MUELLER STATE PARK (Memorial Day 2006)

Memorial Day Weekend 2006 was spent at Mueller State Park near Divide, CO.  This was our 5th visit to this great park, and we nailed the legendary site 123 again.  Randy was up at 2 AM the day after Thanksgiving 2005 to book this site.  Just one problem...when we arrived we were told we were scheduled to arrive the day before!  Randy forgot that he booked site 123 starting the Thursday before Memorial Day knowing that if we waited to arrive until Friday, this site would be gone.  So now we had a problem...we were only confirmed for two nights camping on one of the busiest weekends of the year (and we really, really wanted to stay three nights). 

 

Keeping with a tradition we started two years ago, we have spaghetti for dinner on the day we arrive.  Lea cooked whole-wheat pasta with browned soy added to the Prego spaghetti sauce.  She told Randy it was ground chuck and he didn't know the difference.

 

To power up for our first full day of activities, we dined on scrambled egg and potato breakfast burritos.

 

   

Randy and Cameron played catch on site 123's long driveway.

 

Lea and the girls played Monopoly in the Outback.  Lea beat defending champion Courtney for the title this camping trip.

 

Court plays with a buddy who was camping with her family in site 112. 

 

We were surprised to find GenesRUs from Outbackers.com in the same campground loop.  We spent two evenings with them catching up on 2006 camping schedules and roasting marshmallows to make great s'mores.

 

The trails at Mueller State Park do not allow pets, so we drove to the nearby Crags campground where dogs are allowed.

 

This was a cool part of the hike.  Aspen trees leaned in as if to honor you as you walked the path between them.

 

As I have said before, diets and common-sense eating are left behind when camping.  On our second night Randy grilled T-bone steaks and the third night was a treat as well with grilled brats!

 

CAMPING TRIP GETS EXTENDED !!!

Refusing to go home just because Randy forgot what days he reserved, we waited until checkout time on Sunday to claim any campsite vacancies for Sunday night.  We kept frequent (and probably annoying) communications with the Park Rangers who were taking inventory on available sites.  We were told it was not looking good, and the only confirmed available site was a walk-in tent site.  At 12:15 PM our luck changed when the campers in site 37 decided against renewing for another night.  The lesson here is if you are really annoying, you'll eventually get your way.
 

On Monday morning we set out for one final hike.  We chose the Homestead trail that started and ended in the park.  Cameron is seen registering us for the hike.

 

Early in the hike we encountered this cool rock formation that looked like a person's head.

 

Here is the same formation with the sun in a better spot.

 

We surprised a herd of elk wandering near the side of the road.

 

Traveling with his family on a trip to Colorado, Outbackers.com member Shake1969 ended up in site 24 (the same loop as our site 37).  We would have missed them if we had been unsuccessful in securing a site for Sunday night.
 

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