The Pan American Highway-Holy Shit I’m Actually Doing this?

Good morning, everyone. I am officially on the road and left Monday May, 23rd. After a week on the road I’ve decided it will be easiest to post once a week as I’ve found even I don’t know where I am going and most places have iffy reception/no wifi.

Week 1-The fun Begins

Monday-Night of fun and Debauchery

I left Golden, CO around noon after having a final lunch with the family. My goal for the day was to make it to Gunnison, Colorado where I’d be staying the night with an old friend and visiting another, we’ll call them Frank and Leroy. I was excited for the drive as it was a easy half day drive depending on the amount of stops you wanted to make. From Golden I headed south to catch HWY 285 one of the most beautiful highways in Colorado. I stopped just outside Buena Vista for the obligatory mountain photo shoot, before heading to Poncha Springs to catch HWY 50. Pulling into Gunny around 4pm I knew I had some time to kill so I stopped by the visitor center. They were super friendly and recommended Hartman rocks (unfortunately I never made it). Its BLM land with free campsites and pit toilets. There’s tons of hiking and mountain biking trails there. After leaving the visitor center, I walked around the modest downtown before meeting my old friends Frank, and Leroy at High Alpine Brewing Company for some beers and pizza. Our server was amazing and had a lot of fun watching us embarrass ourselves. As for pizza it was amazing while you can’t go wrong with good beer with a better view on an outside porch. The night slowly turned into pure debauchery as the tequila started flowing while Frank and Leroy enjoyed some recreational lettuce. We capped the night off with a run to Love’s gas station sandwich shop.

Tuesday-Disaster Strikes

Tuesday started out with leaving Franks for the much-needed McDonalds breakfast special consisting of a sausage McGriddle, two hashbrowns and an orange juice to help keep the morning tequila scares away. However, before I got sustenance, I received a call from Paddy O’ Flanagan my friend from Boston and who was a great co-worker at Groom. With my gullet full, and days’ worth of conversations done I started heading toward my second stop, Mesa Verde. Upon leaving Gunnison I decided to be “unique” and take HWY 149 through Lake City rather than drive the main highway to Montross then down to Mesa Verde. This turned out to be an amazing choice in hindsight. I can easily say  “I would live in Lake City if I had enough money to buy a lot”. It is truly an undisputed gem of city. There is an amazing historic downtown and you the Rio Grande mountains surrounding it. The town still has its small-town soul that has not been bought up and purged into a glistening playground for Millionaires and Billionaires like so many other Colorado towns. It’s a great example what its like to live in a “normal little mountain town”. The entire drive is filled with picturesque scenery to Pagosa Springs. After getting some nutritional subway I started heading for Durango where smoke was noticeable rising from the mountains. I switched from my jams to the local radio in time to catch the report of a fire that had just started on a mountain just outside of Durango.

I continued to Mancos, CO which has an awesome little downtown and a great State Park (planned camping spot). At the entry to the park is when I decided to check and make sure my laptop was handy in order to start going through the previous day’s photos. After a brief search and with the backpack nowhere in sight I opened my phone to find a dreaded text from Frank asking if I forgot a backpack at his house. The string of curses that followed a follow up text confirming it was my backpack was enough to make the most hardened sailor blush. In order to calm down I continued to look through all my gear to see what else I was missing and lo and behold I had forgotten my pots and pans back in Golden. In order to keep my cool, I called my mother to vent some frustrations concluding with a Hard Rock playlist as I now had to complete another four-to-five-hour drive back to Gunnison to my stupid laptop that I am writing this very post with.

Lo and Behold I never made it back to Gunnison that at midnight like I hoped as the HWY 50 was closed at Blue Mesa leading into Gunnison. Pulling in around midnight to find a semi parked with road closed signs dashed any hopes I had for a comfortable couch to sleep on. The worker road worker manning the gates approached and let me know that the road was closed until 6:30am or do another three-to-four-hour loop around on some smaller county roads. I shot Frank a courteous text to let him know I would be showing up at his house in the morning.

Wednesday-The Shit Piles on

I showed up to Franks house a tired and beaten man grabbed my computer and hit the road as my next destination was the LA Sal mountains just outside of Moab. As it turns out HWY 50 was closed for extensive road work while they put up rockslide protection and is only open for three different time periods per day otherwise known as shift changes and lunch break. So, I decided it would be best to get to my next camp spot in the La Sal’s where I’d be staying for the next couple of days. I took HWY 92 to avoid the chaos of HWY 50 and to get to I-70 quickly. It was a pleasant drive with good scenery.

