Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Centennial RV Park, Montrose, CO - Aug 4-10
Centennial is another surprisingly nice RV park, with WiFi available for a fee. It is a Passport America (half-price club) park, which usually has a 3-day limit in the summer; however, we called ahead to find out their weekly rate and were told we could stay a whole week at the PA rate, quite a bargain for the area. When the skies were clear (which they weren't a lot of the time) we could see the fourteeners near the towns of Ouray & Telluride on the southern skyline. It was quite a dramatic view. Also dramatic was the breathtaking drive from Cortez to Montrose, over Lizard Head Pass, surrounded by lovely mountain meadows and high peaks the whole way.
We began our time in Montrose with a visit to the local Chamber of Commerce in order to get information on local activities. We also walked the historic downtown area and had the lunch buffet at the new Nepali restaurant. The food was much the same as an Indian buffet. Saturday was the annual Olathe Sweet Corn festival, which we all wanted to go to. We pictured a typical small-town festival, but this is a much bigger deal, with a crowd of over 15,000, over 200 vendors, entertainment by Randy Travis (winner of 5 Grammy awards, etc), all the roasted corn you can eat, and a fabulous fireworks show. Not bad for the (somewhat elevated) price of $12 ($7 for seniors). The fireworks were some of the best we have seen, with many flares going off at the same time.
We visited Black Canyon of the Gunnison for most of a day, mainly visiting overlooks and gazing into the depths below. The Gunnison River is often visible and is quite lovely. Occasionally rafters & kayakers can be seen camped along the shore. We saw some rappellers who went down the steep walls of the North Rim via an extremely strong & long (over 2000') rope (& heavy -- they said it took 4 people to carry it). Apparently, they just do it for the thrill of rappelling down, because they use climbing aids to return to the top. We enjoyed the canyon, and did about 3 miles of hiking just visiting most of the overlooks.
Telluride was about 55 miles away, and we went there for another day trip. None of us had been there for years. At first the multitude of shops was overwhelming, but after walking around a bit, we began to enjoy it more. We saw some of the back streets and rode the free (in summer) Gondola to Mountain Village, a newer development that they are pushing for rich ski people to buy into (sort of a mini-Vail).
The ride in the gondola was lovely, but Mountain Village has nothing to recommend it. We did find 4 more painted pumas in Telluride, and they were all lovely. We found the most wonderful bakery here called Baked in Telluride. Nothing we purchased was less than delicious. They serve meals in addition to yummy baked goods. We were sorry we had lunch somewhere else, but at least were able to have dessert & get great things to take home. After 2 pm they have many of their baked items at BOGO -- a real deal!# posted by Doug and Willie @ 7:52 PM 
