Scout Summer 2025: Rocky Mountain High, Colorado
Hello from Colorado! The past week has been filled with big mountain views, songbirds, clear creeks, and high elevation. It's had me thinking about time, and how differently it moves when we're on the road. Days can fly by (filled with hikes, driving, work, etc.), but weekends spent at camp can stretch for miles. Our days are guided by the sun - we wake up with the songbirds greeting the sunrise and bundle up in bed as soon as the light leaves us and the cold sets in. Two or three days in one place can feel more like a week spent slowly soaking it in.
We spent a few more nights where I left you last, camped out in the hills behind Purgatory and hiking the nearby trails.
We made a nightly ritual of walking down the hill and through the meadow to the creek behind camp for sunset views and fresh water. It's amazing how aware of water consumption we become when we only have a max of 21 gallons on us at a time. It's hard to reconcile our careful use with the free-flowing faucets at home. But a fresh creek near camp means showers every day - quite the road luxury!
Our nightly path down to the creek from camp
On Sunday we packed up camp and headed in for a much-needed "town day" in Silverton and Ouray. In Silverton, we did laundry, got some groceries, and enjoyed a little shopping. This tiny old mining town in the mountains feels like a movie set or a scene out of Westworld. When we arrived, the dusty streets were nearly empty, but twice a day the Durango-Silverton railroad rolls right into town and dumps a load of tourists off who take over the once-quiet streets in a hurry to get their shopping, eating, and sightseeing done before the return trip 2 hours later.
Don't tell, but I took this shot from a gas station in Silverton
We, too, moved along quickly and continued on the "Million Dollar Highway" to Ouray, a picturesque town nestled among the mountains. We enjoyed a burger and a beer, did a bit more grocery shopping, and set out to find camp. We spent the next two nights in the canyon beside nature's perfect noise machine.
Surrounded by peaks, we decided to try out the hiking trail across the street. It promised to be steep - 2,200 ft straight up. We figured we wouldn't make it all the way, but could enjoy however far we got along the trail. 2,444 ft of elevation and 2.9 miles later (at around 9,000-11,000 ft, mind you), we reached the top. The views were worth it, but we added this one to the "great hikes I'll never do again" list.
From Ouray, we set out for Gunnison. We first visited this spot in 2021 for a short one-night stay in the van and swore we'd be back. It's a high-desert area with views of the snowcapped peaks to the north and hundreds of miles of trails. It has the boulders of Joshua Tree with the long-range views of the Rockies. We didn't get as much biking in here as we'd hoped (our first day of bad weather), but we did get a sunrise complete with a rainbow.
From here it was finally time to head to Crested Butte for our third time staying in our favorite spot in CO. This is the first summer we've taken the Scout to CO, and let me tell you, nothing will better highlight the difference between driving the van and the truck than these mountain dirt roads. In both CB and Gunni, we remember the stress of navigating steep, rocky roads (or being too nervous to drive them at all) that now feel like a breeze. The clearance and 4x4 of the truck have allowed us greater access to areas, and in CB, we were able to venture deeper into Washington Gulch for the most prime campsite yet.
In places like this, we feel like we're stealing something—our house with a million-dollar view, all for free.
Roamin' on,
M
