Hello MBD members,
Not so long ago, I had a road trip to a place that I've been to and decided to write a journal about the interesting people, places and things that I met, saw and did during that time. I just want to share this with you all because it reminded me many memories in Vietnam, that you are currently living everyday. So, please enjoy and let me know what you think, and treasure your memories that you create everyday.
Sincerely,
Dancobra6
P.S. I will post a portion of the journal at a time and would love to hear what you take of it.
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Presence of Memories: a Road Trip Journal
Leaving Denver, I chose to take the alternate route through the mountains instead of interstate highway, so that I have a chance to experience the fall color along the way. The whole drive estimated about 400 miles and 8 hours. Of course, I was praying as driving that my beloved beat-up car didn't break down; otherwise I would be dead meat. The road runs through many beautiful mountain passes, snaking through many hills, valleys and passing by small towns. Sometimes, running along a canyon wall at one side that was carved out by a river millions of years ago. Other side was a creek; remain of the river, running tirelessly with deer feeding in occasion along the banks. Sometimes, passing in between canyon walls at both sides straight up above where I could see the marks of nature in the past...
Driving along, a view was opening up in front of me, a vast valley between the mountains with small hills and valleys running up and down. As going down hill, I could see as far as the eyes could see. The grandness of nature opened in front. A sense of nothingness hit me. "Wow, this is beautiful!" I whispered. Far, far away, along the foothills of the mountains, streaks of yellow and golden of turning aspens appeared. Here it was, the Fall! As I expected and some. Looking up the mountains through the windows, it was covered in a dark blue-green of evergreens. Here and there, touches of firing-orange trees that were trying to catch some last moments of Fall before the chilling Winter arrives, single spots of orangely red trees surrounded by greens signaling theirs leaves were at end of the cycle falling back to Earth, patches of yellow trees that their leaves were in the process of separating from the tree attachments. Everything looked like a painting that I remembered seeing it somewhere or just a painting that I free-style painted in my head at the moment. Beautiful, very beautiful! As my car was passing through many hills and valleys, ahead of me was the only road. The single road cutting through the valley in the painting and I was being in the middle of it, driving along and continued praying...Things passing by the windows, and the clouds were rolling in to block the Sun, adding different lightings to the painting.
Driving further, the mountains were covered with brightness of colors and sounds under the Sun, now blending in shaded areas of the blocking clouds leaving others laughing brightly under sunlight. The mixing and blending of shadiness and brightness were playing out in the painting. How beautiful! Then suddenly, the view was closing up, the tree lines were running towards me and wanted to touch my car. I was driving into the forest. And the road, the single road! Again, cutting through the forest of trees, both sides of the windows were yellow and golden colors passing by. I had entered a vaulted hall path covered in fallen leaves. Many, many leaves were flying in the wind and slapped into the windshield. Above, the sunlight tried to break through the dense of tree leaves, continue falling, and spottily shined through the windshield hit my face. The sun glare made me to flip open the visor. A discontinuing pattern of breezing wind, bright sun and golden leaves were passing me by, as my car was moving ahead. It triggered in my head a scene in a movie that I couldn't recall the name, a beautiful woman walking in a street where leave falling trees running along the sides under the sun... I told myself, "Huh, I need to take a picture of this" but I couldn't stop while my car was laboring up hill in the narrow road. Many cars behind me were seemingly screaming, "No! I dare you to stop!” So I had to keep moving and let everything osmoticly sink into my head to make some permanent neuronal connections that hopefully someday I'll paint it back as I was observing it now...
Passing through many beautiful towns, my mind was let go as the wind was blowing by the windows. A flashing light of a police car in my rear mirror, I slowly came to a stop. A police walked up to my car and opened, "Good morning, sir! Speed check was 74 in 65 miles per hour road." Momentarily, I talked to myself, "Damn, I can't believe police came out the woods and not enjoying nature". He quickly, "May I see your driver license, registration and insurance, please?” I replied, "Yes, sir" and started looking for the stuff. He then walked back to his speedy police car and doing his "lawful" work. I was thinking it was going to be more than a hundred buck ticket for sure, with my current chronic "broke" condition, I can't take anymore assault otherwise it'll be incurable. Sitting in the car, waited I did, until he came back with, "Everything is clear, so what do you think?” From me, "My school is sending me to a hospital down here to do some work, I tried to get there as fast as possible before my car gives up on me"...After many further exchanges as I was trying to talk my way out of this difficult situation which by the way interrupted my neuronal firings to make some memories of the beautiful nature, he ended with "I'm gonna give you a warning ticket today but be careful yourself!” That was a shock. I was trying to be cool, not to jump out of my seat and break through the roof of my car, "Yes sir, I sure will. Thank you for your understanding. Have a good day!" I felt like a million dollars, again. Slowly getting back to the road, leaving the kind policeman behind breathing the dirt, I said "Hey, I need to move forwards, baby!”
Going further along, not saying that nothing else came up. As I was singing after getting out of a rather pocket-threatening situation, looking street signs to make correct turns avoid getting lost, a deer appeared in sight. Of course, I was doing around 65, trying not to have the situation repeated. Away, he was standing on the side of the road, looking at my car moving forward. I was looking at him and coming to a conclusion that he’d wait there until my car passed, then cross the road. My car continued moving ahead. The deer decided, "What the heck, I'm gonna cross anyway!” He was leisurely half way through the road; my car was about 200 feet away. "Oh, sh-t", I slammed the brake, the car squeaked. The big dude quickly returned back to the side of the road. And he told himself "Dude, that wasn't a good idea!" Lucky me, I escaped the near miss without a scratch. Then getting to town....
The town, Cortez, was established in 1890's and around 8,500 in population. There are so many things to do here that I don't think I'd have enough time to do it all. Some line up for showing include visiting thousands year old Indian ruins, taking the steam powered train running up the mountain to explore old mining towns, many beautiful mountain biking trails in and around town, flying the 2 seated single engine plane that the host family promised to take me, driving the scenic route through many old towns that I hope my car wouldn't give up on me (So far)...and many more.
First weekend,
I was quite excited to spend my first weekend in a new place. As I found out some information before coming here, there were 3 things that I wanted to do for the first weekend.
Friday morning, I got up early to get ready for the first adventure. I had been in the house myself for the last few days. When I got to the place in late afternoon, I met the host couple, Bob and Robyn, and settled in for that evening. They told me that they were going away the next day. The couple asked me if it’d be all right to stay home alone in a new place, away from home... I said it’d be absolutely OK and they didn’t have to worry a thing about me. I told them I’ve been to many places and just finished a rotation not too long ago like this. I rather preferred really having “myself at home”; you know what I mean. The couple went to Florida for some kind of meeting and vacation for a week. Having a breakfast quickly, I left the town to go to the Four Corners.
