Sunday, July 18

Lunch at the Brick Oven in Crested Butte, CO

On motorcycles we headed up to Crested Butte for lunch. We dined at Brick Oven Pizza on the patio. I know you’re supposed to have pizza at a place called Brick Oven Pizza, but their hamburgers and sweet potato fries are great! We walked around a little and explored the street market they were having that weekend. John bought a couple of quick links for his chain at the local bike shop. This was our first time in Crested Butte, but I hope it won’t be the last. I see why our Chicago friends love to go there. On the motorcycle ride back to Taylor Park, we were caught in a bit of rain. It was a little chilly, but we survived.

Here is a video of part of our ride from Crested Butte back to Taylor Park. I didn't capture the part that includes the rainy part of our ride.

After returning from Crested Butte, we packed up camp and headed toward Grand Mesa. The drive through the Blue Mesa Reservoir area was about as eventful as the one through Monarch Pass. We stopped a couple of times to let the old truck cool off. The drive up to the top of the mesa resulted in a couple of cooling-off periods as well. John’s vacation project this year is to diagnose and treat whatever is making the truck despise climbing. We’ll be staying with the Autreys in Fruita for a few days, so hopefully he will get it figured out then. He thinks it might be the clutch fan or something. I’m glad I’m married to a man who can do anything. (Well, anything except maybe put the lid down on the toilet or put his clothes in the hamper. I guess a girl can’t have everything.)

We arrived in our camp site at Jumbo Campground in the Mesa Lakes Recreation Area around midnight. Since the campground doesn’t have water hook-ups, we had to stop at the faucet and fill our freshwater tank. By the time we got everything set up, it was probably close to 1:00 a.m. before we went to bed. I was so exhausted I decided to forego a shower for another day. I know, gross. That's just how tired I was!