UnCaged Travels: Chasing Cooler Weather

As many of you know we try to leave Arizona in the summer months. However, we decided to forgo our annual summer trip and stay home to get some 'honey do's' started around the house.

WHAT WERE WE THINKING!!!!

It's hot in Arizona in the summer. Even though outside is HOT we have been able to organize and thin out some stuff in the garage. But we are by no means done. We've had a very wet 'Monsoon' season which has been enjoyable, but it had tapered off for a couple of weeks and staying HOT. So we decided to 'get out of Dodge' for a couple of weeks.

First we travelled to the central part of Utah to the Manti-La Sal National Forest and the Trail mountain range surrounding an area of creeks and water basins called 'Potters Pond' in search of the oldest geocache in Utah with our friends, Vivian and Lee. Also to do some four wheeling and just enjoying the evergreen covered mountains and cooler environment. Then after saying our good-byes to Vivian and Lee we ventured to Montrose, Colorado to visit friends and enjoy the cooler weather of the area.

Utah

We arrived at Potters Pond Campground and were welcomed by cooler evening temperatures and I (Deb) was happy I had brought a hoodie. During the day it did heat up to the low 90's, but nothing like AZ.(and it did get COLD at night) Following are the photos of our time near Potters Pond.

Potters Pond, Utah

Shared campsite #2 at Potters Pond Campground. Jack and I
are in the tent and Vivian & Lee are in Airstream Basecamp.

We enjoyed a number of searches for caches that turned into nature walks/hikes .
Jack is leading the way.

We sat and relaxed after a tough up hill hike to the oldest geocache in Utah.

Taking in those last glimpses of beauty as we hiked out.

Great views abound from the famous Skyline Drive above Potters Pond at over 10,000 ft elevation.

If you look closely you can see sheep (there is about 6 in this photo)... not the rocks.

Not a very good photo but those are sheep in the meadow with sheepherder on horseback and
numerous dogs moving the herd along. We were happy to finally see the herd because the entire area is dotted with sheepherder wagons but we hadn't seen any sheep until now.

That concludes our Utah trip. Thanks for coming along.

Colorado

While we were staying in Montrose we were able to tour the museum, visit and shop in nearby Ouray, spent some money at the Ridgway Farmers Market on some goodies, meet up with some friends and attend the Palisades Peach Festival. As usual we enjoyed staying in Montrose and the surrounding areas to get our fix of mountains, rivers, wildlife, forest, four-wheeling and cooler weather and even found a few geocaches.

Our cabin in the Riverbend RV Resort, Montrose, CO

We were only a few steps to the Uncompahgre River.

Montrose mural of John Wayne and his famous gallop through the meadow in the
movie True Grit which was filmed nearby.

Our visit to the Montrose Museum:

A 1912 photo of the Montrose Depot
now the Museum.

In the museum was a section on the history of
Jack Dempsey, the boxer. He had lived and trained
in the Montrose area.

This caught my eye as a neat ride in its day but it would be a bumpy ride with leather strap suspension and take a look at those brakes.

A day at Ouray, CO:

Mountains above Ouray that got a dusting of snow that night (IT's MID-AUGUST !)

This bench is made out of skis framed with flowers.
Very inviting.

Main Street, Ouray, CO

The mountains are calling........

Flowers in bloom along the Owl Creek Pass dirt road doing some Jeeping.

Peach Festival:

We ventured to Palisades, CO to attend the annual Peach Festival with friends from Montrose, Linnea and Eddie. We ate peach pie, peach ice cream, drank a peach margarita and bought peach preserves and syrups. It was a fun day had by all.