Moominmama's Adventures: A Last Hurrah for 2024

In which Moominmama travels west to Colorado but enjoys a last adventure before she holes up for the winter...

Moominmama is washing sand from inside her ears and out of her coffee cup before morning coffee. That is thanks to a visit to Great Sand Dunes National Park, the last hurrah of 2024 before I move into an apartment for the winter.

Moominmama loves sandstone, but hiking in actual sand is a different story. Where's a camel when you need one? Still, the dunes here make for shifting shapes and interesting photos. This crazy desert is created by strong prevailing winds that break down the San Juan mountains to the west and move them granularly into a cove of the Sangre de Cristo mountains.

It's an unusual confluence of features creating these giant sand dunes (can you tell the little dots are people?), and it was my last stop en route to storing the Moominhouse for the winter. This is always a little sad! But I feel like I made the most of 2024, milking the year for all the adventures I could!

Before arriving at the Great Sand Dunes, I had to cross the Mississippi River, always a cause for celebration!  Once I clear Kansas City, the plains open up, and I feel back in the wild west.

This year, I stopped in Kansas to spend an overnight at Pawnee Rock. This is a rare elevation on the Plains, first used by native people on the hunt and later as a point of note along the Santa Fe trail. 

Because settlers and railroad barons took some of the rock for construction, it is no longer as high as it once was: an estimated 100 feet above the plains. 

But in the early 1900s, the locals put a monument and stone pavilion at the top so visitors could get a sense of the original view. Later, Pawnee Rock was recognized as a national historic site. Here it is at dawn.

The town of Pawnee Rock still uses the site for Easter services, setting up in a hollow spot where a preacher and choir can stand above the audience. 

This per my friend Jim, who was out there walking his dogs and led me around the site. A retired machinist, he's lived here his whole life and rarely traveled. He's a proud "Flat Earther," he said, because from where he stands, the earth just doesn't look curved, now does it? I appreciated his kindness and conversation just the same. 

Here was my view from the top of the pavilion, with my car and trailer just below, and the wide open blue sky and plains stretching out for as far as the eye can see! It really does have its charms.

From Kansas, I crossed into eastern Colorado and stopped at the foot of the Spanish Peaks for a couple days of hiking. These mountains had caught my fancy on an earlier drive when I did not have time to stop. So this time, I made reservations at a campground. With the trailer safely at camp, I drove up to Cordova Pass to hike to a reported vista.

Heading up 11,260 feet, the forest road to Cordova Pass turned into a single pair of snowy, icy ruts about two miles from the parking area, with no place to turn around except the top. It wasn't the ride up that got me though; it was the ride down. 

I had to pass no fewer than five cars coming toward me, and somehow none of us got stuck or slid off the edge. Had to peel stiff fingers from the steering wheel after that drive, but the view from the top was pretty great!

Moominmama drove a couple other hairy mountain passes on the way to storing the trailer and getting to my winter destination in Grand Junction. But none as bad as Cordova Pass!

I will leave you with a photo from the town of Ouray, with hot springs in the foreground, that I took coming out of the mountains from Silverton. This is a narrow, steep and twisting road but beautiful beyond measure.