Telluride, CO (Prt 1)
Thanksgiving 2023.
We were putting the last bit of work on the van thinking that’d we do a simple first trip to break it in and make sure there are no issues, that was a short lived idea. We ended up driving the 8hrs to Telluride, CO instead since we were just too excited to finally go somewhere and be van-lifers.
So we set off through AZ, passing through the “4 corners” which to us was very anti climactic and not worth the $8/person to stand “exactly”where the states meet, we were close enough. Then up into the mountains of southern Colorado. Pulling into the town of Telluride is breathtaking. The mountain back drop is EPIC. We got familiar with the town before heading up to a campsite since we knew we’d be fighting what was left of daylight to get settled in.
The van handled its first bit of off roading as we cruised down Last Dollar Road. First couple of bumps and snow patches of course had us pretending we weren’t nervous. We set up our Thanksgiving dinner of mash potatoes, cheddar broccoli soup, and lamp chops and watched the sunset start to glow behind the mountains. As we had this ~beautiful moment~ we began to notice that a bit down from us cars kept coming up the road to join a group with steady bonfire going. Since it was just us we decided to go be social and say hi. We found out it was a group of the local lifties just getting back into town for the season and this apparently was their hang out spot - one guy actually living in his own trailer up there! Comedyyyyy
The lifties gave us some insight on where we could park overnight since staying up at the current site might not be the best idea giving the incoming snow. Thank youuuuu. Even though we told ourselves we’d travel south to Durango before the snow came, we couldn’t get ourselves to leave! So we let ourselves get snowed in for the next two days, exploring the now quite snow covered town :) (to be noted, yes it was very cold).
Alas it was eventually time for us to go, the snow had stopped and the sun graciously was out which we needed to help melt the snow on the only road to get out which was going to be an uphill battle. Liam, although he does identify as Jeff Gordon, made sure to tell Rachel that in case we were to essentially slip on ice and drive off the cliff that she should JUMP out of the van. Safe to say, we had it under control.
Cherry bomb survived! Our DIY van conversion had its first success!
All the best & HEAD WEST!
*Notable activities:
drive Last Dollar Road
Telluride scenic gondola ride
Cowboy coffee
Hot toddy at Wood Ear (what made Rachel realized she even likes hot toddy’s)
Also the ramen at Wood Ear
Baked in Telluride