A white fluffy cloud afternoon...

Day 180
9-3-2006
Started: Outside Las Animas, CO
Finished: Outside LaJunta, CO
Today's Miles: 22.0
Total Miles: 2488.0

Our bodies are without a doubt enjoying the luxuries of our home on wheels this week. We are taking advantage of sleeping in a little later than usual because the temperatures have finally dropped enough for us to walk comfortably any time of the day. We have been contemplating for quite some time now what direction we will take for the remainder of our journey. We know winter is right around the corner, especially for the higher elevations of Colorado, Utah and Nevada. However, after two long days of looking at maps and discussing our options we have decided to continue following the American Discovery Trail. We have looked at several routes that the ADT offers and plan to choose the safest means of travel. We feel that we've come this far and we do not want to turn back now. So with that said, we are utilizing a great map program that Dad Wiest has on his laptop combined with our new topo maps of Colorado to plan our route out for the next leg of our journey. Randy's leg is continuing to recover, some days it reminds him that it's by no means healed yet, so the "mule" continues to "stubbornly" log miles every day. Today was a beautiful day to be in the rolling hills of Eastern Colorado. The sky was full of white fluffy clouds and the sunflowers were abundant everywhere. From time to time we were barked at by large fields of prairie dogs and late in the day were fresh meat for some very annoying mosquitoes. We stopped in the town of Las Animas and enjoyed a few cheese sandwiches that we had packed out for lunch. Not long after leaving Las Animas we came upon the historical site of Bent's fort. Bent's Fort was built in 1833 to trade with plains Indians and trappers. For much of its sixteen year history the fort was the only major permanent white settlement on the Santa Fe Trail between Missouri and the Mexican Settlements. The fort provided explorers, adventurers, and the US Army a place to get needed supplies, wagon repairs, livestock, good food, water, rest and protection in the vast desert. During the war with Mexico in 1846, the fort became a staging area for Colonel Stephen Watts Kearny's "Army of the West". Disasters and disease caused the fort's abandonment in 1849. We continued hiking into the early evening hours until Dad Wiest and Lynn arrived to pick us up for the night. We stopped at a local fruit stand on the way back to the KOA and purchased some fresh Colorado corn for dinner. We enjoyed a great meal of grilled hamburgers and veggie burgers, mac-n-cheese, and delicious sweet corn as we sat outside under a cool Colorado sky.

Your Friends on the ADT,
Randy and Sheri
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