Captain’s Log – Star Dates 08262009 through 08282009
Location: Cruising the Galaxies of Colorado and New Mexico
(Translation: Golden Clear Creek RV Park, Golden, Colorado; Las Vegas KOA, Las Vegas, New Mexico)
Trip Miles: 8,525.0
Diesel Price: $2.67 per gallon; 31.7 gallons loaded at Las Vegas, NM
Report from Engineering: Star Ship Wolverine was making a hell of a racket coming down the I-25! This necessitated a visit to Enchantment Ford in Las Vegas; cracked discovered in exhaust tailpipe; tailpipe weld repair job cost fifty-five bucks. Now, we are cool! Go for the long run home!
Weather: Sunny in a.m. and early p.m.; Temperature at 85F; Severe thunderstorm rains and gusty winds in late afternoon forced emergency berthing at Las Vegas KOA.

Driving to Denver, Colorado, from Cheyenne, Wyoming, was a SHOCK to us! Whereas Cheyenne is a laid-back country town of 55,000, Greater Denver is a megalopolis full of fast-paced young-ish drivers all talking into cell phones! Denver overflows with good-looking people who are into fitness. These are folks on the MOVE…”Let’s Make It HAPPEN!” This was not a pleasant galactic entry and the space pilot got a bit frazzled!

Golden is a cozy New-Age city that is totally dominated by the enormous Coors Brewery. We camped overnight at a pleasant creek-side RV park operated by the City of Golden. The evening of Star Date 08262009 was spent visiting Barbara’s niece Christine, an energetic dentist who recently opened her own Cosmetic and Family Practice Dentistry office. Her high-tech office was gorgeous and so was the house that she and her orthodontist husband Kevin have built in the foothills of the Rockies! We spent a relaxing evening dining with Christine, her two young sons and her two rescued dogs. We were sorry to miss Kevin who was touring New York City with his mother.

At this posting, we greet you from Las Vegas! Friends, Las Vegas, NM, is a HISTORIC (Hah!) town of 16,000 or so and is considerably OLDER than Sin City. Back in the days of the Santa Fe Trail in the early 1800’s, it was an important, thriving trade center. As mentioned in the Captain’s Weather Report, Las Vegas was not yesterday’s intended destination. We had hoped to make Santa Fe before sundown.

Last night I must report that we were feeling sorry for ourselves. We had yet another equipment problem which caused an unplanned layover and loss of a day of travel. Had we not experienced that equipment problem and had we not been required to spend an extra day in Las Vegas, we’d have missed Fort Union National Monument.

Fort Union was an important military supply and defense base on the Santa Fe Trail from 1851 to 1891. The value of the fort passed with the coming of the railroads. Its ruins remain on a remote windswept plain twenty-five miles north of Las Vegas, NM. We toured this silent memorial for two hours, allowing its rich history to speak to us. We had a glimpse of a time when the only way to travel between Missouri and Santa Fe, New Mexico, was by animal-drawn wagon along a 900-mile rutted dirt track. We had a view into the harshness and dreams of camp life here, especially for the wives. Somehow fittingly, the U.S. flag at the park visitor center flew at half-mast today, in remembrance of the passing of Sen. Ted Kennedy.

We are now on the Long Run Home and have a thousand miles to go before our arrival. We’ll be travelling at Warp Speed…God willing… and will post our next, and last, entry at the conclusion of our journey…

Until then, stay well!

Affectionately,
Captain Baldy