A typical autumn morning, the Sun came out with the full of brightness. However, there was still lingering a bit of chilly air from the night before, perfect weather for a drive. I looked at a map to get some direction. Then, drove…away from the town…away from houses…a gray mountain appeared in sight, covered with early morning fog. Turning right at the intersection following the sign to Four Corners, I proceeded. Driving… No more houses or any kind that could remind me of people or activity. Straight ahead, one single road runs up and down many small hills and valleys. Looking out of windows on both sides, Nothing! There was nothing in the landscape, only a rugged terrain. Occasion remnants of a small creek ran through long ago. The surface was dry and copper-red colored. Here and there, some shrubs clung to rocks and tried to find some living out the death of dryness. Far on the left, some columns of sediments high up, looking like many structures of Grand Canyons that I saw on TV (never been there, may be some day). On the right, the rugged landscape and again nothing else…it looked like I was driving on the Moon surface. No kidding, it actually looked like the Moon surface! There was no trace of human footprints or any disturbance on the surface. The whole landscape was like what it was millions of years ago. Wow, this was cool! I let myself believe that I was on the Moon surface for a moment, enjoying myself of a sight that I had never seen before. Except the road, but I did not pay attention to the road. Looking out the windows on both sides, nothing reminded me that I wasn’t on the Moon. For a long time, my car was the only one on that road, no other cars. Driving…and driving, in a while and for a long time, the mile markers on the side of the road were the only thing reminded me I was still on surface of the Mother Earth. That was strangely beautiful! Getting back to reality, yes, I was still on the surface of the Earth and there was a road that I needed to pay attention to. Not to put my car in a ditch.
It took me an hour to get to the Four Corners, the place! It was still early in the morning. The wind was blowing the chilly air against my face. I walked out of my car, surveying the place. There were many small stalls where Native Americans set up to sell their crafts and souvenirs for tourists. However, as I found out later the prime season was over, so only a few were open. There were 2 shops that sold food, but I just had breakfast not too long ago. No appetite yet, at least for now. I walked to the place, Four Corners. Yes, that was it! The only place in the U.S. where 4 states meet at one point. I read the plate saying about its history, and then stepped on the metal circle divided in 4 with the name of each state in each. I kneeled down with my knees in 2 states and touched my hands in others two. I was just in 4 states at one time. Yes!!! Then many others came up, but they didn’t do what I just did, just standing on the point and spinning around... Later, I saw a sign of one of the food stands saying “Famous Navajo Fried Bread”. Huh, I got to try it. They asked me what I wanted to put on it. I told them everything. They fried the dough bread, it came out like a rice paper (banh trang) but thicker. On it, they put powder sugar on 1/3, honey on 1/3 and cinnamon sugar on the other 1/3. I sat down and ate; it was good, really good! It just reminded me that I’d be going back to Vietnam, soon. I’d try to visit some of many ethnic groups similar and try out their fantastic foods. Finishing the delicacy, I walked around the stalls to see what people were selling. Many interesting things and hand made stuff, necklaces and bracelets made from natural stones in the area, silver products and jewelries, potteries with hand carvings of native symbols…I stopped by and had an interesting conversation with one of the Navajo silversmiths. He was excited to tell me about history of his family and how he got the skill from his grandfather, what his family was doing at the time…At the end I felt guilty not buying anything from him. His stuff was out of my pocket shooting range, but I really enjoyed the conversation and learned some new things… I bought a couple of postcards from a different stall to send back for my collection and a T-shirt with the Four Corners logo on it… Heading back home, it was a little bit after noon. I decided to kill the afternoon with a bike ride. The family has a mountain bike that I saw and asked them to borrow the evening I got there. Biking…
The next day, Saturday, on my list there was a festival with horse parade in Durango, 60 miles from the town I was staying. I figured it would take about an hour to get there and the festival started at 9 o’clock. I got up early to get there in time. It was early in the morning and the Sun has not come out yet. Driving out of the town, different direction from the last day trip, I saw, far in front, the foggy mountain barely visible. The scenery was a bit gray. Along sides of the road, some yellow leaf turning trees close enough that I could see the presence of fall. Then, slowly the fog was lifting and replacing with sunshine. Finally, the Sun was completely visible. The whole scene was covered with the warmth and brightness of the Sun. The mountain in front of me was showing its fall clothes, a full display of golden, orange and yellow colors mixing in with green. Behind it was another higher mountain peak jealously but slowly taking off its foggy cover, showing off some white touch of snowcap on the top. It was amazingly beautiful! As I continued driving passing though small towns, along the road, many hills on both sides of the windows were waving with their colorful displays of their own. But it was closer so I could see the details of the display make-up…under the beautiful morning sunlight…
Approaching the destination, a big sign showed “Welcome to City of Durango, incorp. 1881” Going to the downtown, I saw some people directing traffic and loud music was being played. It was just 10 minutes before starting of the parade. I felt the excitement. Finding a street, parked the car I found my way to the start of the parade, along with many other out-of-towners rushing toward that direction. From the background I could see the mountain behind old buildings. The parade was going to start at the railway station, they told me. The place that I was going to take the steam train up to the old mining mountain town, later I found out, on my schedule of things to do the following weekend. Then I walked back away from there to find a good high spot for a good view of the parade. The parade started with 6 Clydesdales pulling a carriage, then, a band playing country music on an open horse carriage. A beautiful young woman in her own carriage with the crown of the town beauty Queen was waving at people. Following, many horse groups represented their own neighbor towns or ranches. And many beautiful women dressed in traditional outfits of 1800’s walking along side with gentlemen wearing like settlers. Of course, cowgirls on their horses were showing off their “wildness”. Then, kids were trying to hold on their horses so tightly from being thrown off the horsebacks… The whole thing was very joyful. Smiles on everyone’s face showed the satisfaction of their enjoyment. It lasted for about an hour and then people dispersed away to many places with activities and music…I strolled down the main street where many beautiful historic buildings preserved and now converted to gift shops and restaurants. Checking out the town, architectures of the buildings and seeing people, I continued to walk around the “National Historic Downtown”, on a sign that I discovered later…
