Day 10 - Washita Battlefield

After a 3 hour drive from the dry and missing attractions in Texas, we arrived at the Washita Battlefield National Historic site near the town of Cheyenne, Oklahoma.

Long before Custer met his end at the Little Big Horn, he led his troopers to attack Chief Black Kettle's camp along the Washita River in Western Oklahoma.  In the pre-dawn hours, Custer and his 700 troopers attacked and routed the 100 or so Indians in Black Kettle's camp.  Two hours later, 30-60 Cheyenne lay dead and 53 more were taken captive.  Custer then had his troops kill about 800 horses and mules the tribe had and destroyed all their posessions and supplies.  Black Kettle was supposed to be under the protection of the Army at the time but that made little difference, he and his wife were among those killed.

Washita River

There is an excellent visitor center with fine displays and presentations and paths throughout the battlefield with educational markers.  This is a beautiful place with tall prairie grass and a peacefulness about it that indicates nothing of its past.  More pictures of this area can be found HERE and the video below will give you a sense of being in the sea of grass.  We left the battlefield and traveled to Weatherford, Oklahoma for the night.

Day 10 - Missing Lake, Closed Quarries :(

We left Guymon, Oklahoma around 9:30 and ambled south into the Texas Panhandle.  Along the way we passed field after field of massive windmills (see video below), the steady southerly winds had them all churning along delivering lots of kilowatts.  We were heading toward Fritch Texas and the Lake Meridith National Wildlife Area and the Ablates National Monument. 

Both were in the same area and we figured to spend the better part of the day exploring them.  After driving 10 miles off the highway to Ablates, we found a hand written sign on the door of the visitors center saying the ranger was on a tour and would return around 1pm!  Since it was 10am, we decided to drive up the road to the monument's flint quarries and have a look - not to be!  We came to a locked gate and a sign saying that we needed reservations for entry.  So, unless you plan in advance (not noted on maps, guidebook or anywhere else but the National parks website) you can't get in.  BUMMER!

Lake Meredith launch ramp!

Not to be discouraged, we continued further still into the boonies to visit Lake Meredith and the wildlife area.  The picture of the launch ramp shown on the right tells the tale.  The massive Lake Meredith shown on maps and "Waterfront Lots" brochures is but a shadow of its former self.  Years of drought and increasing water demands by Amarillo and other Texas cities have drained the once massive lake to mud puddle status.  There is supposed to be a bit of lake down near the dam but as far as we could see, just grass and trees but no water anywhere.  For more pictures of this area, click HERE but don't tow you boat this way expecting to catch a fish - only walking catfish stand a chance!  Oh well, East toward Oklahoma in search of lunch and a "National" something without a closed sign.

Windmills!

Day 9 - Capulin Volcano

King of the world!

Friday morning we left Pueblo Colorado heading South towards New Mexico.  Off to the West, a heavy cloud cover settled on the mountains and stayed there for our 3 hour trip to Raton, New Mexico.  At Raton, we went to the New Mexico Welcome Center and discovered that that Capulin Volcano National Monument was about 30 miles East along US64 right on our planned route to the Oklahoma Panhandle.  The monument was about 3 miles North and 1/4 mile above the town of Capulin.  Mary & I enjoyed the visitor center there and decided to hike the crater rim to get away from all the noises of civilization.  Capulin is a unique example of a nearly intact cinder cone volcano - they usually erode quickly (in geologic time) but for some inexplicable reason, vegetation grew on this one fairly soon and prevented major erosion.

From everywhere on the crater rim, the view extended to the horizon perhaps 50 miles away.  We were standing in New Mexico while to the North was Colorado, Northeast was Oklahoma and to the Southeast Texas.  The only sounds were the wind, birds and our own breathing.  We had eagles for company but failed to see and of the rattlesnakes the rangers cautioned us about.  After our decent, we continued on to the prairie of "No mans land" in the Oklahoma panhandle spending the night in Guymon and had a great dinner at the Acapulco Restaurant there.

This was a unique and unexpected experience.  Click here for more photos and be sure to watch the video below.

Day 8 - Royal Gorge

Bottom of the gorge.

After leaving the Manitou Cliff Dwellings, we drove to the Royal Gorge just West of Canon City, Colorado.  The park surrounds a large portion of the gorge and includes a bridge, incline railway, cable car and more.  One admission covers all so don't panic at the price - you get your money's worth.

