Something nice to have the truck back in trip ready shape at any moment. Bill and Larry wanted to do a fall fishing trip. It's been a long while since we've all been able to go together so I was all for it. The weekend happened to be birthdays for both Bill and my son and I didn't need to convince him to come along.
They left Pueblo Friday at 11 or so. Took an easy ride up after having lunch in Canon City. They decided to go up and over Tin Cup pass, one we've done may times. Robbie would meet at my place after work and we'd take off down 285 to Buena Vista and into the Taylor valley via Cottonwood pass. All of our trip occurring in the dark so none of the scenery was observed.
The meet up spot was Spring Creek Reservoir. We would arrive in the dark. Apparently so did Larry and Bill. We caught a call on the way when we stopped in Conifer. Larry said they were in Taylor park and heading to Spring Creek. The math didn't add up, even with the lazy start to the day they had. He filled me in the next morning on the why.
Using Gaia I was able to find the way in the dark. About 5 miles out I made a call out on the radio as Larry said he'd have a handheld to monitor when we arrived. He responded he was up as it was about 10:30 when we were near. It was a good thing he was up as we needed a little guidance in the dark. Outside of Larry's voice guiding us in the last little bit, there was no welcome party waiting outside. Both were snug in there abodes and it was cold outside. Robbie and I made quick work of setting up the camper.
Top popped, we got the furnace fired up. Holy cow was the blower motor unhappy! It was squealing like mad. Loud enough I'm sure our sleeping neighbor's might not be happy about it. So I moved the truck a good 25 feet past Larry's to give a solid buffer from the sound. It is putting out heat as much as it is noise. I also realized setting up, the insulated mattress pad Robbie normally uses in the overhead bunk was MIA. Despite having tons of extra blankets and a good sleeping bag, without an insulated mattress the air movement under the bunk tends to pull the heat right out of who ever is sleeping up there. So the kid took the passenger front seat to sleep.
My normal clock has me up early, so I got dressed and got out to explore. I did tell the kid to take the bed to stretch out a little bit. Nobody else is up yet. Sun is rising but not over the ridge yet.
Looking back at camp.
Frosty.
We managed to nail the aspens at the peak of their color changing magic for this part of the state.
It was chilly for sure.
I decided to take a hike down to the lakeside to survey it for the rest. Larry had his older brother riding with him who is walking with a cane from a botched knee replacement and of course Bill with his wheelchair would need to make this treck.
The lake looked low. I scampered down from what used to be the shoreline down to what looks like former lake bottom by the black muddy surface I'm walking on. Thankfully it's still frozen and holding my weight. It will not be capable of holding any weight once the sun gets on it.
Looking back at camp, the surface would not be easy for either of our two counterparts to get down to the water.
The hill to the north of us was on fire with the aspens changing.
The still lake making great photo ops for sure.
With the rest up I relayed what my little hike found so we packed up and set out to move up to Mirror lake.
We did take a slight detour to try fishing at the Pothole #1 that we've had success at before.
Pothole video
A birds eye view of the Taylor valley. That is the Taylor river opposite the lake we are at.
Taylor valley
Making our way to Mirror heading through the town of Tin Cup.
Still in the golden aspens.
We got setup at camp and got down to the lake. It lives up to its name for sure.
The kid was the first to catch one, but it bounced off the shore and back in the water before he could grab it. Mine was the first on land. A wee little rainbow, too small to keep so I sent him back after taking my pic with him.
The score card showed, Bill got three, my 1, Robbie's 1, Larry and his brother got skunked. Back in camp hanging out.
Larry chopping up some goodies for dinner. That's his brother too.
I had sliced up some steak into strips to fry up in the skottle with the taters and onions. Though thanks to Robbie's suggestion we marinated the steak with some Japanese BBQ sauce. Holy cow was it good.
We finished off with some cake for the birthday boys. We hung out for a while until after dark and turned in. The furnace in the camper refused to come on. I could see by the current draw changing when the thermostat kicked on, but the blower would not come on. No blower, no heat. We piled on the layers as we knew it would be a cold one. By 10, I'm in the mode of the full body shivers. I say screw it and climb into the cab and fire the 8.1 up to be the heat source. I ran it up long enough to get to operating temp and then shut it down. I was afraid we might catch some exhaust possibly and end up taking a forever nap if I left it running any longer than I did. I ended up running it three more times overnight. Sleep was fleeting as you can only get so comfortable in the front seat with it reclined. I woke up at 6:00 and wanted to snooze a little more. Next thing I know Larry's knocking on the back door at 9:00. It warmed up enough to let me and the kid actually get some solid sleep. So since we slept in, breakfast was off the table and we just broke down camp to hit the road. All in all a great weekend catching up with Bill and Larry, as well as his brother and more importantly my son on his birthday.
