colorado National Monument |
It only takes a couple of hours to
drive from the Fruita Campground in Capital Reef National Park to Fruita,
Colorado.
We book a few nights at the
Monument RV Resort, just a few miles down the road from the Colorado National
Monument and down the street from the Dinosaur Museum and across the street
from the
James M Robb – Colorado River State Park. The Campground is clean, the staff friendly, WIFI
is present but not robust and spaces are close together.
After grabbing a forgettable
dinner at the Chinese restaurant down the street we stop by the State park for
the 411 on camping there. Walk-ins can
get available spaces for up to 3 days.
Everything else is booked on-line through Reserve America three days in
advance or more. There is also a day use fee of $7 per night, or an annual park
pass for $70. We immediately go on-line
and book 4 nights. Once we move across
the street and see what a great spot we have; full hook-ups, laundry facilities
and stunning views of the red cliffs, we go back on-line and book the next 4
nights. We also purchase an annual pass.
This gives us a total of 12 days here in
the Fruita/Grand Junction area.
This time of year the weather in western Colorado is pretty variable and the weather app unreliable… A sunny
morning can suddenly morph into gusting winds, thundershowers with huge
displays of lightening, or a gentle summer rain. But nothing last very long… the saying here
is, “If you don’t like the weather, wait fifteen minutes.”
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| T-Rex |
The Dinosaur Museum is a perfect
diversion on the first rainy day. The exhibits are well done and are geared to
both young and not so young visitors.
There is a lot of current information on new paleontology discoveries
including some of the dinosaur egg and embryo exhibits that we saw last summer
at
The Yale University Peabody
Natural History Museum.
The Museum of Western Colorado in
Grand Junction is light on artifacts but rich in information about the
area.
Lots to read here with small
displays about the earliest nomads, the pre-Colombian Fremont culture and the
Native Ute tribes.
The bulk of the
museum is dedicated to more recent (as in the last 200 years) history of the
local economy.
The precious metal mining
busts and booms of the 19
th and 20
th centuries (including
a replica of an uranium mine) and the cowboy culture complete with famous
gunslinger weapons.
There is also a
tower to climb and get a great 360
° view of the entire valley and
surrounding mesas.
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| Bam-O-Rama |
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Independence
Monument |
The Colorado National Monument offers
spectacular scenery and some challenging hikes in a compact footprint.
At the visitor center we pick up trail maps
and a BLM handout for ancient petroglyphs and pictographs in the area. The
drive along the rim with sheer cliffs and a distinct absence of guardrails is
not for the timid, but they still drive it and stop on a blind curve and wave
us to pass… argh!
From the top of the
canyon we do a couple of hikes, the short Canyon Rim Trail grants great views
of the colorful Wedding Canyon, Window Rock, the Book Cliffs, the Colorado
River and the town of Fruita.
The Coke
Ovens Trail, skirts just below the top of the canyon with views of the iconic monuments.
From the bottom of the canyon we take the
Monument Canyon Trail to Independence Monument and loop back along the Wedding
Canyon Trail.
Along the way we hear what
sounds like gunshots reverberating in the canyon.
Once around the corner we see the source of
these sounds.
A group of six young Desert
Big Horns are gathered in a circle (much like a Rugby scrum) practicing bashing
heads.
The rest of the herd is up the
canyon with the top ram carefully watching over his haram.
The Grand Mesa the largest flat-topped
mountain in North America dominates the Grand Junction Skyline.
Hwy 65 winds up past the Powderhorn Ski Area,
across the Mesa and down the other side. At 10,000 ft above sea level, the mesa
top is a variety of dense forest, colorful alpine meadows dressed in a plethora
of wild flowers and sparkling mountain lakes. There are lots of camping
opportunities here, down dirt roads that turn to mud with the afternoon
thundershowers.
At one point while
exploring the area, we stop and help a guy who stopped to take a picture.
His truck is axel deep in the muddy turnout.