 We started our afternoon with a 1000+ foot decent to the bottom of the gorge on the incline railway.  The Arkansas River is at the bottom of the canyon and is only about 50 feet wide there.  The river shares the canyon bottom with a standard gauge railroad track that has quite a history itself including a "War" between the Santa Fe and D&RG for rights to run track there during the Pike's Peak gold rush. 

View from cable car


Back up the railway and then on to the swaying ride on the cable car almost 1/4 mile above the canyon floor.  The car is the original (comforting?) and it travels about 5mph crossing the canyon in about 5 minutes.  We enjoyed the ride but if you are subject to motion sickness, you probably ought to walk across.

After leaving the cable car, we opted to walk down to the wildlife pens where bison, elk and bighorn sheep are easily viewed. 

Bighorn sheep

This was quite a treat for us as these large animals are difficult to see in the wild.  See more pictures at the photo album link below.  We went on to view the Skycopter and walked back across the bridge to the visitor center where they were closing for the day so we drove to Pueblo to spend the night
tired but pleased with our first day on the road home.

Royal Gorge Photo Album

Video from the bottom of the gorge.

Video on the bridge.

Day 8 - Manitou Cliff Dwellings

We began our adventure with a short drive West of Colorado Springs to the town of Manitou Springs and the Cliff Dwellings.  Though nowhere near as large as the more famous Mesa Verde ruins, these are more complete and accessible to us.

These were built by the Anasazi and were built sometime between 1100AD and 1300AD.  There is also a 3 story Pueble style building dating from 1898 that houses the museum and gift shop. 

This site has been available to the general public since about 1906 and is accessible and well maintained.

You can see more of our pictures of this site here and can visit their website here.

We wandered around the site and the museum for a couple of hours then headed for our next adventure at the Royal Gorge.

The task ends, the play begins!

Colorado Sunset

We spent our first 7 days of this road trip hauling a trailer and pickup truck full of "Stuff" that just wouldn't fit into my Daughter's rented moving van.  Then we passed the next 7 days enjoying the scenic wonders and historical sites along the crooked path home.  This trip marked our 15th and 16th weeks away from home this year, encompassed some 4100 miles, 14 days and 13 states.  We have travelled well over 14,000 highway miles so far this year with a couple of months to go.  I'll date the posts so they will eventually appear in the correct order.

Day 1: Thursday October 14, 2010

We hit the road to North Carolina to see what we had gotten ourselves into - 300 miles and 5 hours later we arrived at Trish's house, hooked up the trailer and began loading.  Jeff and Karissa came to help load and with everyone doing their best, we were loaded by 5pm.  I never would have believed how much we were able to get into the trailer and the truck bed.  A short trip across town to spend the night with friends Jim and Carolyn Hatchell - the rig held together but felt sort of "Soft" - needed air in the new tires.

We stayed up too late visiting, eating Thai food and just enjoying the company - slept like rocks!

Day 2: Friday

After Jim prepared a great breakfast, we aired up the tires and hit the road for home (it is on the way and the bed is confortable.)  The rig felt much better with the tires properly inflated and we had an uneventful trip back to Loudon.  There was a rather loud sucking sound going up the mountain - just the truck letting us know that if we were going to drag an extra 6000 pounds around, we had to feed it lots of fuel on a regular basis.  Arrived in Loudon about 4pm.

Day 3 & 4: Saturday, Sunday

Left home around 7:30am and arrived in Marion, Illinois at 2pm Central Time.  We hooked up with my aunt Ivolene and began the 2 day family reunion - click the link if you want to see more about it.

Day 5, 6 and 7: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday

Left Marion about 8am and arrived in Kansas City, Missouri to visit and spend the night with Mary's Brother Tom and his wife Maxine.  We arrived about 3pm had a great, though short, visit and met their Son Brent.  Tom & Maxine have become friends (not just relatives) and we lamented that they weren't traveling with us to Colorado.

Tuesday drove across Kansas and stayed the night in Goodland.  Wednesday we arrived at Trish's new home about noon (Mountain time).  We got unloaded and picked up the kids at school, waited for Will to get home from work and hit the road for Colorado Springs (they didn't need us hanging around in the way while they were in the process of moving in) - took the sunset picture above - crashed and burned!

The stuff is in Colorado, the trailer is safely back to U-Haul and we slept in Colorado Springs.  The play part of this adventure begins with the next post.