               Rather than take HWY 191 into Moab I decided it would be best to take HWY 128 and boy is it worth it. It truly is the road less traveled and a much prettier drive into Moab as it takes you along the Mesas before dropping into the Colorado River Valley. After failing to drive up one of the many dirt roads for a grand overlook into the valley I turned tail and headed for Moab in search of water and gas. While filling up I consulted the Ioverlander app to see where I might find some water. Unfortunately, I was too scared to ask the gas station employees at the Maverick station if I could fill up one of my water jugs there. So, like any sane person I figured I would get water in La Sal a town of a couple hundred. Thankfully when I stopped at the tiny general store to get some last-minute supplies I asked if I could fill up a water jug. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t be able to get any water at the general store as there was no water spickets. Luckily though the gentleman working as the cashier mentioned that he owned a RV park not far away and said I could fill up my jug there. After making sure I would have water for my stay I proceeded into the La Sal’s.

               It was beautiful driving into the La Sal’s punctuated by having to Drive through a two-foot-deep creek. Luckily, I found an amazing camp spot just off the road that had one to two bars of service depending on where you parked. I spent a couple hours setting up camp and lounging about. Not creating a game plan for the inevitable. Unfortunately, after an afternoon of exploring I could not locate the pit toilet that was rumored to be near a lake in La Sal pass road. With time running out I was forced to grab my shovel and head into the nearby Aspen grove… Once nature relieved itself, I walked back to camp to start a fire and dinner which turned out to be a pack of Raman for dinner.

Thursday-O Deer time to meet the Neighbors

After sleeping in on Thursday morning -haha, it’s not like I have a 9 to 5 these days, ehem suckers. – It was nice to have a lazy morning of just hanging out in camp and having a heart healthy bowl of honey bunches of oats. It was shaping up to be a five-star day. It’s rather hard describe the beauty of being in a half bowl with snowcapped mountains to the east and north furnished with a dazzling carpet of green running up to the tree line, while to the east you can see a couple hundred of miles of rolling hills giving way to jagged canyons before starting to give rise to a haze filled view of the Uncompahgre Mountains. All this is glory is situated under the canopy of pure white wispy clouds racing along under the light blue sky above.

               So as I am enjoying the views mentioned above a female doe comes trotting up through a clearing in the trees and decides that my truck and camp spot are the bees knees and decides to park herself under a lone tree for a shaded rest. Being calm and collected and telegraphing that I mean no harm I slowly made my way to my truck to gather my camera and lenses to snap some photos. She turned out to be a regular Marylin Monroe and was quite photo genic before getting tired of my shit and decided to dig a little in the mud to try and find -water or food- I’m not sure.

               With my daily dose of excitement completed I decided to do dishes (guess dishes and laundry are just a fact of life you can’t avoid them-what a scam right) and clean up. While cleaning the dreaded rumbling of the gut ensued forcing a decision to be made. Either drive about an hour and cross the Colorado-Utah state line to a lovely little lake with pit toilets or grab a shovel. We’ll say I made the decision drive down to the lake for uh photo opportunities yeah photo opportunities. I can say it was a marvelous campground along the lake with a good view of the La Sal’s and of a not often seen boarder crossing. I also discovered an off-road trail called the Rimrocker which seemed fun but maybe a little to intense for my taste at this time in the journey. The day finished with a disappointingly average sunset.

Friday-Stupid, Stupid, Stupid-Heads up long post filled with stupidity

Welp I can say Friday was eventful to say the least the goal was a little Friday hike and then drive to a rest stop outside of Ogden/Salt Lake City. Again, I started out by sleeping in-becoming a habit-due to staying up late, which is not what you want to do when planning on hiking a mountain. I was still full of piss and vinegar and decided my goal was going to be mount Peale. What a shit show that turned into. I cleaned up my campsite and made sure the fire “dead out” before loading everything up. I was pleasantly surprised when I found someone had cut the tree which had fallen and was laying over the road which would have forced me to take the bike off the roof.