It was mid afternoon that I decided to walk back to my car and heading back home. I looked at a map to see where I was. I started walking back on 3rd ave, a beautiful street! Both sides are lined with big, tall trees that shade sunlight. Behind nestled old Victorian homes with unique architectures, green front yards and flower gardens. The median of the street is quite large and covered with tall trees, in occasion some patches of flowers were carefully planted with an array of different colors. And the best part was, yes, the fall color in display…Leaves were falling, suspending in the air on the way down and ever so gently touched the ground. The wind blew softly in occasion to lift dry leaves off the ground. The leaves were a bit free of gravity and running along the sidewalks, creating sounds as they touched against each other. It seemed like they were happy playing in a beautiful autumn afternoon. The Sun was spotting through the dense of tree branches and wanted to play along… A perfect picture in a beautiful setting of autumn, as I was walking a long and kicking up dry leaves. Everything felt sensual… Many emotions were rising up in my body. A passionate feeling that I sensed was taking over. Only; Just that moment! One of those moments that I didn’t have any conscious control, feeling helpless and letting the senses taking over… Walking and got in to my car, I turned on the radio. A local station was playing, “Wake me up when September ends” from Green Day. I listened and paused for a moment…Wow! How appropriate and beautiful for the moment! The September just ended, here was the beginning of October. The lyric of the song was filtering into my brain mixing with the sights and sounds of what I was just experiencing. I was emotionally melted, but I didn’t want to be waked up…
On Sunday of the first weekend, I chose to do some thing close by, not driving too far away. Just so I had enough energy left in the tank to show up to work on Monday. Picking out things to do the night before, visiting a museum of the ancients called Anasazi Heritage Center sounded pretty good. It was about 15 minutes away from the town. So I packed some necessary stuff to go there the next morning. There was no rush like the last two days, just taking a leisure drive to the town. It was as a pretty drive as many times before with fall colors, but with different views of things. There is no abundance in beauty as people say; there is always some thing new and different that you didn’t see, even you see the same thing many times. But this was different road and different scenery altogether… It was a bit cloudy on that morning. I got there a bit early. There were only a few cars in the parking lot. I entered the lobby and was greeted by a receptionist. She told me that she just played a video about archeological discovery of this place, so I might want to check it out in a theater. Having plenty of time to kill, I went in and watched it. The heritage center was established when people in the town decided to build a reservoir in 1980’s. A large area of history of ancient people would be flooded and lost. So they asked archeologists to come in and dig out artifacts and remnants to be preserved for future generations. Huh, very good idea, in fact. In display were so many artifacts and remains of ancient people dated as far back as 100 B.C. or further. Reconstructions of ancient people villages, families and society; how they raised children, finding food and surviving were fascinating. Then, history of the area when Spanish conquistadors came later…
Of course, the reason they built the place was preserving things from the flooding of the reservoir, so it was logical for me to visit the reservoir itself. A very quiet drive to the reservoir because almost no other car was on the road that day. In fact, it was dead quite. The whole landscape was paused in silence as I was looking out of the windows. No activity at all, in scattered houses along side of the roads. Everything was standing still, nothing moving. There wasn’t even any wind to slightly disturb tree leaves. Wow, this was strange! I stopped my car to listen if there was any noise at all. No, nothing, a complete silence of quietness, everything remained in place without a slight motion of any kind. I mumbled, “Wow, this is some thing”. I continued the road to the reservoir, a beautiful view from the road along hillside down to the reservoir. Then I turned to another road leading to a top of one of the mountains surrounding the reservoir. Looking out from a cliff, I felt so small in the grandness of nature and the vast landscape. Dark clouds looked so close above my head and the sun spottily peeked through, reflected in the water. A combination of mountains, water and clouds was beautiful in a noon picture…
Leading to the second weekend, I was still at home by myself for the first 3 days of the week. Honestly, it was pretty nice... until Tuesday evening. As routine for a week now, I got home around 5:30 every day, prepared a dinner for myself then checked out the news on TV. Nothing else interesting was on that Tuesday evening, so I decided to continue the book that I had read some of it over the course of the week before. Before going to this place, I brought with me 3 books to read, just in case getting bored for some reason; even though I had lined up myself to do many things. One was about a memoir of a young American women living in Vietnam, another was about general knowledge of life from a famous symphony conductor/writer and the last one was a travel book to gear up myself for the trip to Vietnam that I’m going to take in about 2 months away. I didn’t expect to finish them all during the time staying here. Surprisingly, I had gotten pretty far through the first one “The Art of Possibility” after a week. With this pace, I thought I would finish all before going home. Anyhow, getting back to the Tuesday night, alone by myself in bed, reading the book, it started to rain. On the way to work in the morning, it was a beautiful day; so the rain caught me off guard. I didn’t think it would rain after such a beautiful day like that, but as people say, in Colorado you can experience all 4 seasons in one single day. So it rained…and rained…It started with sprinkling then getting heavier and heavier. I could hear the hard popping sound on the roof. It caught my attention because I haven’t heard this sound for a long time. The heavy raindrops hit the roof that covered of metal sheets; producing a familiar sound that I heard, long, long time ago growing up. Yes, the sound as I could recall at the moment from memory… The little house that I grew up in as a child, like many other traditional houses at the time, was roofed with metal sheets. Every time it rained, it rained hard. My cousins, many of my friends and I in the neighborhood played in it. We stood under the edge of the roof, water came streaming down to our faces, and we splashed each other with rainwater. Some days, it rained and was very cold outside. Thus, I had to stay in bed to read books or do something else instead. I could hear the sound! …The same popping sound that I didn’t pay attention growing up, but it is there. It always exists in the deep conscious of my mind. Until now, this moment, I relived all over again the memories and the familiar sound of the childhood. But why now? I had seen it rained before many times and never noticed. Trying to find an answer or a reasonable explanation for this, I didn’t know what to think of this. Just because that I was being alone and away from the busy life in big city, daily hustling and bustling of work and school, constant background noise of the city itself or I just became sharper in term of observing things for whatever reason or most houses in the city are roofed with shingles, not metal sheets that I couldn’t hear the sound when it rained. That was all I could came up with at the moment, to explain what just occurred; to make myself agree that it could be one of those things or a combination of things. After all that, I opened the window drape to look outside. It was dark, pit dark that I couldn’t see any thing except still hearing the popping sound of rain…I guessed this time the visual had been taken over by the hearing in the battle of senses. There was no orientation of space, but time was essential at the moment. Needless to say, I felt a sense of solitude and selfness after living and reliving of the presence and the past…
Second weekend,
The couple got back on Thursday, so it was a change of atmosphere. We had dinners together in the evenings and I promised to cook some Vietnamese dishes for them to try during the time of my staying. From the last weekend, I imagined this weekend would be as busy. There were 3 things on the to-do list for 3 days weekend as the last.
