Man, I slept so good! A nice thunderstorm woke me up in the middle of the night. I remember wondering what time it was before drifting off back to sleep. At approximately 7 a.m., DH woke me up to ask where my camera was. He walked out around the campground and witnessed a beautiful scene of cloud enshrouded mountains. Upon his return to the camper, he began to cook a light breakfast while I dressed the girls.
After breakfast, we took advantage of the Coronado State Monument. While DH and the kids learned a little about the residents of the 1600’s, I went off in search of the geocache. As usual, I misread the GPSr and ended up about 1/2 a mile from the actual cache location. All was not lost though as the views of the landscape was so beautiful it could be a cache by itself. I was disappointed that I’d made such a mistake yet again and resolved to miss this one in order to get moving on to Durango, CO.I rejoined the family for some touristy sight seeing and the walk back to the parked vehicle when I spied the treasure. The geocache! Hidden right where I shoulda been looking in the first place! YAY! At this point, I decided to let the girls “find” it. There was a small outcropping of rocks near the cache that looked like it’d make a wonderful photo op. I suggested the girls have a seat there and Little Bird in all her curiosity could not sit still. She looked a bit like a bobble head doll toy with all the turning, twisting, and looking she was doing. Finally, she spied the cache and stopped her wiggling before declaring, “Treasure! Mommy, a Treasure!”. Jumping up, she grabbed the box and proceeded to open it for treasures only a child would deem valuable. Happy meal toys!
The kids dug through it for some geojunk and I dropped travel bug into it, telling DH, “Mission accomplished!”. Satisified, we returned to the campground to hook up and hit the road again. At 10:10 a.m, we pulled out NW on 550 toward Durango, CO. As we ride, the landscape changes dramatically. Where before the land was somewhat flat and sparsely vegetated, now the red sandy dirt juts up in front of us, ever growing along the route.
We arrived in Durango, CO at approximately 1:30 p.m. and began searching for the campground. I had keyed the location address into Maggie and she directed us straight to the local Walmart announcing, “You have arrived!”. DH and I looked at each other. He asked me, “So what just happened?”. I replied that I didn’t know yet but one thing I DID know was that the Walmart parking lot was certainly NOT the Cottonwood RV Park.
We proceeded to poke along Hwy 160 before I spied a hidden billboard announcing the campground we were looking for. We pulled in and set up. I found myself very disappointed in this particular choice of campground. The website had showed a river flowing by which gave me the impression that there would be the peaceful sound of such lulling me to sleep tonight. This campground is nothing more than a gravel parking lot with hookups, picnic tables, and a shade tree or two. There is no playground or pool for the kiddos either. On the plus side, the bathrooms and showers are exceptionally clean.
I also did not see a fire ring. I find that I miss the “roughing it” atmosphere I grew up with but hesitate to give up my comfort in the travel trailer. We haven’t built a single campfire on this trip.
After we got set up, I sent The Teen off to the shower. Upon his return, I decide to attempt a couple of more geocaches while DH finished up some work reports. Before doing so, however, I want to locate the Diamond Circle Melodrama where we have tickets for the evening show “The Spoilers”. Once that little chore was accomplished, we set out for the geocaches.
This little quest took me and the kiddos into the Greenmount Cemetery. What a beautiful place to rest! It’s old and very picturesque. As we were driving through in our attempt to find the coordinates, a doe and her fawn appeared right in front of us. They casually meandered through the cemetery as if that’s where they belong instead of in a nice quiet meadow in the valley. As soon as they disappeared, a buck in velvet showed up. Who knew that so much wildlife could be seen in a cemetery?
Once we had our fill of picture taking, we resumed our quest for the cache. The GPSr led me back to the cemetery gates, where I left The Teen & the girls in the truck while I climbed among sage bushes and cacti on the side of a fairly steep slope. I got to the coordinates and looked all around, nearly giving up before spotting it. As I reached for it, a small iguana looking lizard jumped out right on top of it! It scared me to death, but what concerned me a little more was that this lizard looked just like one of those made up bearded dragons (a.k.a. yellow spotted lizard) in the movie “Holes” only a little smaller! I took a stick to move the critter and proceeded to claim my find. With that done, we moved on to another at a tiny local park. Got this one claimed, played around at the park, and walked along the banks of the Animas River. The sound of the water flowing over smooth round stones is the most peaceful sound in the world. It literally “washes” your worries away.
I took a moment to meditate and looked at my cell phone for the time. As I predicted, it was time to head back to the camp for a quick dinner and to freshen up for our evening at the Melodrama.We got packed up to enjoy a story about corrupt politicians trying to cheat a couple of hard working miners out of their cherished yellow rocks. The play was cute but the most fun was the audience participation. We had to Boo the villains, Cheer the heroes, and Awww the sweet heroine the hero was in love with.
At the end of the show, the accompanist “sound man”, entertained the audience with “The Maple Leaf Rag”, “The Entertainer”, and “The Bumblebee Boogie”. Nathaniel Powers is quite the accomplished musician, never once looking at the sheet music in front of him; instead keeping an ever watchful eye on and interacting with the audience. Wow!As the cast came out for their finale bows I realized how tired we were from traveling all day. I suggested to DH that it was time to call it a night. We took the opportunity to leave even though there was more entertainment on the program. Kangaroo had fallen asleep in my arms and was becoming a bit too heavy for me to continue holding her.
The weather was so nice and cool that when we got back to the camper, we opened the windows and turned off the air conditioner. We all got dressed for bed and the kiddos passed right out! Once I went to bed, that was it for me. I was out before my head hit the pillow.
Shortly thereafter, we were quite hungry for some breakfast. I had great plans to prepare some breakfast sandwiches for the road, but I ultimately failed at getting that chore completed in time. DH told me we’d be fine without breakfast for a couple of hours while we consumed some mileage. Eventually, we were forced to make a fuel stop. As it happened, there was a 