               Going up a quite rough and bumpy forest service road I made it to the trailhead. Starting the hike, the weather was beautiful with barely any wind. Knowing that a storm was going to be rolling in on Saturday I was committed to making it up quickly to avoid strong winds and get some great shots. Oh, how I was mistaken, as it turns out the beautiful easy to follow trail started to head into an avalanche shoot where one of every five trees was knocked over not only obscuring the trail but also allowing snowbanks to remain. Some of the banks were about three feet deep which I can confirm by having my leg disappear into some jagged ice-snow. After being forced off trail, while bushwhacking my way out of the shoot I finally found what appeared to the reemergence of the wonderful trail. To my dismay the trail only lasted about a hundred yards before giving way to a massive scree field. Now not yet discouraged I checked the Alltrails app to confirm how far I had made it. To my surprise while looking at the winding route which make a swerving drunk walk look tame, I discovered I had only made it about a third of the way to the summit. Now knowing I only had about a mile left till I reached the summit I decided to press on. However, after another tenth of a mile of repeatedly getting lost, and zagging when is should of zigged in a massive scree field while trying to follow the cairns and avoiding the trail which was buried under a massive amount of snow in the avalanche shoot, the wind started to pick up. Being relatively stupid and knowing that I was inching ever closer to my goal I decided to continue onward. That is until the wind gusts started hitting 30 to 40mph.

              Now 30 to 40mph winds might not seem too bad, so let me put it into perspective for ya. I am in no way shape or form in my prime hiking shape, you could even call me a pudgy man, and on top of that I am wearing my brand-new hiking boots (never broken in) as well as my camera backpack which is a giant square of a thing that when gets hit by a 50mph gust of wind turns into a parasail. Alright now picture your out of shape in your spiffy new hiking boots with a parasail of backpack, on a very unstable scree field in which the slightest misstep you’ll find yourself rolling down a steep rock covered mountain slope with the nearest hospital at least an hour and a half ride away. So yeah, I chickened out and turned tail after getting some photos-mom would be proud I made a decent decision. The hike down was no less fun as I continued swerving my way around and over scree fields and fallen trees. When I made it back to my truck, I drank some refreshing water and decided it was time to hit the road.

              Since it was still relatively nice out starting to get into the late afternoon, I decided it would be cool to take the La Sal Pass Road out and then get onto the highway and into Moab. So, I started heading up the road where to my surprise I found a rumored pit toilet at medicine lake with some camp spots accompanied by a beautiful view of South Mountain. Frustrated I decided, to take some photos then continue down the road. To be fair there was ample warning about what I was getting myself into, as there was a bright yellow sign stating that the road was not maintained and only high clearance 4×4 should continue forward. Like the amazing person I am I figured it couldn’t be that bad, so I committed to the four-to-five-mile slog in my mind. Another warning bell should have been that not even five minutes into my decent, four supped up jeeps with extreme suspensions came racing up the road. Not thinking twice, I continued down being forced to drive on one of the roughest roads I’ve ever driven on.

              The road consisted of driving through two-to-three-foot-tall snowbanks and going through mini gullies where the Tacoma’s built-in pitch and roll indicators where close to maxing out. After making it around some hair pin turns it was into the heavily forested area where I could hear the trees smacking into my bike strapped to the roof. However, the road soon climaxed at a sharp corner going through a one- to two-foot-deep creek and roughly seven feet wide leading straight into a scree field. Cursing the very decision to try and drive this route I forged on to the unsettling sound of rocks shifting and scraping along the skid plates. Naturally I stopped in the middle of the scree field for some photos as the views were worth it. Slowly losing my grip of the steering wheel as I passed through the field, I made it to yet another hair pin turn which is where my adventure would stop. Rounding the corner there was a couple of small boulders just beginning to show their size being washed clean by years of rain which also created a miniature valley on the approach. So, like any sane person I slowly approached and got stuck. See as that failed, I decided I was committed as the only way to turn around was the hairpin turn, I put the truck in 4-wheel drive and gunned it. Now being stuck with the front right and back left off the ground most people would probably think about a better way to get over the “bump” in the road. I decided not to head any conventional wisdom and threw my truck in reverse to get some space for a running start (bad plan). Now with roughly six feet to spare I gunned it again and almost made it up and over but ultimately wound up in the same position.

