Day 4 ... Across the Rockies

So, we got rained on last night ... it started at around 4:00 am and it really poured down for about 20 minutes. The good news was that our preparations kept us completely dry!!! The bad news, was that there was still a light misty rain when we got up in the morning and we had to load the car in those conditions, but all things considered, it could have been worse.

Rather than trying to get breakfast together in the rain, we decided to stop at a diner this morning. After that, we headed further West towards Colorado. Shortly after we left North Platte, the rain ended and we had very nice weather the rest of the day.

We took I-76 from Nebraska South-West to Denver. Once we reached Denver, we got on I-70 West and passed many of Colorado's most well known ski areas including Vail, Beaver Creek, Copper Mountain and many others. It was really painful to drive by these places at the wrong time of year.

We stopped a couple of times along the way to see some things that caught our interest, including the Glenwood Canyon Recreation Area. This was a really beautiful place with whitewater rafting that looked totally awesome. Too bad we couldn't fit a little of that in on this trip ... maybe another time.

We finally reached Black Canyon of the Gunnison River National Park late in the afternoon and went to the campground to check out our site. To be perfectly honest, I wasn't thrilled. It was in a very remote area with no shade, and it was really hot. Since we need to stay here for two nights, I made the decision to find an alternate campground in the town of Montrose, CO, which is about 11 miles from the park. Sitting here now, I can say that I'm glad I made the change.

We got settled in, set up camp and ate dinner, after which we played some chess and mancala. The bugs aren't too bad here, as compared with the previous three nights, and it's a very nice, cool night. We're getting ready to turn in for the night now.

Tomorrow is the first day we get to enjoy ourselves without having to spend the whole day in the car. We're planning to head to the canyon, do some hiking, a little scenic driving and maybe some biking. After that, we'll head back to our campground and relax. It will also be nice not to have to "break camp" in the morning, and set up again in the evening. Given our relaxed schedule for tomorrow, I promised Josh that we'll make chocolate chip waffles for breakfast tomorrow. He's really looking forward to it!