Day 2 Arkansas Headwaters Recreation Area Ruby Mountain Campground Nathrop, Colorado

We began our day at Carnage Creek.  This is an EXTREME 4×4 trail.  We decided to just go and look.  Tim got out of the Jeep and walked up the lower portion of the trail.  I heard him say “That’s crazy!” and “That’s nuts!”   Waves of relief washed over me.  We didn’t have the machine to go over these types of rocks! 

We found a gentle trail through the mountains.  It was as lovely as yesterday.

I took a bunch of pictures of some of the local flora.  There are so many plants and trees here that are unfamiliar to us.  I have this neat new app called Picture This.  It is plant identifier.  I had lots of fun using it today.

Lunch spot with Tim “putting some glass on it,” or looking through the binoculars.

We emerged from the trail onto the highway.  Tim had wanted to check out some trails in nearby St. Elmo’s. 

This is a tiny historic town.  There is a general store and they sell feed for the tame chipmunks.

We found the Tincup Trail but it was 2pm and it is 13 miles long.  We plan to come back and do that one tomorrow.  The Grizzly Lake Trail is much shorter.  The trail guide we bought labeled it a difficult trail.  We went into the general store for directions.  The first thing the guy asked was if we had a modified Jeep.  He gave us directions but then remarked that it was a pretty tough trail.  He told us to be on the lookout for the winch points…OY!!!  We got into the Jeep to find the trail.  Tim asked if the guy had made me feel nervous…WHAT???  YES!!!  But we were only going to look…

We made our way across the stream and this is when the book says that the difficulty level really kicks up.  

We were standing in the stream looking at the trail.  Tim walked up the hill to evaluate further.

This is the winch point.

He decided to try to go up the first part and evaluate again.  I stood watching helplessly.

He stopped and got out to look again.  If only we had skid plates…but we don’t.  We backed out and turned around.  WHEW!!!  I love that we both like to have this off-road adventure and I also love that Tim uses good judgement when deciding whether or not a trail is right for us!  There are so many excellent trails in Colorado, I know we will have a blast enjoying many of them!

We spent lots of time trying to get a campsite for the weekend.  The place we are staying at is fully booked.  Our dilemma was twofold.  First of all, it is Labor Day weekend.  Secondly, there is a major country music festival in the town of Buena Vista featuring Dierks Bentley and Luke Bryan.  We tried several national forest campgrounds and a private campground with no luck.  A gentleman at the private campground directed us to an area with dispersed camping.  We drove out there to check it out and we plan to go there tomorrow morning to see what is available.