Ahhh yes! What a view to wake up to.
To leave the area we could either go back the way we came or go forward. I walked the trail ahead and it looked doable, but the trail was about 4-6 inches thinner than my track width. Ouch! I could tell that mostly quads had driven this section over the last few years. It was pretty and exciting!
We headed up to Governor Basin after breakfast.
Some more pretty mine ruins.
A not "too" old light on this mine car.
I love this area! D took some great wildflower photos.
The ol truck.
So many roads to nowhere.
There are a couple of still active mines in the area.
There are some great sights along Yankee Boy Basin.
D and I love this mine entrance. There are a couple sections of ladders down a sheer cliff to a horizontal mine opening just above a rushing river. Now that's some dedication to get to work each day!
After popping into Ouray we decided to head up Mineral towards Animas Forks. About half way up the hill a couple of the plugs in the slashed tire blew out. I replugged them, but I knew then that I shouldn't be getting more remote without securing a new tire first. We changed plans and decided to camp somewhere on the way to Montrose.
As my buddy Dennis would say. It looks like a fat kid stuffing his face with licorice.
There is always time to take photos of the flowers while replugging tires.
Tracks to nowhere.
I took a little hike to see the rest of this old mines operation up the hill.
Looking down at the "million dollar highway."
This ones for my brother. To entice him on a Colorado motorcycle trip!
We always see deer in peoples yards in Ouray. I'd have to say that it's a sign of a good town. haha.
Well, I pushed the tire as far as I could without a stitch kit. (I've always had good luck with plugs, but with a stitch kit this would be an easy fix. Just dismount the bead on the tire and literally stitch the gash up with a thick rubber patch and some glue from the inside.)
As we drove up a graded dirt road the plugs blew back out again. I concede defeat! Bring on the spare!! (for the first time in a non-racing situation, I put a spare tire on. Damn!)
D was happy for a few minutes to read.
A couple people asked me for pictures of my rear lighting setup. Here you go. It's all pretty simple and the lights themselves are waterproof.
These LED's are all along the rear hatch of the truck. Great for cooking dinner back there at night.
"I want more licorice!!!"
I also grabbed some pics of the jack I carry. It's a basic enough aluminum floor jack. I removed the front and rear wheels and fitted it with an aluminum skid. It's just tig welded right to it. With the heavy steel wheels removed it's very light.
Okay, back on the road to find a nice camp for the night.
After driving around for a while we realized that the few spots to camp were taken. We spoke with a couple hunters and thankfully one of them took pity on us. These guys were great! They've been coming here for 20 years to camp and hunt and knew of a secret spot! It was a tight squeeze, but once I got the truck on there... well... take a look.
Oh happy day.
Now that we were settled in, our new hunter friends came by to see if we wanted to come and visit their nice warm fire. We went up there and over the course of several hours we got to know them like you might know someone after several years.
After hearing all about each others life stories we headed back to our camp for some giant smores yet again.
Listening to a river is a great way to fall asleep! It was an easy day, just what we needed.
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