All it takes is a length of rope and Dave
pulls the other truck onto solid ground.
Both times we explore the Grand Mesa, instead of taking the civilized
highway back, we opt for the more adventurous route down the unpaved narrow End
of Land Road. It’s a shorter distance and much more exciting!
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Fremont
waving hands |
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Ute
waving hands |
Just northwest of Fruita, Highway
139 connects the towns of Loma and Rangely through the
Canyon Pintado HistoricDistrict. Along this road are nine sites
of Fremont Culture and Ute petroglyphs and pictographs.
We use the BLM printout with a map and detailed
descriptions of the sites that we picked up at the Colorado National Monument
visitor center.
There are also signs
along the highway and information at each location.
Some of the sites are visible from the road;
others a short hike from the highway.
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| Collared Lizard |
Dinosaur Hill with a large
dinosaur bone imprint in the hillside along the highway looks interesting so we
stop.
The hiking trail winds around the
hill where in 1901 a mostly complete 70-foot long 30 ton Apatosaurus skeleton
was exhumed and shipped off to what is now known as the Field Museum of Natural
History in Chicago.
As far as Dino-sites
go, there’s really not a lot to see here except a
rock outline on the hillside where the bones
where the skeleton was laid out prior to shipping, and the blocked off opening
to the tunnel where the skeleton was exhumed.
The interactive signs are missing or so faded that they’re tough to
read. The best feature is the imprint of a large dinosaur bone that was
illegally removed – the one visible from the highway. It’s like those movie
trailers where the only good scene in the movie is the one in the trailer.
It’s a hot short hike through high desert
overlooking the Colorado River and the town of Fruita, where dinosaurs used to
roam and their ancestors:
birds and
lizards (depending on which school of paleontology you subscribe to,) still
call this hill home.
Staying this close to a larger
city has its advantages. We can shop at REI and Cabellas for our outdoor
needs.
The City Market has good
selections for most of our foraging needs.
But once we discover
Palisade Peaches (fuzzy balls of juicy goodness) and
Olathe Sweet Corn (probably the
best in the world) we frequent the roadside fruit stands.
There are also lots of restaurants
to choose from when cooking is not on the menu.
We only eat out a few times, with the aforementioned forgettable Chinese
dinner, another average Mexican meal and a Sushi surprise.
No Coast Sushi has two locations,
one in Grand Junction and a new location in downtown Fruita.
We sit at the Sushi Bar so we can interact
with the Chefs.
Traditionalists can
enjoy Nigiri and Maki Sushi with fresh seafood flown in from Hawaii 3X a
week.
They also offer innovative rolls
with regional ingredients created by local chefs.
We take a chance and order a couple of their
specials.
The Smoked Duck Roll:
with
shitake mushrooms, asparagus, fresh mozzarella, tea-smoked duck, hoisin,
raspberry, cilantro and gyoza strips.
If it looks like a Sushi roll and tastes like a duck is it still
Sushi?
Regardless it tastes really good!
The Cougar: fried oysters, cucumber and
cream cheese wrapped in marlin with wasabi tobikko, ponzu-katsu sauce and
Japanese Mustard has more traditional ingredients and a bright combination
of flavors and textures.
All of the
specials are created by the No Coast Chefs and they are constantly developing
new items with hopes of making the menu.
Our chef treats us to her version of a traditional soba salad, with
glass noodles in lieu of the soba topped with a diced octopus ceviche, it’s not
on the menu yet but with the great balance of flavors and textures it’s
probably only a matter of time.
All this
and a bottle of Sake and we’re happy glampers.
There are also the purveyors of
adult pick-me-ups in the area.
We don’t
make it to any of the area’s wineries (we’ll save this for later.)
We do stop for a pint of stout at the
SudsBrothers Brewery. And we pass by the green-cross dispensaries… After 12 days we
officially like this part of Colorado and their state park system.
We’ve already bought the annual pass… so it’s
off to Ridgway State Park and the land of Ralph Lauren…