Friday morning, the plan was to go to Durango to take the steam train to Silverton. As I read the schedule on a brochure that I picked up at the local visitor center, the train departed at 9:00 in the morning. It took me an hour, last time I went to town. So I figured I had to be ready early to catch the train. The same road that I drove last time, on the early morning of autumn, but this time it was a little bit chillier as time getting closer to winter. What a difference a week made! Even with all things considered, I got there about 15 minutes before departure. Rushing to the ticket window, I was behind a few people trying to hurry up. The ticket lady asked me what kind of ticket I’d like to have. I asked people previously that it would be better to take the train one way and take the bus back so I could see all of the beautiful sceneries. I told her that I’d do that with a ticket in an open car so that I would have an unlimited view of things. Walking on the train station platform to find the correct car, I got to my seat and sat down. Next to me were a couple of kids with their father. The mountain blocked up the early sun; so it was cold with breezy wind. The train started rolling through many streets in town, and then leaving the town to follow the long Animas River. I started shivering after a while; even with my coat that I thought would be enough. Then the train was running along side of a high way, I saw the curious eyes of motorists who got out of their cars along the highway to wave and take pictures of the train. Here, rarely anybody takes train for commute, probably just for vacation or scenic trips. I bet many of them had never taken a train ever before. The train separated from the highway to running along the river again. The Sun started peeking out on the top of the mountain, bringing much needed warmth. Of course, it was still cold because I was in an open car, just a tiny bit warmer. The father and sons were playing and pointing at things outside. On the other side of the river, many small hills backing against the mountain, scatters of beautiful houses, with smoke coming up out of chimneys appeared on the top of the ridges, still sleeping in the early morning. The train continued snaking along the river. As I looked down the river, some parts, water was forcefully running over dead wood lodges that were washed down from the mountain and got stuck in curving bends. Other parts, many small lodges were easily floating along. Many places, the train was running very close to trees along side of the river that I could reach out and touch small branches and leaves. I could smell the aroma of the leaves, a distinctive smell in an early, crisply cold, autumn morning. The wind was still breezing in my face. The hills ran toward closer to the train for some instance but then away to open up a wide field of land...
The shaking and rhythm of the train was familiar from the beginning. I hadn’t ridden a train for some time. And now, as I remembered many times leaving my hometown in Vietnam to go to school far north and going back home every summer and holiday, I was in a train, again. But this time, it was different. The scenery was different, the people were different, and the place was different. Looking out, I didn’t see wide open green fields of rice paddies, Vietnamese women with traditional white conical hats planting rice, kids on water buffaloes plowing the fields or small villages with houses surrounded by palm trees. Instead, I saw wide open hay fields, here and there some horses, and houses of ranchers surrounded by golden color of quakes and aspens. It was familiar but different. It was close but far. I was switching back and forth between reality and memory, presence and past in my head…in a state of suspended…Suddenly, a bulk of thick, black smoke blasted the air, stopped me in my thinking. I smelled the burning coal. Coal debris in the smoke was flying in the air. I stuck my head out to look toward the engine car. It was coughing out bulks of thick, black clouds from smoke stack; on the other stack behind, a white soft cloud of steam dissolving in thin air. Such a beautiful contrast! Trying to get the coal debris out the corners of my eyes, even with my sunglasses, I saw a gentleman about 4-5 seats from me without sunglasses, a big mistake!, suffering from this. He was trying to open his eyes just big enough to see the beauty of nature, but not too big so that the debris would make him to close them for the whole trip. By now, the air was warm enough that people started to move around and from car to car to checking things out, seeing other people and buying refreshments. I was still in the same spot in the same car. The dad and sons had left to an adjacent covered car to take a break from the cold and debris.
After enjoying myself in a spacious spot for a while, many people from covered cars started to move in to the open car. A young couple approached and asked me if they could sneak in the empty seats to better see the scenery. Of course, those weren’t my seats, so I told them, sure. They settled in as many others, looking outside. It was beautiful and warm from a full blessing of the sun. The scenery going by was magnificent. Many tall mountain peaks with small snowcaps on the top showed up. At the foothills, patches of aspen trees with full fall colors in display, then fields of brown-gray hay waving under the wind, and closer to the train of course the river was still there, along side of the train…It was breathtakingly beautiful! A perfect picture of grand nature in front of my eyes made my heart softened in such a beauty. The couple was holding each other tenderly, cuddling close in each other arms and whispering in each other ears… The cool, breezing wind was still blowing in my face. I felt lonely, very lonely… I was overwhelmed with the sense of loneliness. In front of the grandness and beauty of nature, I felt small and incredibly lonely. As many times before, walking on a quiet street or going to an event, after a beautiful piece of performance or in front of a nice exhibition, people can see in each other eyes; magically tuning in the same wave length of thinking and sharing within closeness of each other. In turn, I usually ignored or pretended that it wasn't there when it happened. But I couldn’t this time; the sense of loneliness was greatly overwhelming that I didn’t have enough toughness to wipe away. It felt colder… and empty…
Continued running along the river, the train began to run at the bottom of canyons. The tall and steep canyon walls blocked out the sun, returning of chilly air filled the air. A really loud horn, and many followed, tore the silence of the wilderness. The train slowing down and came to stop. People looked around to see why the train stopped. I looked outside and saw few gentlemen in uniforms walking on the ground. They were heading towards the front of the train. As I realized, they prepared to fill up the big tank car with water to continue the journey. Duh! The train is powered by steam pressure, I told myself and laughed, it probably "ran out of steam". A long whistle blown to signal clear, the train continued its way to the final destination. The sun returned with its warmth after the train cleared the long, steep canyons. Then, in the view appeared a big mountain, under bright sunlight. Layers of sandstone sediments running horizontally on its steep side are remain of millions of years on the bottom of a sea, before being put up by the force of nature to form this continent. A stunning display of different colors, ranging from bright copper to rustic red, was reflecting under the sunlight. Just beautiful!
