Tom's National Park Adventure

Something happened last night that I have never experienced before!

I went to bed at 9:00pm. That is when I usually head to bed since that is when it has been getting to dark to read.

Around midnight I was woken up by someone knocking on my little camper set up. He identified himself as a park ranger and informed me that he may have to evacuate me and everyone else in the campground due to a wildfire just across the highway!

When he told me he was a ranger I instantly thought that there must be some concern about flash flooding, since I was so close to the river. After he explained about the fire, he also said that he would come back later if in fact the fire got out of control and we had to evacuate.

Since I didn’t feel in any danger, because flooding wasn’t the issue, I did the only thing I could think to do ….. I fell back asleep.

I woke up again about 4:00AM. I couldn’t figure out if I dreamed about the Ranger waking me up or not. So I laid in bed for another hour and a half. I didn’t smell any smoke so I still didn’t feel in any danger.

I got up about 5:30AM and packed up my camp. I drove to the shower house and got cleaned up. Since there was nothing left to do except to start driving East, that’s just what I did.

When I got up to the highway I could see that much of the hillside on the other side of the highway had been burned in the fire. There were still a bunch of first responders on the scene.

I drove for five hours and was already at the area I was supposed to spend the night this evening by 11:30AM! So I just kept on driving. I called my friend Max McClain and he was happy to receive me a full day earlier than we had originally planned.

The drive from Colorado River state Park is basically straight uphill until you go through the Vail Pass. Then the drive is pretty much downhill all the way to Missouri.

There is a very interesting area along the way called Glenwood Canyon. I took some videos of it while I was driving through it.

I ended up driving a little over 12 hours today! I got to Max and Judy’s house around 8:45 this evening.

Lots of driving, but that means I will get back home a day earlier than I had originally planned.