Durango Colorado Camping

 A long time ago in a state far away, we went camping near Durango with Leo's family.  It was actually the beginning of June 2021.  And it was a ton of fun!  I started to blog this back in August last year, and you can tell by in being January 2022 now, that life went absolutely mad.  But my kids miss my blog and I miss journaling, so I'm jumping back on the wagon and am going to try to catch up.  Anyway, back to camping.  We stopped in Green River, UT for breakfast. 

We got to the campground first and then Leo went and picked up an RV for his parents while the kids and I hiked around.  It was really beautiful--we were in the Vallecito Campground.  Alex and Amy came that night late, and then Martha and Orlando came the next morning.  Cesar and Aliesha came later that day and met up with us in Durango.

Leo's family wanted to look around Durango and I thought it would be fun to take the kids to the river parade going on that day.  

The river parade was pretty cool.  The boys thought it was fun to be sprayed from the boats with water guns as they passed under us.  Efraim was very concerned for them and would yell for them to be careful, which caused a lot of laughter (the sobriety of the boats was questionable.). Anyway, it was fun but chilly and sprinkling rain.  

Had to get a picture with Jack Dempsey, right? 

 

Also, I dragged them to the hotel where Louis L'Amour wrote many of his books.  Nobody appreciated that except me, but it made for a good bathroom break.  Also we got ice cream, and it was a ridiculous, uppity place, and one of the kids ordered a vegan ice cream.  Yuck.  Nobody liked it.  The mint chocolate chip tasted like mint leaves, (not terrible, I thought, but odd) and that didn't go over well with the kids eating it either. 

We went on a hike by our campground, but Martha and Orlando turned back quickly at the first steep drop off--Martha is terrified of heights--I had read the hike was easy (it was) but didn't realize it would be quite so steep on the side.  Anyway, I wish we had planned it better, because we felt bad leaving them, and so eventually turned back when I think most of us would have gone farther.  

At the end of the trail (for us).

The RV we rented for Martha and Orlando and Aleisha because she couldn't live without a shower.  😂

Our tents.  Sadly the red one went in the dumpster at the end of this weekend.  I had it barely hanging together here with a lot of duct tape.

The first night on our own.

Elena and Isabel practicing the life skills of putting up a tent on their own.  They've now got it down.

Hiking with the boys while Leo was gone.

See, kind of wonky.