Letting the teenager drive

We let the teenager drive twice on this trip.The first time was in the parking lot/campground of a KOA. That went well. The brakes are kind of tricky so I was a little worried. You really have to press them. All the way. 

The second time was on the highway when we left the Cheyenne, Wyoming  rest area. OMG. That was freakin scary. I love her. I think she's a pretty good driver. But no teenager should drive on an 80 MPH freeway with trucks entering and passing 18-wheelers and whatnot. And that was it. That's all the driving she did. I was not emotionally stable enough for any more than that.

Blue Hole, New Mexico

I can't tell you how excited we were when we looked at our route to Lubbock and saw that it took us straight through Santa Rosa. This was one of our favorite stops last summer on our way to Santa Fe. In less than 3 hours from Angel Fire we were all jumping into these icy cold springs and soaking up the sun. I highly recommend this pool. And the only fee is $5 for parking!!  (If you look closely you can see the CWV waiting patiently in the parking lot back there.)

More Angel Fire

In the evening we drove back to the base of the mountain (the sky was full of thunder and lighting otherwise this place is an easy ride from camp) for dinner at the same Tex-Mex place we had lunch. There are only a handful or restaurants in Angel Fire and both pizzas places were closed tonight. Slim pickins. The churro dessert was worth every penny. Make sure you order it with the ice cream. 

Angel Fire, New Mexico

We continued to make our way back to Texas via New Mexico and the Angel Fire bike park we've heard so much about. It was fun, but I've been to funner. The very best part about Angel Fire is that you can camp literally at the base of the ski mountain for just $15 a night. We had the entire campground to ourselves for 2 nights. I wish we had water access because we could have really used showers. The day we got there we went white water rafting in the Arkansas, but somehow that didn't make me feel cleaner.

Sugar Loaf’n Campground, Leadville, Colorado

Our intention was to stay the night in Frisco, but last minute camping on a Friday night in Colorado is damn near impossible. We ended up near Turquoise Lake in Leadville instead. No complaints. This place is gorgeous and they have a laundry room and now we have clean clothes!!

Low clearance

Our roof rack is awesome, but it just barely fits into some garages. We even scraped a tiny bit in this Winter Park garage. Yikes!

Frisco Adventure Park, Colorado

There are at least 4 creepy white vans in this parking lot right now ... also, it's a Friday and we can't get a campsite ANYWHERE in Colorado. Even the dispersed camping is unavailable. What to do ...

Also, I highly recommend this place. It's FREE, there's a Whole Foods Market just down the road, and the dirt is perfect. The skatepark is pretty fun too. Just don't break your bike before you're done riding. Looks like we're gonna have to go all he way back to Austin to get the bolt we need. #EmpireBMX

Twin Lakes, Colorado

We came down the mountain intending to rent canoes or SUPs, but the weather had other ideas. It cleared for a while and we walked the beach and the boys ran into the lake and dunked themselves (crazies!!), but then we headed into town for pizza and shopping.

The Abbey, Leadville, CO

Our view from our bunkhouse in Leadville. We got to park the CWV right in front of our window! It seems like this would've been one of our better nights of sleep, but it was one of my worst. Someone banging on a door in the middle of the night, incessantly. And then teams leaving to climb Mt. Elbert at 4 a.m. They tried to be quiet, but this is a creaky old building. I'm ready to pitch a tent again.

Shower time!

SBF put a rack on this van so we could have hot showers in privacy at the foresty campgrounds. It finally came in handy in Winter Park. I highly recommend the Zodi Instant Hot Shower. I've been using it for years. It even works if you drop the pump into a stream and hook the spout over a tree. The biggest obstacle is if you’re in a remote campground with no access to water. Then it’s hard to sacrifice drinking water for clean armpits. Luckily this campground had water. Our next one did not. Just stay a few steps back from us while we’re chatting.

Winter Park, Colorado

Spent a day riding at Trestle Bike Park and then camping at Idlewild Campground. It's first come first serve and lucky us, there were 3 sites left when we pulled in!! The bike park here is big and the trails are long. I would like to spend more time here and explore some of the other riding, including the river path to town from the campground. I would also like a campsite that wasn’t right next the highway. This view is from from the Winter Park parking lot.

Steamboat Springs, CO

We ended up camping at this little spot in Steamboat Springs for 2 nights. The first night we were exhausted from driving all day. The second night we were wiped out from downhill biking at the Steamboat bike park. A lot of the trails in this park were closed, but this was still one of my favorite places to ride. Nice and smooth!

More fossil hunting, Wyoming

This fossil hunting trip is in a super secret location I’ve been going to my whole life. It took a while to find the exact right spot, but the ants here build huge fossil-filled mounds. The best treasure hunting to date!!