Strong persuasion/coercion during her UConn graduation was successful; Ashton is here!

Sand, sun & snow – every well-planned trip needs a theme, right?

Tomorrow’s theme ‘sand’ was a ‘road trip’ away from Boulder County so decided to break up our commute with a trip to dusty, wind-swept Pueblo 🙂 ROAD trips can be fun but a 5-hour drive the day after an almost 5-hour cross-country flight – maybe not so much.  Decided to use Pueblo as a 2-day base for our South to North – sand to snow Colorado holiday.

Started the day with a drive through Denver (all major roads run thru Denver) and an early lunch break at Rosie’s Diner in Monument.  Another hour later we arrived in Pueblo.  Saw a ‘Colorado State Parks’ Facebook post a week or so ago detailing the state’s annual fish stocking efforts at Lake Pueblo – and needed a Day One excursion ‘filler’ so… Lake Pueblo State Park here we come.

Lake, desert, cactus – why not?  Done; check 🙂

What us snowbirds didn’t count on in southern Colorado was the HEAT.  Ro darted from bush to bush to escape the rays, dug a hole/circled thrice & hunkered down — TWICE, found shelter under a rock ledge – my dog was H-O-T hot.  Gorgeous cactus flowers and striking geological rock formations highlighted our first hours.  But the heat was dragging my party down, we needed WATER.

Not sure where this trail was leading us but I could see water far in the distance – so we dropped off [the trail] & followed a river gulch through sage and rock to its conclusion – Lake Pueblo, which was no mirage 🙂

A dip, some rest, a bean burrito, and the day looked 500% better.  Followed the lake perimeter back to parking (no more trail for us).

GREAT Day One hike!

https://www.parks.state.co.us/parks/lakepueblo/Pages/LakePuebloStatePark.aspx