Before long, the train arrived in Silverton. A beautiful town surrounded by many beautiful mountains, situated at 9300 feet, established in 1874, population at one point was up to few thousands when it was a boomtown. Now, there are around 700 during summer and 400 during winter. No more silver mining industry exists. The last mining company moved away in mid 90’s. Now, it totally depends on tourism business and skiing for the most part. I got out of the train and stretched. It was about 4 hours of shaking and occasion blast of coal dust, but it was a real experience. I heard people talking of finding a place for lunch. But I put it up for later, started exploring the town. Through an announcer on the train, we had 2 hours to explore and have lunch before returning. I walked down the main street, lining with many beautiful historic buildings that were probably restored and painted recently. They looked pretty new. Of course, there were a lot of restaurants and shops. Smelling of food made my stomach turning and my mouth watering… After visiting the town museum and checking out many other places, I returned to the place close to the train. An interesting restaurant named Chattanooga caught my eyes. Huh? I heard of Chattanooga in Tennessee, but not in Colorado. So I went in. The owner greeted me with a warm welcome and told me to make myself at home, just sat wherever I wanted. I sat down. Looking at the menu, there was a page talking about its history, why it got the name and when it was open…since the beginning of the town. I ordered the special of the day, which were a codfish dish and a beer. It was a little warm outside, so the beer was perfect. I already finished my beer and had been waiting for the meal for about fifteen minutes. The owner came out to apologize because of messing up the order with other people and asked me if I’d like another beer, it would be on the house. I said yes, absolutely. The meal arrived few minutes later…
Returning by bus was as much beautiful as getting there by train, but with a different view. The train took a route, relatively smooth at not too high in elevation. Even though, it labored quite a bit up hills many times. But the bus powered its way through 2 mountain passes, both at 11,000 feet. The bus driver was also a tour guide while driving. Through a speakerphone, he talked about history of the area, pointed out many mountain peaks that have snow year round. All and all, there are fourteen 14ers in San Juan, fifty four 14ers and 740 13ers in the state. From the bus, we could see many of them. He joked that those are for our challenge to top them, and laughed satisfyingly. The road runs from one mountain to another. Between them is a straight down view of basins of bruce, fur and ponderosa evergreens... Then he talked about a bike race called the Horse Iron, happens every year in summer, from Durango (6500 feet) through two 11,000 foot mountain passes to Silverton (9,300 feet) trying to beat the train. The record was from Durango hometown hero, Tom Danielson who raced along side with Lance Armstrong every Tour de France, set at 2 hours and 5 minutes and beat the 4-hour train by half of the time. And there is a talk that he challenged Lance to race this race to see who is the best in mountains.
Saturday, the big one was on. Visiting Mesa Verde National Park was one of the things that I wanted to do before coming here, regardless what happened. So yes, I was all excited about it. And next year will be 100 years since it was established as National Park. It was a quite beautiful drive to the park. The road runs along many mountains that I could see the vast plains below. Some scenic overlooks reveal many beautiful views to towns and the landscape below. There were some areas recently destroyed by wildfires along the road. Remaining of dead trees and charcoaled branches showed the devastation after the fires. But nature takes care of itself as always. It was true, I saw new vegetations already thriving on top of the burned down. Then as one time before, I encountered deer on the side of the road. Not like the last time, I stopped and waited to see if they wanted to cross the road or return back to the woods. There were quite a few of them actually. They all stayed together in a pack. Of course, these deer were smarter. I could see the puzzling looks in their eyes but eventually they decided not to cross the road. That was a very good decision by the way; unlike the last deer I encountered on the road was a bit indecisive…Coming to the park visitor center I saw a sign of offering tours of the ruins. There were 2 young women in park-ranger uniforms at the counter. I asked one of them for a tour ticket, she pointed me to the other saying that she didn’t handle money. I got my ticket for a tour of one of many ruins; the others were closed for the season. I had about 30 minutes before the tour started. To use my time wisely, I toured the museum next door. There was display and reconstruction of the ancient Pueblo people settled in the area more than a thousand years ago. Also the history of their ancestors, who first came to Americas through the Bering Strait from Asia, later occupied the land and migrated south to South Americas...Of course, I know some of the facts through the years, but still found it very interesting in the context of seeing real artifacts and evidences in display.
It was time to drive to the meeting place for the tour. There at a cliff overlooking the canyon, many people were waiting for the tour guide. The view of the area from that place was spectacular and I could see the ruin that we were about to explore. Then the tour guide appeared, the first young woman that I met over the visitor center. She came down and got everybody attention. Now, I got a better look at her. She was about mid twenty, decent looking and pretty “tough”. The reason I said that because, one middle aged guy in the group threw some coins down the cliff for good luck. She caught it and gave the guy a very “extensive and valuable” lesson of what he just did. The guy was so embarrassed in front of every body and took a “hide” from that point on. She then went over rules and regulations before we took a hike down to the bottom of the canyon leading to the ruin. There, she got every body into a circle and talked about history of the area and the very people that made the place their home. Ancient Pueblo people migrated southward following the big river “Rio Grande” to settle at this place more than a thousand years ago. Their civilization peaked around 1200’s with quite large population relying on hunting bison, buffaloes, and other big animals; and growing corn on top of mesas. Then people phased out, completely gone away from the area. The last group of people called Basket Makers was there around 1600’s. Until now, archeologists still don’t know why people left the area. But they believed, because of environmental destruction of the very mesas they depended on for food, that led to erosions of rich soil and not able to produce sufficient food for survival... Then we explored the ruin which comprised of many kivas (circular rooms underground used for ceremony and religious purpose) and many 3-4 story towers for living or storage. All were built by sandstone and mud. The ruin or cliff dwelling (buildings under a giant rock cliff to protect people from snow or rain) was a small village at the time where as many as 10 families lived. It was amazing how they could build such structures by hand and still remained until this day…
Everybody was awed and amazed after the trip to the ruin; came to better understanding of the nature and early history of humans in North America. That was the only ruin (Cliff Palace) that people could have a guided tour at the time. Then, the tour guide/tough park ranger told everybody that we could go out and explore ourselves to some other small ruins around the area. There is another beautiful and big cliff dwelling called Balcony House (the ruin hanging out of the canyon cliff like a balcony, appropriate name!) on my brochure but it wasn’t tour guided because of difficult climbing and not suitable for the season. I asked the tour guide to see if there was a way to see it. She told me that I could see it by hiking to the other side of the canyon and looking back but could not get there directly. I said to myself, I was already here and wouldn’t miss this opportunity, so I took the hike. Besides seeing the ruin, a whole different view of the canyon was on the path. On the edge of the canyon looking down and away, I felt the insignificance of my presence and dissolved in the grandness of nature... Then into my car, I drove along the top of canyon and stopped many times to look at many other small kivas and ruins. It was just unbelievably spectacular! So many things to see and so little time! By the time I realized that I wasn’t going to see everything in one day, I drove back to the visitor center for a break and refueling myself. It was early after noon. There is another ruin close by the visitor center called Bruce Tree House (archeologists first discovered and saw a Bruce tree there, huh, another appropriate name!). On the way, I hiked down to see it and of course a lot of people were there. Many others were huffing and buffing on the way back up…
After that, it was about mid afternoon and on the way back up I saw a sign of a hiking trail. Reading the map, the Petroglyph Loop Trail is about 3 miles and estimated around 2 hours. The trail follows below the edge of the plateau, then climbing up to the rim of the mesa and returns to the area close to the visitor center. The thing was that if visitors get back after hours (5 pm), then they have to be responsible for themselves, basically no help if they get lost. It was around 3:15 at the time, I saw a couple started heading down to the trail. I needed to make a decision whether to go or not. It took me 5 valuable minutes to come to the decision of going. Checking my supplies, 1 power bar and a bottle of water left, I told myself that I could make it in time by powering through it. Yes, I started heading down the trail, really going fast. After 10 minutes, I caught up with the couple that I saw. They were in sort of stop-and-go mode to check out the views and doing their “couple” things. I had none of that to worry, so just kept powering my wheels. It was a short down hill to the bottom of the canyon, after that, up hill all the way to the top of the canyon. Many times, hiking on the edge of the plateau middle of the canyon, the view was unbeatable. Going between 2 big boulders, I had to sideway myself to barely make through it. It felt like if one of the boulders started breathing, I would be crushed into pieces.
