10-04-08 Saturday (Child Population Control)

Our last full day here in Ouray. I must start by telling you that Jim made muffins last night. He didn't use the muffin pan but used paper muffin cups. This has worked for him in the past but only with the cups that say "No muffin pan needed" right on the package. Here's how they came out.

Square.... it's the new round.

Jim had planned out the day. I'm so happy he does this, it certainly helps with knowing what the hell we're gonna do. It also cuts down on missing sights. Our first stop was to the Ouray Museum. This historic miner's hospital opened to serve miners and their families in the Ouray area in 1887 under the direction of the Sisters of Mercy. The museum is now owned and operated by the Ouray County Historical Society. The museum currently boasts 32 exhibits featuring Native American, Minerals and Mining, Transportation and Railroad, Ranching, Hospital and Medical, Civic and School Memorabilia, Firearms, Victorian and Gold Belt Theater. Unfortunately they were closing early today for some sort of event so an hour seemed too short to read all of the exhibits. The museum as a whole was quite impressive.







We toured around the neighborhoods behind the downtown area. I saw a sign/scenario I thought amusing. I title this "Playground Dangers". Notice the swing set in the foreground and the danger sign in the background. Gotta love it.

I'm thinking of opening an alligator petting zoo for children, located next to an explosives manufacturing plant. Any other suggestions?


After the downtown drive, a quick stop home for some lunch and then off to another trail. Because of yesterdays VERY long trail, I made several jokes toward Jim about it. Before leaving for the trail today, I said things like, "Dasher, be a good boy, we'll see you tomorrow." Or I asked Jim if we should pack a change of clothes. This trail was called "Last Dollar Road" and was a class 1 (Easy) trail. It actually was difficult in some areas due to large rocks and washed out roads. This trail was in the San Juan region and led from Ouray to Telluride. Once in Telluride, we took a gondola up the mountain to a ski city called "Mountain Village". Most everything was closed until ski season but it was neat to ride the free gondola up and down. The area is accessible by car so we're not quite sure why it's made to appear as though it's so secluded. Maybe skiers like to park below, ride to the top and ski down? I guess it's pretty hard to ski up hill. There were 2 sets of gondolas. One was open aired ski type that was closed and the ones we were in were trams. There were a lot of bikes parked at the bottom so maybe it's the easiest thing for them?


After the gondola ride to and fro, we stopped off at a place called "The Sweet Life" which was a burger, soda shop slash candy store. There we had some chicken tenders AND get this, fried Oreos. I had been wanting to try some cookie or cake deep fried. This was pretty good. Battered and then drizzled with chocolate syrup and topped with some powered sugar. Overload. This place had various newspaper reviews and even a Rachel Ray review framed up. It's too bad the 2 young girls manning the place could bring it down. We walked in and found melted chocolate on the floor near the door. In the middle of ordering, 1 girl noticed a previous customer's children (see above for solution to unruly children) had spilled gummy worms onto the floor from a self help bin and she almost through a fit. Girl 1 had to point out the mess to girl 2. Girl 2 resumed taking our payment. As we ate our food, girl 1 and 2 took turns text messaging. Girl 1 stopped for a few minutes to draw a design on her hand with a Sharpie. Jim and I watched as neither one ever grabbed a mop or a broom. Sad.

The slideshow below is a combination of today's 2 trips. You can pause them to read the captions or study the photos.

There's been some pros and cons to being here this time of year. A lot of things are closed for the winter, and we don't get to see the wildflowers all over the place. I wouldn't change the time of year we've come though. The leaves are pretty, we've driven through snow flurries and tourist traps are empty.

Tomorrow a "winter storm" is moving in. We encountered some flurries today here and there. Our next destination is Farmington, New Mexico.

Oh, before I forget, I stumbled on this webpage about someone's RV MISadventures. It's pretty funny. Right click here and open a new window cause I'm not done with you yet.

Lastly, here's a short video of a view we stopped and drooled over.