Mammoth in Colorado Days 10 and 11

 Wednesday 15 September 2021

Lake Trinidad State Park to Caprock Canyons State Park
Planned 5:24
Actual 5:49
Lost an hour on the time zone change at the Texas border

Ready for a long drive? We weren't. A bolt in the right-side slideout broke; luckily Ed had a bolt that would replace it, but any sort of repair like that takes longer than you hope. It probably added a half-hour to our departure time. and our planned trip was over five hours.

But no matter, we were lucky to be leaving at all! We chose the shortest route with the fastest Google Maps time, which was directly over Raton pass and down the hills of  New Mexico. We headed east on highway 84, the same one that had taken us to the volcano on the day before. I read the pamphlet during the drive--it appears that most of the pointy things on the plains there were also extinct volcanos, 55,000 to 62,000 years old.  The large volcanic field surrounding the monument contains at least 100 recognizable volcanoes.

There was a goodly number of Pronghorn Antelope roaming the fields by the road.  Good to see those fellows, survivors from a dark and dangerous time in north America's history. They evolved to outrun and outwit dire wolves, the short-faced bear, the North American lion, jaguars, hyenas, and cheetahs, all contemporaries of the lowly pronghorn.

I wonder if we should plan the rest of our RV lives to be a quest to see all of the mammals of North America?  Those thoughts and many other random ones coursed through my brain on the very long drive. We lost an hour, too, when we crossed over the Texas state line. 

The drive mostly looked like this:

Shortly after five o'clock we drove into Caprock Canyon state park. The office was closed, but they had clearly printed instructions on the self-pay station, so I duly filled out the form, dropped it in the box and stuck the white copy on my windshield. Then we unhooked the Jeep and had to dodge a herd of bison on the road to get to the campsites. 

Just as I remembered--this place is gorgeous to the max! I took Molly for a walk down to the prairie dog town and before we even got there, I noticed that two of the heads poking up from the holes weren't prairie dogs at all.
Burrowing owls!

While I was watching, a coyote ambled across the other side of the town.

Thursday day 11
The drive home was boring and served only to (a) get us home, and (b) confirm my notion that I should never take the highway 380 route from Denton again. Too many stoplights! Google maps says it's fifteen minutes faster to go all the way down 35-E to US-121 and back up, and in this case I believe it is correct. But we made it. Home.

Notes:
1. Quit being afraid--go ahead and schedule trips in the mountains. The TALL mountains. The RV can do it (with a little TLC).
2. At a park like Trinidad, with lots of good trails, spend more time moseying around looking for birds. Even if that means leaving the dogs behind. Sorry.