Some areas were a bit steep, I had to cling myself to tree branches and propelled up. I was sweating and breathing like a horse, not just huffing and buffing. The surrounding was quiet. I couldn’t hear anything except my footsteps and the “breathing” out of my ears. The afternoon sun reflected on the canyon walls was beautiful. Finally, I got to the top of the mesa. It was relatively flat for an easy hiking. The only trail was in the middle; both sides were rugged landscape, shrubs and trees. On the guide map, it said I can’t walk outside of the path, touch or doing anything, leave it as it is, because it will destroy the ancient soil which supports the ecosystem there. The scene of trees, dead woods and shrubs was very ancient. It looked like nothing had been touched or changed. No trace of humans, nothing had been disturbed. Everything has been the same as it was thousands of years ago. It was surreal, really!
Keep walking more, suddenly; I saw few deer crossed in front of me from one side of the path to the other. I stopped and looked. It was a mother and 2 calves on one side and a father on the other. They were about 20 feet from me. I was frozen in silence. I’d never encountered wild animals that close up and personal. It took me a minute to process and came to realize that I was surrounded by deer. The mother and calves were looking at me like an alien from a different planet just landed. I was having goose bumps on my neck while staring at them. Then, one of the calves started peeing while looking at me. Nice! I didn’t know whether because they were in shock to see me, or just a happy relief that I didn’t move. In my head I was laughing, “Dude, this is not a very nice for first greeting!” Anyway, that was a special moment, at least for me to see deer for the first time that close up. After a few minutes, on the other side the big daddy was jumping up and down, running back and forth along side. I had a feeling this wasn’t going good. I looked at him and he looked straight right back at me, still jumping. I was staying still, not moving an inch but thinking that he was ready to charge me, if he felt his family was threatened. Thinking about that, the flight-or-fight response started, a jolt of adrenaline rushing through my body. My heart was beating as fast as it could. For a split second, I thought that if I ran, I wouldn’t run as fast as the big dude. So I said to myself, “You better not move an inch otherwise, you’ll get hurt”. I stayed very still and tried not to forget breathing. After few intense minutes, the mother and calves started moving back to the woods, and then the big daddy followed behind. Thanks God, I felt so relief that nothing had happened. Still peace between mans and animals, at least for the last few intense minutes. Sweat running down my back, I started walking away in relief…Stopping by a cliff looking out the canyon, thinking, that was SWEET! An awesome feeling of fear and joy, I felt blood rushing through my veins…
Sunday, I cooked some Vietnamese food for the host family to try. We had many good and interesting conversations in the evening…
The last 2 weeks had gone pretty fast, faster than I thought. Here we went again, the third weekend…
I planned to visit many small towns around the place. From the brochures that I got, they all seem very interesting with history and scenery. Also accidentally, I found out that there are two vineyards close by: Guy Drew and Sutcliffe, not too far from the town. So I decided to make a road trip on Friday.
Friday morning, I didn’t have to drive far away as previous weekends. When I started heading out, it was pretty nice, clear and sunny outside. Inhaling lungful of early morning brisk air, I was on the road to the vineyards… The drive was very beautiful as some of the drives that I took before. Different variations of red sandstone along canyon walls reflected by the early sunlight created a bright glow in the valley. I stopped my car a few times to look out to the other side of the canyon and look down the valley. There are some pretty, small houses along side of a small creek called McElmo on bottom of the canyon. Some places, the road curves hard above steep canyon wall to run along side of the creek… There, it was the first vineyard on the other side of the canyon. I could see from this side of the canyon, rows and rows of grapes on a piece of land along side of the rock wall. The soil is dark brown and old grey; combination of erosion from sand stone rock and old sediments of an ancient river once flowed through the valley. Usually, people grow grapes in many vineyards on hillsides fairly flat with rich soil and plenty of sunshine. But I’d never heard growing grapes along side rock wall. Later, I found out there is plenty of sun, of course, and the canyon provides very rich soil. However, the climate here is not optimal to grow grapes. Despite the generally dry climate and frosty cold at night, the rock canyon wall acts like a buffer absorbing the cold at night and cooling the heat during the day, sort of like an air conditioner regulating a micro climate in the area. This produces a very different taste in wines from the grapes. That was quite interesting, actually! I didn’t know if I wanted to believe it or not but it sounded pretty logical… Later, I drove further down the road to the second vineyard, which is a little smaller, situating on the side of the road. There wasn’t much activity in terms of taking care of grapes or making wines. Basically, it was sort of the end of the season. Things were slowing down and coming toward preparing for the winter…
Saturday, going to Durango again, this was the third time I had gone to Durango. There was some sort of exhibition in the history museum that I came across last time. The host couple, Robyn and Bob, celebrated their wedding anniversary that weekend and going to a hot spring there to relax. They invited me the night before and wanted me to go there with them. Even though I really wanted to check out the hot spring but had to politely excuse myself because I didn’t want to be in a middle of things, especially such an important event of their wedding anniversary. In the morning, I got up fairly early and the couple was already up and about to go. Robyn saw me and rushed to give me a big hug. She told me they already loaded up 3 bikes into their SUV so that we’re together going biking along Animas River when I met them there. I hesitated for a moment and not knowing what to do after such a warm gesture. Eventually, I had to excuse again saying that I was going to town with different things to do in mind and may not meet them there after all. They smiled away accepting my excuse. On my way to the museum in town, the drive looked more familiar as the third time around. I got to the museum a little before 11 am. The sun was quite intense but the air was still cool and breezy. I came in and was greeted by a lady. She introduced the museum and what was going on that day, including special sale of things. After visiting the museum and checking out things, I bought a couple of interesting reprinted posters of the town events in 1800’s and such. Of course, postcards were for my collection and my friends. There was a cemetery tour in the morning but I missed it. So I asked the lady what it was about. The tour guided visitors to old graves of many pioneer settlers and history of the town in general. I imagined it would be quite interesting things to know. So I asked her if I could catch up with them. She said that they probably would be done by the time I got there. Anyway, I insisted for the direction there so she showed me on the map. When I arrived at the cemetery, which is situated on a beautiful hill looking down to the downtown and the Animas River, I didn’t see any group of people resembling in some kind of touring activity. Disappointing, I drove around the place and later coming back to the town…
On that night, I was in the house by myself again because the couple called home to tell me that they were going to spend the weekend in Durango. I told them jokingly not to worry a thing; I’d be still alive when they came back. They laughed. I wished them a wonderful time there. Then, I went to my room, figuring out the plan for the next morning.
