Saturday June 29, 2024 Albuquerque NM to South Fork CO

 

We were up around 7am and Steve had the coffee ready. We did more catching up with Steve and their dog Juice and their cat Chaco. Sharon is visiting back east so we didn’t see her this trip.

We picked up coffee and breakfast sandwiches at McDonald’s and then headed north on I-25. Cutoff at Rt 550 where we topped off the gas (cheap gas).Rt 550 is a beautiful 4 lane road that went as far as we went today. We turned east after Cuba, NM on Rt 537 which turned out to be a desolate but well paved two laner through the Jacarilla Apache Indian Reservation. It was devoid of traffic or towns so it was a nice peaceful road. Although I definitely wouldn't want to break down there!

We intersected Rt 64 and went through Dulce then continued toward Chama where we picked up Rt 84 to Pagosa Springs. We’d been told to check out Pagosa Springs so we went through the town. It was crawling with tourists and super busy. We stopped at Two Chicks and a Hippie for an all-day breakfast (Milo) and a chicken salad wrap (Deb). Then north up and over Wolf Creek Pass which is 10,850 ft. We pulled into the South Fork, CO visitor center where we loaded up on brochures. They have a very active tourism business around here with kayaking, hiking, skiing in the winter, raft trips down the Rio Grande river and guides for fishing and hunting, etc. There is a mining museum and tour we will go check out tomorrow. 

There is lots of water here so everything is green with waterfalls everywhere. We saw the transition from desert to mountains as soon as we crossed into Colorado.

Deb reserved a spot at the Silver Thread Base Camp, a nice RV place with lots of shade and right on the Rio Grande.