Big Towns, Rich Towns & Ghost Towns: The Rocky Mountains






Friday October 15 - Denver, Co to Moab, UT

Preparing for the ghostly walk





Silver Plume's Main Street



 We spend the night in the East Denver KOA. The topography of Eastern Colorado is actually an extension of the Kansas prairie, exactly opposite of what most would expect upon crossing the state line. As we check in at the office, I mentioned this to the owners, stating "this isn't exactly the Colorado I envisioned." Their reply was, "The Colorado you envision is on the other side of town. We pride ourselves here in East Colorado as being the Gateway to Kansas." We thought that was pretty funny. We cooked a nice meal outdoors on the porch of our cabin. It was getting colder as the night wore on. Thankfully the cabins here have heat. All four of us slept soundly. It was a long day on the road. Even The Beagles were wore out after a big romp at Lake Scott.

After breakfast, we leave the KOA and take I-70 through Denver, a BIG city (to us anyway). As we enter Denver, we can see the faint outline of the majestic Rockies. Mile after mile they get closer and closer. We keep driving, smack in the middle of the morning commute traffic we go, passing by malls, strip malls, box stores and finally, the downtown skyscrapers themselves. This is actually only one of three or four times on the entire trip where we had to deal with city traffic. Popping out of downtown on the west side, we finally begin our ascent. Wow! Ruth is blown away (as am I) and jumping out of her seat trying to see everything. Snow capped mountains surround us as we climb through Vail Pass. We stop in Vail, home of the rich, famous and infamous, for lunch al fresco as we bask in the beautiful Colorado sunshine, taking it all in. Faint memories come into my mind from a previous visit to Vail with my ex-wife in another life way back in 1985, when she just missed running over Jack Nicholson one snowy night in downtown. But that's another story. After lunch, we motor on to our sightsee stop for the day, the ghost town of Silver Plume, CO.
Silver Plume is actually categorized as a semi-ghost town, as about 200 people still reside here, down from a peak of about 1200 during it's mining hayday in the 1880's. Mine shafts and mining equipment still dot the mountainsides from that time.The buildings are still intact and the residents are doing lots of renovation. It was very easy to imagine this place as a bustling Old West mining town as we explored nooks and crannies up and down the dirt packed streets for the better part of an hour.



Snow capped Rockies

 Leaving Silver Plume, we climbed higher into The Rockies. We both were awestruck and speechless at the beauty these mountains presented to us. We ascended towards more snow capped peaks, then finally (and reluctantly) began our descent down the other side to Grand Junction, CO., the jumping off spot for the Colorado Plateau, the red rock desert and canyons, and our roosting nest for the next 5 days. The Crown Jewel of southeastern Utah,........ Moab.



Silver Plume- mining equipment





Silver Plume-Main Street

Gretchen-one tired beagle