              Now seeing that the sun was quickly setting, I hopped out to take stock of the situation and confirm that I didn’t break anything after some nasty sounding noises from underneath the truck. Already fluster by my poor decision-making abilities when I looked under the truck, I could see fluid leaking from the somewhere along the skid plat. Now in a panic to avoid being that guy who gets stuck, ridiculed, and spend a small fortune to somehow get his truck pulled into town from the middle of nowhere I threw it into reverse and proceeded to ignore the bushes scraping the driver’s side as I backed up to the hairpin turn. Knowing that I would never make it back out in two wheel drive I turned around as quickly as possible and made the drive back up to medicine lake. Once I made it to a paved road I parked and climbed under to discover that the fluid was just leakage from some frozen AC lines… Feeling like an idiot I drove straight through Moab and to Salt Lake City to celebrate with a midnight run to In-n-Out, before going to a rest stop for the night. To add insult to injury the rest stop was the most disgusting bathroom I had or have set foot in. The stalls where out of toilet paper with junks arrayed on the floor under the stall divider next to a pair of boxers that had a clean and very present mud streak running along the inside. Crawling into my truck a defeated man I slept the night away.

Saturday-Waterfalls, Lakes, Mountains, and a Hurricane Forced Wind-Part 1

Friday, Friday, Friday, oh boy what a day. Friday started with a train rolling forcing an end to what little sleep I would be getting.  Deciding not to enter the rest stop restroom or shall we say den of disease I decided it would be better to find a bathroom somewhere down the road. For breakfast I had decided on a breakfast burrito so after pulling out google maps and a quick ten-minute search I found my quarry at Jake’s Brookside. Firing up the truck I set off, thinking about the deliciousness to follow as I hurried down the road.

Much to my concerns Jake’s Brooskide turned out to be a gas station with a tiny kitchen in the corner. Now let me tell you when you mix laziness with stupidity sometimes you get amazing results and sometimes horrifying results. As I sauntered to kitchen area, there was a heat lamp with triangle hashbrowns, burritos, and a bacon bagel sandwich. As I was still quite hungry and thinking I could have leftovers for lunch I got the sandwich, a bacon burrito, and hashbrowns for about $15 dollars. A bit weary I retreated to my truck to eat since there was no seating options. The bagel sandwich tasted about two hours old while being stale at the same time, so to make it a little more edible I put a hashbrown triangle on it. Now as a potato connoisseur, I can say I was horrified when I took a bite. The hashbrowns tasted about three hours old and had an electric taste to them due to and turning into rocks under the glow of the heat lamp. Being hungry and knowing I spent my hard-earned cash on the meal I decided to gut it through the bagel and one hashbrown. Next, I turned my attention to the breakfast burrito that got me into this situation. Placing a piece of the second hashbrown on the burrito I took a bite. Its tough to describe the slimy (inside), rubbery (tortilla), weekday old (best taste comparison), burrito that made me question how all my life decisions brought me to this point. I finished the other hashbrown and tossed the burrito as I would only eat it if it was the only option available after being lost on a mountain for a week. Deciding to get out of there I started heading for Park City.

After driving for roughly another hour I made it to Highway 189 that takes you from Provo to Park City. It is a spectacular drive with the steep canyon walls, waterfalls around almost every turn. Issues began as I was about a quarter of the way up the canyon where I had stopped to get some photos of the truck in front of a waterfall. The dreaded sound of a low gurgling, slowing growing until reaching creating a perfect cacophony of noises that signaled a bathroom was needed and quick. As I scurried around to put my camera gear away, I hopped in my truck and made a beeline to Vivian Park. Luckily the park was quite empty as I pulled in and to my joy there was an ample amount of pit toilets and a fancy toilet in the center of the park. I hustled over to the nice-looking restroom thinking it would have flush toilets. The toilets turned out to be a very fancy pit toilet system. Unfortunately, the toilets had a major a design flaw, when someone opened the bathroom door a gust of hurricane forced wind where you don’t want it. While on the can two people entered making a bad breakfast decision even worse. When I was finally done and safe from the winds I called my cousin from Fort Collins to ask him “what are they into Fort Collins”.

               To forget the trauma, I had just experienced I decided it would be best to continue up the canyon where I was met with one of the most stunning views to date at the Deer Creek Reservoir. The reservoir is perfectly situated to the east of the Mt Timpanogos Wilderness. The vista is a true sight and highly recommended. The nice lady at the state park let me pull in to get some quick photos. See picture below.

