WE ARE HOT! HOT! HOT! / VERNAL, UT TO MONTROSE, CO

9/26
We loved our campground at Vernal. The sites were spacious, the surroundings pretty with a HUGE dog run area, no leashes needed. Nice people, a relaxing ambiance. A place we could have stayed for a few days. However, time to move on to Montrose, CO.

Vernal is a trip in itself.

 Lovely town with wide main street with baskets and planters of flowers everywhere, city pennants and interesting shops. We stopped later at Dinosaur National Monument to have a quick look-see at the quarry, and soon thereafter met a Danish father-son team of motorbikers who have been sponsored by Canon. Their trip is called Cross Americas-- from NYC to Buenos Ares. They have been gone about a month and expect to end their trip sometime in March 2011. They had their bikes shipped across while they flew from Copenhagen. Such interesting people we meet!

     As we drove, we passed by many small state recreational areas with nifty names. Waving Hands, Kokopelli, White Birds. Lunch was at 4-mile Draw, on a rock.

 This was surrounded by interesting rock formations with lots of cavities formed by erosion.

We had a most unique lunch with plenty of food left over to put into the freezer for later! Xian was especially fond of this meal!! We truly left very little behind!

Then we drove over the Douglas Pass.  This is a mountain pass at 8240 feet above sea level, ( 10- count 'em- -switch backs ) with some incredible views, one especially great one that gave us a view of the Grand Valley of the Colorado River, about 25 miles away.

 On this pass we ran into trouble again, as the engine began to overheat once more, and we had to be quite careful. This problem has just begun to occur, and we're looking forward to getting it diagnosed. We took advantage of a pull-out to let the engine cool ( at 8,000 ft.) where our two Danish friends, Chris and Jay, also happened to be stopped to enjoy the view. We took photos, they took photos, we exchanged emails.

They have a website detailing their trip. (alas in Danish!!) Later on, as we were pulled over-- letting the engine cool of course!-- they pulled in for some directions. There we said our final goodbyes and wished them lots of luck, especially in South America!

   When we finally got to the campground we were glad to say the journey had ended for the day!!