September 1999

Well, we are back in Bisbee, Arizona. Hurrah!!!!!!!! Actually, once we turned south, we were like stable horses who smell the barn. We were ready to get home but we didn't push it, taking three days to cover the almost 700 miles to Bisbee, Arizona.

We started the month off with broken springs on the trailer. Here we were, 16-miles down a bumpy dirt road with one of the more important components of our suspension dangling. Not to worry - there was a welding shop on the way, maybe they could fix it. Well, they could replace it but we would have to drive to Grand Junction for the part (a 240-mile round trip). We did. They did. And we were on the road for Meeker, CO before sunset. We pulled into a site and as Fred was setting up the trailer, Suzi started dinner. You need a salad bowl to make a nice tossed salad, right? When Suzi pulled the bowl out of its storage place, under the sink, it was full of water! At some point, between our departure and arrival, the kitchen sink's drainpipe came loose! Who would ever think of checking drain pipes? Well, no real damage done (found another use for a hair dryer - drying out a cabinet). Dinner was served with only an hour delay.

The next morning we noticed the people parked next to us were working either on their truck or satellite dish. Fred thought we might be able to help. We did help, sort ah. They learned there was a problem was their satellite dish. But their truck we couldn't help. It seems the dealer "fixed" a leak in their transmission was now a gush. After some socializing, the men went their respective trucks. Soon Fred stuck his head into our trailer and announced, "We got a flat tire." No problem, just call roadside service. The guy came out, switched out the tires, and got ready to leave when Fred, once again, stuck his head in the trailer. "Suzi, you won't believe this. The rear window of the truck's cap just fell out." It took another day to get both the tire and rear window fixed (one good thing about small towns - everybody has multiple skills so the guy who fixed our flat was able to repair, with Fred's assistance, the rear window) and our run of bad luck ended.

Of course, we still had to survive the fall weather - above 10,000-feet it wasn't particularly balmy. We had many nights of freezing temperatures but were able to stay ahead of the snow. The best feature of this autumn weather was most of the tourists had gone home. More and more often we shared the mountains with only the "local" Coloradans.

We finished the White River, Pike, and San Isabel national forests before heading home. While in the White River we surveyed a very pretty cluster of campgrounds adjacent to the Trappers Lake Wilderness Area (one of those picture book areas of Colorado). We decided to hike to an overlook for a picnic lunch. It was a pleasant hike and we found a nice open meadow with a spectacular vista of Trappers Lake. Suzi found a flat rock and Fred, with 7 miles of shoreline, found an anthill to sit on! After about five minutes of doing a very strange looking dance, we got the ants out of Fred pants, found a rock large enough for both and enjoyed an ant-free lunch.

Of all the National Forests we have visited doing our work, none have shown as many indications of "over-loving" as the Pike National Forest. The area in and around this Forest is very developed and built-up. Close enough to both Denver and Colorado Springs, the Pike National Forest is what we dubbed "backyard playground." Many people seem to think "this is my forest and I can do what I want." They don't seem to realize the cumulative effects of what they and others do. Example: an angler parks his car on vegetation off the road and slides down a riverbank for some fly-fishing and than another does the same and another and another. Pretty soon the vegetation dies, the bank erodes, the fish move away, and the angler complains the river has been over fished. They just don't see the cause and effect of their actions. But we shouldn't say too much since what we are doing, we hope, is bringing more people to the National Forests and might, as in the case of the Pike, cause an area to be over-loved.

The last cluster of campgrounds surveyed were in the southern part of Colorado. The drive there provided an interesting view of the many aspects of Colorado's topography. Our route took us from lodgepole to Ponderosa-pine woods to the hassle of Colorado Springs. South at Colorado Springs the land opens into vast prairies. To the east of I-25, the grassland stretches on forever. To the west, towering mountains raise up skyward.

On the way to the last of this season's campgrounds, Fred decided to take a photo of the fall-colored aspen. As he found just the right spot and angle, a stiff wind came up and snatched his hat. The hat was deposited in the side of a very steep embankment, among young trees and bramble bushes. Now, there are some things that Fred might consider leaving behind (on occasion, Suzi is one of them) but never his hat. So we have Fred scrambling down about 50-feet, 80-degree embankment to his hat. And that was the easy part!!! The climb back up required a long length of rope, or in this case, hose. Oh, the adventures of this summer.

From the solitary mountain ranges of southern Colorado, we made a bee-line through New Mexico to Bisbee, Arizona. We traveled from the lush grasslands of Colorado over the Ponderosa-pine covered mountains of northern New Mexico into an arid landscape that showed reminders of the monsoon season. It was interesting to note how much longer it takes for an imprint of mankind to be erased by nature in such a landscape. There are places where trails used by the Ancient Ones, who lived here before Hopi, Navajo, or Apache, can be seen. Over use and droughts in the 1880's are still noticeable. And wagon roads, used by the U.S. Calvary at the turn of the century, leading off to the horizon are visible. But some are trying to erase some of these telltale marks. Near home in Bisbee, we saw grass growing as tall as the cattle's tummies and few indications of man's passing. This view was provided courtesy of the local ranchers' efforts to re- establish the "natural ecology" and erase damage done by man. Two things we have learned during our adventures (and this year only re-enforced them): We live in a beautifully diverse and enormously interesting country; and, there is no place like home. Our tentatively projected plans for next season is to finish Colorado's National Forests, then move on to Wyoming and Idaho and, with luck, start Utah. But first we must finish the Web files for White River, Pike, and San Isabel National Forests, and get the Southern Region Guide and Southwest Region guide to our e-distributor. Our winter should be busy and productive. So we end this season with the hope your winter is also busy, productive, and full of good times with family and friends.

Suzi and Fred