Saturday-Waterfalls, Lakes, Mountains, and a Hurricane Forced Wind-Part 2

Leaving Deer Creek Reservoir, I headed into Heber City to see if they might have a camera shop so I can get a new longer distance lenses for wildlife and mountains. In Heber I decided it was time to get more toilet paper as I was almost out and pick up other supplies and restock my food. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any camera store or store that had lenses. Knowing I couldn’t stay long and needed to hit the road I started to head north to Bear Lake. Heber city had a quaint downtown that would have been awesome to explore but time didn’t allow for it. Driving up to bear lake led me to I-80 for a very brief stint of interstate driving and a quick hello and goodbye to Evanston, Wyoming another cool little town to spend a half or full day in. The drive Evanston to Bear Lake was amazing as well. Everything was a vivid green behind the dull grey of mist that on a sunny day would culminate with coming over a hill and being met with a cerulean blue lake stretching for miles.

               Pulling into where I had initially planned on camping curtesy of Ioverlander. Unfortunately, when I pulled into Bear Lake State Park in Utah the rate had been raised to 35 dollars. Since it was still midafternoon, I made the decision that I would keep going along the o’l dusty trail and camp at outside of Lava Hot Springs and take a soak since I had been driving in rain/camping in cold weather for a couple days. So, performing a quick turnaround in the State Parks parking lot I headed along the lake. There where a couple cool towns such as Garden City and Montpelier which warrant some time spent (a day between the two). But alas I needed to keep pushing forward. Where I realized I have no concept of time is when I pulled into Lava Hot Springs and realized that all the campgrounds and town was overflowing with people due to it being Memorial Day weekend. So, like any sane person I decided to keep heading toward Craters of the Moon National Park. Checking the weather and knowing a I was facing a cold night I hustled down the toward Craters of the Moon. The sunset was spectacular and the best one to date, which I’ll blame for making for it was Memorial Day weekend. Arriving at Craters of the Moon I realized all the campgrounds were full. Realizing my blunder, I was forced to turn around at Crater and drive 45 minutes back to a rest stop for the night. By the time I arrived it was around midnight and not bothering to pull out the solar panels in a 38-degree rainstorm I hunkered in the driver’s seat for a cold night.

Sunday-Bone Chilling Rain

Sunday started off by passing Craters of the Moon and heading to a free BLM campground at Silver Creek just outside of Carey Idaho. I scrapped the original plan of entering and walking around Craters of the Moon due to sure bone chilling rain that was lazily misting throughout the area. By the time I arrived at the campsite it was roughly 37 degrees with a heavy mist which would give way to heavy bouts of rain being blown sideways by gusts of 30mph winds. I decided it was time to start editing some of the photos from Saturday. Huddled in the driver’s seat with laptop in hand I got to work.

After a bit of editing and general tomfoolery, I noticed that my Goal Zero battery was about dead and needed a charge along with a rumbling in my tummy to let me know food was needed. Now you see, this is where I uncovered a fatal flaw of the pull-out drawer kitchen system. I would have to pull out the drawer with the kitchen to cook some canned Progresso chicken noodle soup. A perfect meal for a terribly cold rainy day or so I thought. After putting on a pullover followed by a sweatshirt, I decided it was time to brave the cold. Pretending to be practicing for a pit crew I hopped out of the cab rushing to pull the kitchen drawer out. I finished connecting the propane to the stove just as I lost all feeling in my fingers, quickly starting the flow of propane, and lighting the grill I poured the soup in the pot. The wind had turned flame wild blowing every direction and even threating to go out I put my hands close by for a bit of warmth so I could get my solar panels set up. As soon as pulled the panels from the storage bag it was ripped away blown around the campsite like and escaped dog running after the neighbors. Using my truck as a wind barrier I finished setting them up and retrieved the case from where it was stuck on some nearby sagebrush.

Trudging back to the truck I checked the soup, which was only lukewarm warm by this point, however being as cold as I was, I called it good poured it into an ice-cold bowl and retreated to the cap to turn on the heater and eat. Once I finished my meal, I cleaned my dishes and then scurried to the bed of the truck and settled in for the night.