Saturday, July 17

John, Sherry, Rahna, and Jerry near the Cement Creek Mine.

We had a leisurely morning. When we let the dogs out for their “nature break,” of course they slinked off to the river. Caleb caught sight of the standard poodle, Molly, who was in the next camp and decided to make a new friend. He chased the poodle back into her camp where they proceeded to stir up all kinds of dust in their camp site. I think he not only scared Molly, but Molly’s owner as well. After many apologies from me on Caleb’s behalf, I managed to get him back under control. Poor boy! He just wanted to play, but I guess he was too exuberant.

With John on top of American Flag Mountain

With Jerry as our guide, we headed out on the ohv’s to Italian Creek Road. From there we took Cement Creek to American Flag Mountain. The trails weren’t bad at all, and the views from the top of American Flag were amazing. Some happy person created rock smiley faces all along the trail. We also saw a few deer, as well as a marmot sunning on a rock. He stayed there for at least a couple of hours, because he was still on that same rock when we retraced our path back to the main road.

Marmot

While on the trail, we chatted with some guys on motorcycles who told us if we wanted to see the Maroon Bells, we could see them by traveling up a 4-5 mile trail to Taylor Pass. What he didn’t tell us was how wicked the trail up there was! At one point, the trail diverged into a rocky creek. We had to travel about ¼ mile through a rocky, flowing creek. I had my doubts as to whether or not we would make it, but we did. As we traveled onward and approached our destination, we heard gunfire. The gunfire came from a group of 20-something guys who were getting hammered and shooting skeet at Taylor Lake. They came down from either Crested Butte or Aspen and were planning on going back the way we came in. Lucky for them, Jerry told them they’d probably never make it in the vehicles they were driving, so they decided to go back the way they came. I hope they had three designated drivers.

View of part of the Maroon Bells from the Taylor Pass Trail

The Maroon Bells didn’t really look like the photos I’d seen, but Jerry said it was due to the location of our view. They are really spectacular. Rahna has some great photos on her camera; I may edit this post later to add some of her photos.

Here is John. Notice I am not on the back for this part.

On the way back down the Taylor Pass trail, we got behind some super slow atv’s who didn’t seem to want to let us pass. Maybe they thought it was a race.

For supper we just roasted hot dogs over the huge fire John and Jerry built.