Sunday, early morning as usual, I had to drive for a long distance to Hovenweep national monument in Utah. There are two roads to get there, one of those is the same road that I took to the vineyards but going further west crossing the border and turning north. I chose to drive that road. The scenery was familiar but when I passed away from the vineyards, things were getting quite interesting. The road started to make several sharp and blinding turns around giant canyon boulders. There was almost nobody on the road. So I drove a little fast from beginning. Then, I almost hit the side of the canyon because of a sharp and blinding curve. From that point on, I told myself no more of near misses if I wanted to show up to work the next day. The drive passed through small towns along the road. Along side, scattering remains of old barns, abandoned old houses and rustic stagecoach wheels in the field looked like scenes of old western movies of pioneer time. Then getting to Utah, turning to a different road northward, the whole view was wide open with the only road in it… To the national monument, the visitor center looked pretty new and modern. Even with touches of architecture were intended to make it ancient and native looking. It was a bit early, plus on Sunday, so there were only a few cars in the parking lot. I came in and was greeted with a big smile by a young lady in park ranger uniform. For some reason, women look uniquely better and different in uniforms. After some information gathering from me, she showed me the self-guided hiking map around the monument, and of course the admission fee to be collected.
On the way I went to the hiking trail which circles around many ancient sandstone towers. However, not like in Mesa Verde with cliff dwellings, towers here are massive structures hanging off canyon cliffs. They weren’t constructed below rock cliffs to get cover from rain and snow. Shaped-out sandstones were put together in layers and sandwiched by mud in between. Rock chips were inserted into mud layers to keep it from rain erosion… The trail wasn’t too difficult. It started on top of the mesa, circling around to the other side of the canyon, going down to the bottom, and then going back up to the top of the mesa again. It was a complete quiet in the middle of nowhere. There wasn’t any noise of any kind, except occasion bird singings. Along the way, beautiful views from the top covered the vast surrounding mesas. The hike was a bit quick, by the time I got back to the visitor center. It was only over an hour or so. I guessed there wasn’t anything else to do there except heading back home. I came back in the visitor center, bought a couple of post cards and drove home. I spent that afternoon at home to reflex on things and relax for the coming workweek.
The forth week was a bit different from other previous weeks. I chose to work a couple of extra days, so I could go home early for some schoolwork. Consequently, I only had the Sunday for the weekend, which was the weekend before Halloween. Because it was a short weekend, I took the opportunity to do some mountain biking on a nearby trail. My 2-door coup is small. The bike didn’t fit it. The family told me to use their SUV, but I didn’t want to. So in the morning, I dissembled and loaded up the family mountain bike to head out for the road. I drove to the Sand Canyon trail pretty close by, according to the map. However, it took about an hour to get there. The back road was a bit confusing and not paved. I regretted that I didn’t use the SUV. Anyway, I got there and assembled the bike ready to go. Walking around to check out the area and the trail, it was nice and beautiful. There was only one car on the parking area of the trail. Fifteen minutes later, people started coming in for hiking. I began with a pretty good ride for a while from the top of a mesa, and then the trail drops in elevation to the bottom of a small canyon. There were many steep drops with big boulders on the way. I had to carry the bike and climbed down the rocks. Then I was on the bike again for a while. But this time the trail was really muddy. It must have rained last night a bit there. Then it wasn’t good going anymore. I began to get tired and feeling my legs. After awhile, I got some serious leg burning and fatigue. Even though, the scenery was beautiful but I didn’t feel it on the muddy road. From the information brochure, it would take about 2 & ½ to 3 hours each way. I planned to do one way, rest and come back in mid afternoon. But starting to think if I continued like this and get to the end of the trail, which is on the other end of the canyon. Then came back. I would get home early evening and exhausted for showing up the next day. Juggling thoughts in my head, I decided to turn around and head home, not finishing the whole ride. On that Sunday night, after dinner, the host family and I carved out our pumpkins and light them up outside the house for the Halloween. It was quite a pleasant get-together and we all had a lot of fun. My pumpkin didn’t look as scary as the others but it was good.
The fifth weekend was approaching fast before I realized it. It meant that I’d be going home on that Saturday. Bob asked me about flying the plane that he promised to take me on Wednesday. I told him if he wasn’t too busy the next day then I’d love to try it. Then the next morning, Thursday, I woke up early to get ready. But coming disappointedly, it was gloomy and cloudy outside. So we canceled and waited to the following day to see it the condition was better for flying. I assured Bob that if it wasn’t looking good the next day; it would be ok with me. He didn’t have to feel that he had to do it just because he promised. Fortunately, it was a beautiful day on Friday, last day of my staying in town. In the morning, we agreed that we would meet at the airport around 10 to let the plane warm up after the frosting evening. Plus, Bob had to go to the local college for an early meeting. During the early morning hour, I called up the work place to tell them that I’d show up late after noon because of the good reason. Everything was going as plan. I met Bob at the local airport. It was a small airport with one runway. There were several single engine planes parked outside and in many hangers. I went to Bob’s plane. It is an old red and white Cessna. Bob went around checking up on the wings, rotor and flaps. I cranked the rotor a few times to see if working. Because he said, he didn’t think we would be able to climb out to fix it when we’re in the air… Everything looked good. We got in and put on headphones. On the way taxiing out to the runway, signaled clear, we took off. There is no control tower or flight controller to communicate to. Basically, everybody flying in the area at the time tuned in to the same radio frequency to communicate to each other. That way they wouldn’t fly into each other. It went sort of like this, “This is Cessna N (ancy) 2045 Z (ebra) at Cortez airport, we’re taxiing to the run way”….”Cessna Nancy 2045 Zebra again, taking off in 2 minutes”…If there was any plane close by coming to land, then they would communicate back to ask us either hold up or they would stay clear to wait for us taking off before they land…
We were up in the air, climbing up high to around 10,000 feet. Bob talked about all of the things in the plane over the headphone, showed me how it works and how to control the plane. Then he asked me to try it to see if I felt comfortable doing it. I did fine, he said. Suddenly, he choked to plane and it stopped for about 3 seconds. It took a nosedive for a few second, and then he got it started and going back up again. I was like “Oh, sh-t”. He did it intentionally, just like people doing tricks in air show kind of things, but just a little bit easier to see if I scared. Honestly, I was surprised a bit more than scared. Then he did that again a couple more times, but I was already prepared and got used to it. That was sweet! By the way. After a while, he asked me to fly the plane. I asked him, “Are you sure about this?” He said, yeah. I replied, “Alright, I’ll try”. So I took over. He told me where to go and turn. At first, I was turning and going around and around. It was kinda like driving a car, but a little more fine-tune. He told me to turn a little right, but I turned the flaps in the tail and the wings a bit much. So it went around and around a couple times. After that, I got a hang of it and only turned a little, enough to make it turn. I guessed I forgot that I was flying a plane on the air not on the road. Then things got a bit easier as time went on. I flew over the family house, the hospital that I worked at, and the downtown. Looking down, it was unreal to see things that up close just high above. Plus I was in the pilot seat with the best view of everything. Well, I flew many times in big and small planes, but nothing like this. The smallest plane I was in carried 30 passengers. This was 2-seat plane, so of course I had the best seat and best view of all. Furthermore, I was actually flying the thing, not a passenger in it. Then I flew over the Delores town where I visited a couple weeks back. Flying over the McPhee reservoir that I looked down from the top of the mountain, but this was a different view totally, from up high and above. Wow, everything looked small but beautiful. Even all of the cows grazing on the hill looked differently unique. It was amazing that seeing the same thing in different views gives you different perceptions.
