Our AUTUMN TOUR - 2023

When we left the DENVER area to continue our FALL TOUR we decided to go a direction that we had not taken in a LONG TIME.  The southern Rockies over Wolf Creek Pass to Durango and Cortez.  This was our route during the nine years that we lived in Southern California as newly-weds.  The Interstate was still in its infancy; Route 66 and the Four Corner Region was the route closest to the family in the Denver are.  We could not have asked for a better Autumn route.  The leaves up north had already fallen - at least north of I-70.  The aspens in South Park near Fairplay were long gone, but the Cottonwoods along the Arkansas River were glorious!!  As were the various trees in the small towns that still exist in that part of Colorado.  The buttes and washes surprised us with golden leaves and our stops in Durango, Monticello UT, and Provo UT were also bedecked in gold, yellow, and red.

As we crossed the California border from Las Vegas, on the interstate, Tom was checking the winds on the PASS at Tehachapee and asked me to turn north just as we approached the 395 junction.   It had been a long time since we had taken that route to southern California.  We were ready for a two day stop at Lone Pine.  What a precious little town at the edge of the Owens Valley Water Project and an Indian Reservation.  We found the church we were looking for, having checked the GOOGLE listing on Saturday,  but unable to connect on Sunday!!  We arrived on the sermon, half hour late.   That is life at this age I am afraid.  Pastor was welcoming, even if we were LATE.  Spoke with him for some time after the service.  The host at the RV PARK had recommended them,  very community minded and welcoming he had said and he was correct.

Sonora Pass had reopened following the first WINTER snow so we took that route, fighting the dirty windshield by stopping with hazard lights flashing in a clear space where we could be seen from both directions in order to try to clear the inside and the outside.  One vehicle passed us in each direction by the time we got the crud and dead bugs off the glass.   We were surprised to be flagged down at a wide hunters camp area a few miles up the road by the car going in the same direction we were.  Two concerned ladies had noted our South Dakota license plates as they passed us and were concerned that we were strangers and didn't know how steep and curvy SONORA PASS was.  We explained that we were former residents of Strawberry and knew the pass well,  but thanked them for their concern.

We arrived at son Tom's after dark, but none the worse for wear, except for the LONG DAY driving.  When we took a drive to Sonora the next week we realized that we had arrived just in time for the fall colors here!  The pistachios are THE TREE in that area of California;  they are decorative and provide an awesome display of red to offset the golds of the oak trees!   We felt so fortunate.  Also checked the "tripometer"  and realized that we had traveled 15,000 miles since the 22nd of May this year.  What a tour this year was!!  From the Olympic Peninsula to the tip of Lake Superior at Superior WI / Duluth MN.  From South Dakota to the southern part of Colorado and Utah, Nevada and the Mojave Desert!!  From Mount Shasta in California to Mount Olympus in WA, to the Rockies, the Black Hills of South Dakota, and Mount Whitney - the highest mountain in the contiguous United States. 

For mountain folks like us quite a summer.