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Published: September 24th 2012
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We crossed the border into Colorado and on our atlas we saw "The World's Wonder View Tower". Curious, we stopped, and came upon a not so impressive tower with fake manikins at the top surrounded by a low ceilinged building. We took a few photos, then a older gentleman came out of the door saying, "Come on in, $1 to view 29 rooms filled with wonders and antiques, and if you can guess the uses of 10 antiques you get your dollar back!" Ok, we could part with a $1 to wander around and check out the view. We were taken aback once we entered the building. It was jam packed with millions of antiques, furniture, horseshoes, tools, bottles, mammoth tusks, indian arrowheads, dinasour fossils, instruments, literally everything that you could think of. There was even not only 1, but 2 separate taxidermied 2 headed calves and well as some jars of albino ratttlesnakes and 8 legged pig fetuses. It was crazy! We slowly wandered through and as we did every couple minutes or so the guide would come up to us with a different little contraption in his hand asking "Can you guess what this is?" We looked a moment
2 headed calf
World Wonder View Tower, Colorado as he talked through saying "oh, this is a hard one..." or "You should be able to get this one...no? Ok, I'll tell you what it is!" I think Charles guessed one or two out of the 15 or so he showed us including rooster sunglasses, an indian nutcracker, rooster castration kit and a walrus part...(the part as he explained the mommas don't have). We wandered up the rickety stairs in the tower to view as it advertised "6 states"...not sure how accurate that was, but it was a nice view of the rural landscape, then headed back to the exit. When we came back to the door the guide said..."Only 1/2 way done, come this way, there are 11 more rooms!" This side used to be an old cafe when it had originally opened as a tourist attraction in the early 1900's. It was jam packed with more antiques and an original stage for live music, which was sloped back towards the wall. The guide explaned the slope was in case the musicians got too drunk so they wouldn't fall on the audience! Overall it was well worth the $1 and definitely the most memorable museum visit we had!
We made it to Denver for an evening and night and the next morning headed for the rockies.
We enjoyed the beautiful scenery at a few stops then found a little town on a river where Charles stocked up with a few fishing supplies. We found a great little campsite right next to the river where he was able to spend a few hours fishing. No luck that night, but the next day he caught us a great little trout for supper after reading some techniques for fly-fishing without fly-fishing equipment!
We spent a couple days in Colorado enjoying the beautiful mountains and rivers and then headed on to Utah.
Our first stop in Utah was at a burger joint in Moab, on our way to Arches National Park. Now I haven't spent too much talking about traveling with the dogs, but surprisingly enough they were so good on the trip. They sat contently in the back until our stops, ran around when they could and hopped right back in to the camper when we said "Load up!". We had, however, had some food difficulties. CeeCee is usually on a raw meat diet at home, but for
our road trip we put her on kibbles to facilitate feeding on the road. We put all the dogs on a high protein kibble, but CeeCee had been super itchy and scratching all night, so we switched her to a high quality duck meat food. That seemed to work for awhile, but the tiny $30 bag didn't last long and we tried something a bit cheaper from the grocery store. This, unfortunately resulted in hourly episodes of diarrhea. She was good to warn us while we were driving with a whine, and we quickly pulled over wherever we were to let her out and relieve herself. We however did stop and get out for burgers. After a pleasant lunch, Charles went across the street to a thrift store, and since I hadn't finished my milkshake I was actually kicked out by the retail worker for having a drink. I went to sit back in the camper feeling dejected and grumbling about not wanting any of her trashy used clothing anyway😉 I opened the door and sat in my seat...on something disturbingly wet and slimy...yes, you guessed it, that hourly epsiode of diarrhea! CeeCee had jumped over the gate (pictured in
Delicate Arch
Arches National Park, Utah an earlier blog entry) she had a nice little puddle on my seat, then jumped over to Charles' seat to spread the love, she then jumped back over the gate to the camper side to claim her innocence. Must give her cudos for keeping it on the vinyl seats and putting an equal amount on both seats so we know she was equally offended at both of us for forgetting about her issue. Luckily there was an outdoor bathroom where I was able to clean up and steal paper towel to clean up most of the mess. We had also brought along a household cleaner spray which helped us feel more confident about sitting in our seats again. We learned our lesson and she started doing a little better after some pepto-bismol and a new diet.
In Utah, we did 3 National Parks in 3 days and it was absolutely gorgeous! After Arches, we went to Bryce National Park, then Zion. Bryce was probably my favourite, despite the crowds, and we were able to find an amazing free campspot to park right outside with no crowds and almost as beautiful rocks and view. We even went for a little
Eugene parked in the "line-up"
One of our free overnight parking spots... hike scrambling up some rocks when we lost the path. At one point I saw a little snake, and my first instinct was to jump over it and scream, but with a closer look, it looked fake, so I said "That's a cruel joke...rubber snake on the path!" Charles took another look, and it actually was real, just still and sunning itself on a rock...it was also a very harmless tiny snake so not screaming was definitely the right choice to make😉
In Zion, Eugene had his final act of rebellion on the trip and the clutch started acting up again. We'd been super lucky the last several weeks and now that we were on steep mountain switchbacks with piles of tourist traffic, he decided to act up. Charles skillfully swerved to a good pull over spot and began the problem solving. About 30 minues later his head came out from under the hood with a groan and holding a small ball of goo at the end of his screwdriver. It was a mouse! A mountain mouse had crawled into our coolant, drank quite a bit and died in out coolant container. Good find, but not the cause of
Hoodoos
Bryce National Park the clutch problem😞 He eventually worked it out and we hit the road again, able to enjoy the great view of Zion before heading further west. We read about another little free campspot just over the Arizona border, so we found the little windy, gravel road and drove through the Arizona desert for about 5 miles to arrive at a site with Indian petroglyhs. Another great campsite with some neat sights and lots of room for the dogs to explore and run around.
On to Vegas! The next morning we headed to Vegas where we were looking forward to a cheap hotel and a long awaited shower...(unfortunately all those free stops in Utah had not included a shower). We had a fun time, saw a Cirque du Soliel show and enjoyed the interesting people-watching that you find only in Vegas (even a few people that jumped in the fountain to collect the change thrown in). The next morning refreshed, but still road weary, Charles pulled an all day drive and we pulled into the drive-way of probably th most beautiful site yet...our home!!😊
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