After flying about an hour or so, we headed back to the airport for landing. Bob showed me how people know it is a right elevation coming in the runway. If coming in to low, it is dangerous and you can crash. But if coming to high, then it’d over shoot the runway. So pilots have to look for the lights on the ground indicating different elevations. There are 3 lights: red, green and white in 3 different angles. If pilots see the red light, it means that the plane is too low. White light means too high. Pilots have to adjust the plane until seeing the green light. Of course, not just light, they have to worry about the speed and other things. After all that, I thought it would be a life-preserving thing for him to land the plane instead of me. So I let him to take control the bird. He talked over the radio to make sure nobody coming in landing at the same time. Otherwise, it would be a disaster. There was a plane coming in a head of us. We circled and wait until it was clear. He landed the bird. It actually wasn’t that bad after we landed and taxiing on the runway. However, I guessed he is experienced to make it look easy...After securing the plane; he took off going back to the school. I went back home to get changed and went to work. The whole experience was second to none. It was exhilaratingly thrilling. I was at work still having the feeling of being on the air. It was sweet! Yeah! I did it, one of those experiences that I probably have opportunity to do once in lifetime.
In the evening, we had the last dinner together and talked about things before I’d be leaving the early next morning. The next morning, Bob and Robyn were going to fly to Pueblo to give a talk at a meeting. Robyn doesn’t like flying that much and tries to avoid it as much as possible. So she tried to talk herself out of it a few days before because it was Bob’s talk, even though she already had medicated patches to prevent motion sickness. After all, they love each other so much, couldn’t stay without, that she had to go along. We went to bed early for the next morning. I set the alarm clock at 5 am and packed the stuff up…
I woke up at 5 and heard some noise upstairs. They were up too. I hauled my stuff into the car. Not surprising, I left with more stuff than I came in. It was dark and chilly outside. The air was crisp. For the first time in a long time, I looked up and saw stars in the dark sky. Wow, it was beautiful! I hadn’t seen stars in a long time. In the big city, there is so much light everywhere that you don’t see much of stars or never bother to look up for stars. Here, at that moment, an open view of the sky in the pit dark of early morning, no pollution of city light, the stars were so obvious even if I didn’t want to look up. Like when growing up, there was no electricity most days of the week. In the heat of many summer nights, I sat outside in front porch with my parents and neighbor friends to talk about things and looked up the sky. There were many stars that I tried to count. Some wasn’t there just a moment ago then appeared out of nowhere to mess up my counting. Occasionally, a shooting star came flying across the sky… Oh, what a good time that was!
Then the moment of saying goodbye, Robyn and Bob came down from stairs. I shook Bob’s hands to say good-bye and thank for everything, sincerely. Robyn came up and gave me a long hug. A very long hug, I felt that she didn’t want to let go and about to weep…I walked away to say a heavy-hearted goodbye and sincere thank, got into my car and drove away. It was dark and feeling heavy in the air…
On the drive back, I tried to register into my brain unique places that would trigger my memories of the place and people that I came to see and meet. Approaching a tunnel, I had to stop my car to wait, just before Wolf Creek pass. There was some rock irrigation work along canyon wall, which road workers had to blast away many dangerous hanging and loose rocks before they came down on motorists. Everybody had to stop and wait out. I thought it would be quick, but waiting and waiting…I opened my bag to take out the Vietnam Lonely Planet to read up while waiting in the car. Finally after 45 minutes or so they let us moving. On the road again, I went through the town of Pagosa Springs. It was a beautiful early morning, some fog hanging low on the hills that the sun hadn’t burned up yet. Many steam columns coming up from many hot spring pools along the river along side the road. I stopped my car and look down. People were having good time in hot spring pools in early crisp morning… Then continue I drove cross many familiar towns again as coming in, including the place that I got stopped by a kind policeman. “Wow, that was 5 weeks ago”, I mumbled.
To be surprised, I started out leaving Cortez with sunny and clear sky, then foggy and gloomy around 1/3 way through close to the Sand Dunes National Park that I didn’t have time to visit. Then changing again 2/3 way through, about a couple hours away from Denver, it snowed in Fairplay. I tried to keep my car moving forward but not sliding off the road, praying to get home in one piece. Coming out of it heading back to Denver, it was nice and sunny again. There is such a change in elevation and landscape that it can go from sunny to foggy rain to snow and back to sunny and beautiful. You just gotta love it. Getting off the back road state high way, I come onto interstate high way. It was going smooth for 10 minutes, slowing down then crawling because of traffic on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. People were stop-and-go. I did the same for about 30 minutes anxiously to get home. Finally, I was home, the familiar streets and places that I last saw not so long, but seemingly very long time ago.
That was the end of the trip, the end of another great journey, which led me to better understand myself and the world around. Through it all, I had the opportunity finding out about people and places, meeting challenges and difficulties also learning valuable lessons and new things. Facing fear that kept me alive, but ambition to discover that put me on top of accomplishment realization. All and all, it was an exhilarating experience and a lot of fun. Being through many emotions from the grandness of nature to kindness of people, from fear to thrill, from the incredible loneliness to the satisfaction of discovery made me a better person. Many solo hiking adventures not only putting me to the mental and physical challenge but also finding solution to problems. It opened a new chapter while the current hasn’t closed.
It is impossible to say enough thank to the people who made my journey such a wonderful experience. I can only attempt to show my sincere gratitude to Bob, Robyn, Duane, Ethan and sweet Lindsey for their hospitality, welcome and kindness. To my friends in the hospital who kindly worked with me in scheduling, gave many valuable tips and advices. Many people that I met along the way from whom, I learned so much about openness, possibility and humanity.