Travels With David, pt. I

June 13, 2001: Taos, NM - Steamboat Springs, CO

At 21, my son David is a reasonably experienced world traveler: he's been to Argentina and Australia, has visited Rome and Hong Kong, and has explored many of the major cities in the U.S. But most of what he has seen of the western United States has been from an altitude of 35,000 feet; so we agreed to spent 10 days at the end of his school year driving from Taos to Vancouver, from Vancouver down the West Coast to LaLaLand, and then back across the Arizona desert to Taos again. I've driven different sections of this route, in different directions, on numerous occasions over the past 30 years, and I'm always happy to do it again ...

On driving trips like this, my tendency is to start at dawn (see the "Leaving Montana" entry in this road-warrior section of the site for an example), but the twenty-something generation has an entirely different metabolism ... so we started at 12:30 PM. Toni's yellow Beetle (officially named "Daisy," but known to us no-nonsense men as "the car" for the duration of this trip) was loaded up with a minimal supply of clothes and a substantial quantity of junk food, and off we went -- driving west on US highway 64 from Taos, across the Rio Grande Gorge bridge, through Tres Piedras, and then north on highway 285 into Colorado. It was a blustery, overcast day, with clouds that got progressively thicker and darker as we proceeded along; but the hills and mesas and meadows were a lush, pale green as far as the eye could see. It's been a wet winter, and a late spring; and the plant life is obviously soaking it all up and growing like crazy. The rivers are all full-to-overflowing, and the various rafting companies are doing a land-office business.

There's an old train line that ran from Santa Fe up to Alamosa, Colorado in the late 19th century, and vestiges of it still remain; the Embudo Station (about 20 miles north of Espanola) is now a pleasant riverside restaurant, and the Antonito, Colorado train station is now the headquarters of the Cumbres and Toltec Scenic Railway, which operates a narrow-gauge railroad tour for tourists who have nothing better to do in this isolated corner of south-central Colorado. We didn't even slow down for it, but I did find myself paying a little more attention to the train tracks further along, as they marked a straight line, accentuated by nearby telephone poles, that stretch north as far as the eye could see.

At Alamosa, David took over the driving chores -- which includes calling attention to landmarks, scenic views, and roadside oddities that the other passenger might have overlooked for one reason or another. Thus, it was David who noticed, and called attention to, a roadside attraction identified as "the great Colorado alligator farm." Half a dozen Quonset huts on the right side of the road were apparently outfitted with whatever it is that an alligator needs in order to survive the high altitude (approximately 8,000 feet at this point) and brutal winters of Colorado. I suppose you know that you're really on a sight-seeing trip when you actually stop to check out places like this; but we were hoping to make it all the way to the northern border between Colorado and Wyoming by the end of the day, so we didn't even slow down (but some Colorado Springs residents named Scott and Rosemary apparently did, at some point in 1999; see their report on the place). Nor did we stop earlier, when I was at the wheel, when we passed the sign beckoning us to visit the Jack Dempsey Museum in Manassa, just a few brief miles off to the east of Romeo. Could it be true that Dempsey was born and raised in this part of the country? Is that why he grew up a fighter? We'll never know ...

One of the things today's parents know about taking teenagers or twenty-somethings on a long car trip is that music is a large part of the experience. If it's a short trip, they might be content to listen to whatever is on the radio ... assuming they know which station they'll be able to pick up on the car radio. But when driving thousands of miles, especially through rural areas where you're more likely to get farm reports and gospel music than anything else, the radio is generally ignored. Instead, the tape cassette player and/or CD player becomes a crucial instrument, and preparing one's music for such a trip is a ritual roughly akin to planning the invasion of Normandy. As it turns out, two cases full of CD's were stolen out of my suitcase on the plane flight to Chicago, where I met David for the beginning of the trip; there were a few musical selections from Joan Baez and Dire Straits in the cases, but what really annoyed me was the two or three dozen computer CD's that represented backup copies of the various programs I use on my beloved Macintosh. That warranted a small shrug from David; unaffected by my tragedy, he informed me that he had brought a collection of 48 CD's, which he hoped would be sufficient to suit both my tastes and his. He had obviously thought about it a lot; the first selection, as we pulled out of Taos, was "Horse With No Name," from America. If you know the music and lyrics, you'll have to agree that it's fitting for a trip through the Southwest. In any case, a sequence of generally pleasant and entertaining music -- Chet Baker, and the Beach Boys, and various bands I've never heard of -- accompanied us as we drove up through New Mexico, into Colorado, and on toward the Rockies.

