Wednesday, January 02, 2008

CULP VALLEY HIKE


WEDNESDAY JAN 2/08

Another clear & sunny California morning. This sure is a great area for consistently great weather. Night time temps drop to about 40F & the day time sunny days get up into the high 60's to low & mid 70's.

Butch & another RV neighbor, Keith, dropped over for a chin wag around 9. Butch, Keith & his wife come here every winter so it's always good to talk with people like them about the ways of the weather in these here parts. We're always a little concerned about the wind & the weatherman says we may be getting some wind & rain over this coming week-end. If we feel it's going to be a little rough we'll slip into an RV park in Borrego Springs to get out of the winds. We found one to-day that is affordable just in case.

Headed up Montezuma's grade later on in search of the Culp Valley campground. That Montezuma's grade is quite a road twisting & turning through the mountains. Found the campground at mile marker 9 & pulled off the highway onto a bumpy dirt road into the campground. No problem for the sure footed Santa Fe though. This a really nice & private RV campground hidden away in the rocks of Culp valley. Only a couple of small truck campers there. The hardest part is getting an RV up or down Montezuma's grade to actually reach the campground. There are scenic hiking trails here & one took us up onto a ridge overlooking the valley floor below to the east. We could see all the way to the Salton Sea & beyond to the Chocolate Mountains. Between the Sea & the Mountains is Slab City but we didn't see anyone we remembered from the Slabs:)) Kelly busied herself building half a dozen Inukshuks & we left one of our Bayfield Bunch internet cards under one of them. http://picasaweb.google.com/stargeezerguy Maybe we'll get an email from the park's, Smoky the Bear now.
Another trail led us down the mountainside towards the Pema Springs, but we didn't make it. It was a steady downgrade, the sun was beginning to sink towards the mountain tops, this was mountain lion country, & it would be a tough hike back up to the car, so we only went about two thirds of the way to the spring before turning & heading back up to the car. We built ourselves up a good sweat on the upgrade though.

Back down the mountain into town, a quick stop at the grocery store & back out to the desert. Kelly got a campfire going & that was about it for another day in the life & times of.............. The Bayfield Bunch:))

To-morrow we head for.........Ghost Mountain!!












Note: To answer Vito's question about the Slabs...... We left the Slabs a couple of weeks ago so don't know anything about that Slab City Talent Show on January 26th. Sorry Vito:((


2 comments:

  1. Great Blog. I enjoyed it and have subscribed to your blog. I would like to invite you to stop by mine as well. We were in our RV over the Christmas break.

    Colby
    http://suncityrv-newsletter.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  2. Smokey Bear - NOT - Smokey The Bear

    ReplyDelete