Actually, the Rockies were visible all along. One section of the Rockies -- the Sangre de Cristo mountains -- forms the eastern backdrop of Taos, and stretches all the way down to Albuquerque. But as we reached Alamosa and continued on north, a separate range of craggy peaks formed a silhouette along our eastern side. I don't know if the whole range has a name, but it includes Kit Carson Mountain (14,165 feet), Challenger Peak (14,080 feet) and Humboldt Peak (14,064 feet). Verdant pastures and meadows stretched for miles alongside the mountain range, most of it occupied by ranches; the first crop of hay had already been cut and baled in some of the meadows, and it was so green and luxuriant that I was tempted to eat it myself. But it's obviously intended as winter feed for the herds of cattle were occasionally visible in the distance, appearing as tiny black specks in the midst of the green.

The road began to climb north of Alamosa, reaching an altitude of 9,012 feet at Poncha Pass. The clouds grew thicker and darker, and began to drop down closer and closer to our own level; meanwhile, the temperature had dropped to a brisk 46 degrees. But the scenery was gorgeous: stands of delicate aspen and birch trees were visible on the sides of the hills, their leaves still a pale green. Shortly after Poncha Pass, we came into the little crossing known as Poncha Springs, where Highway 50 will take you west to Gunnison, or east to Canon City. We stopped for a few minutes in Poncha Springs to load up on more junk food and switch driving chores; after watching a few of the local inhabitants for a few minutes, I concluded that there must have been a lot of inbreeding and incest during the past several generations, and we decided that it was time to get back in the car and head north on US 285, aiming for Leadville and Vail and Steamboat Springs beyond that.

Somewhere around Johnson Village, the temperature began dropping rapidly, and the light rain became heavier and thicker ... until it turned into snow. Real snow, which not only had to be batted away with our windshield wipers, but which stuck to the trees and the ground all around us. By the time we got to Granite, the temperature was down to 32 degrees, and it remained there until we reached Interstate 70 near Vail. Snow on the high mountain passes isn't all that unusual, even in June, and we were at a pretty high altitude; on our left was Mt. Shavano (14,229 feet), Mt. Antero (14,269 feet, Mt. Princeton (14,197 feet), Mt. Yale (14,196 feet), Mt. Harvard (14,420 feet), and Mt. MIT (31,415.926535 feet). Just kidding about the MIT part, but the other Ivy League mountains really do exist there. Anyway, David was amazed by the sight; and finally, a few miles past Leadville, we couldn't resist the urge to get out and throw a snowball or two. Daisy was reasonably cooperative throughout this small diversion, and her yellow color was quite a contrast against the pure white of the snow.

The scenery all through this area was breathtakingly beautiful, especially up near Red Cliff and Minturn. But unless you're Ansel Adams with plenty of time to spare, it turns out to be almost impossible to capture the vistas and the grandeur of the peaks and the ravines and the deep gorges with a simple photograph. If you ever find yourself in Denver with a day to spare, I recommend renting a car and driving a "circle route" that encompasses the stretch of highway 24 from Minturn (which intersects Interstate 70 some 50-100 miles west of Denver) down to Johnson Village. You may not see snow in June, but you'll certainly see some scenery that will stay in your memory for a long, long time.

Once we got to the intersection of Highway 24 and Interstate 70, we cruised west about 15 miles on the Interstate, and then picked up another smaller highway to the north: highway 131, which leads north to Steamboat Springs. Another gorgeous drive, more stunningly beautiful vistas of meadows and peaks, mesas and peaceful ranches. I suspect that most of the auto traffic, these days, stays on the Interstate pathway leading from Denver to Salt Lake City -- and that's fine with me. One of the nice things about the smaller highways is that there's very little traffic. Curiously, though, there's also very little sign of active human life: no pedestrians, no children riding their bikes, no retired folks sitting on their porches watching the occasional car go by. I guess they're all inside, watching the latest re-runs of the Survivor show, or whatever passes for entertainment these days.

Anyway, we reached Steamboat Springs about 7:30 PM, after some 7 hours and 340 miles of steady driving. Checked into a big fancy Sheraton hotel, wolfed down an excellent meal served by a cheerful young waitress so vacant and brainless we could hear the mountain wind whistling through her ears. Up to our rooms, where David retired with his guitar to watch the Lakers demolish Philadelphia in the NBA finals ... while I logged in to pick up my email, compose this brief note, upload it to my web site, and then collapse into bed.

Tomorrow, we'll be heading west to Craig, then north into Wyoming, up through Yellowstone Park, and perhaps into Montana by the end of the day. And David agrees that, yes, it might be a good idea to start a little earlier. Not dawn, nothing crazy ... maybe 10:00 in the morning. We'll see; but it really doesn't matter. Whenever we get started, it promises to be another day of beautiful scenery and pleasant music and quiet companionship. These days, fathers and sons often don't get enough of that.

Continue with pt. II of this series ...