Day 9-12 -- Loving Family, Friends & Colorado

We had a wonderful three days with our Billy, Sophie and their friends east of Parker. Last night Jeri fed us all her fantastic Pasta Fazul and since Joe had another friend who gave him some peaches he asked Jeri to make us a peach cobbler, so she did that, too. It was yummy (and I don't even care that much for peach cobbler). 

Since we pretty much knew Kent (property owner) would not accept any cash for letting us camp on his place and use some electricity we have home a bottle of his favorite liquor, Jamison Irish Whiskey. 

Sophie spent three nights with us in the trailer and loved "camping" with us, even though this morning she (we) had to get up extra early so Billy could take her to her Mother's so she could get to school on time. She has got to be the bravest little girl (heck, person) I've ever seen for the way she takes her diabetes, countless blood tests and four insulin shots a day!

Last sunset from east of Parker

We did not want to overstay our welcome, though, so painful as it was we said goodbye to Billy and Sophie and Kent and Joe and moved over to the west side of Denver and set up in Bear Creek Lake Park campground today at 1:00 PM. 


Electric only hookups, but we are now used to that after staying at Kent's. 😀  this is a pretty nice campground, but I'm beginning to wonder why campground hosts sell firewood and they are never around to sell it. LOL

Our campsite in Bear Creek Lake Park campground #42

Bear Creek Lake Park Campground site #42

Bill, Sugar Belle and Jimmy around the campfire at Bear Creek Tuesday night

Nancy & Jeri

It is great to have both friends and family in the area.  Rick and Nancy Ackerman came to our campsite for grilled chicken with salsa verde and cheese, Jeri's new awesome Mexican-style bean dish and other tasty food Wednesday night.  It was great having them over and we all enjoyed another campfire until it was time for them to go home (Sadly, neither of these two kids are retired yet.  LOL).  Good-byes are never fun, so we hope to see them again before too long, maybe as our guests in Palm Coast!!

Not long after Rick and Nancy left Jimmy stopped by for a campfire visit for a little while.  We are going to his home Thursday night for dinner.  Right after he left and while I was watching the rest of the campfire die out before watering down the coals the Park Host stopped by on his little quad and we had a very nice chat.  He is retired from working for Douglas Country (where our old town of Parker is located).  I guess he and his wife act as hosts at various campgrounds around the western area during the year.  Sounds interesting.  After he left I finished dousing the fire and went to bed.

We had some wind during the night and Jeri got up and retracted the awning.  They do not like much wind.

This morning brought a less than pleasant surprise to Jeri and me.  The gauge on our gray water tank was showing full, so I had already planned to hook the trailer up to the Jeep and go dump both the black and gray tanks, as well as topping up the fresh water.  The water in the sink drains was still draining though, so I (mistakenly) just figured the full sensor was put a bit low to provide a bit of cushion.  Well, okay, to be perfectly honest, I thought the sensor was defective or something because after thinking of the amount of fresh water (60 gallons) and the fact that it was 2/3 full and the black tank (42 gallons) was only 1/3 full, how could the gray tank be full.  It did not compute!!  :-\

So, I must be getting senile...  I (temporarily) forgot that we had filled the fresh water tank to the top at Kent's before leaving Tuesday morning and we had not dumped the gray and black when we got here to Bear Creek Lake Park campground.  duhhhhhhhhh  But at least this means the sensor is good!  ;-)

We had noticed a wee bit of garbage smell in the bathroom, but just assumed the smell was coming up from the bathroom sink drain. I was outside the trailer doing some things this morning when Jeri called me in and said, "hey, Bill, take a look at that.  Now we know where the smell is coming from."  :-(

The sinks were draining alright, draining right into the bathtub!!  Thus the odor.  And Jeri had sat a couple of things in the bathtub that were now quite wet with this gray water.  
[In case you, the reader, are not RV savvy, gray water is the water that comes from the kitchen sink, the bathroom sink and the shower and is just mostly soapy water, with perhaps some teeny food particles mixed in.  Black water comes from the onboard toilet.]

I hooked the trailer up to the Jeep and went to the dump in the campsite and drained and flushed both the black (first) and gray (second) tanks.  Then on the way back to site #42 I stopped at the water fill station and topped up the fresh water tank in preparation for our departure tomorrow morning for Grand Teton and Yellowstone.  Then back to site #42 and set the trailer back up and disconnect from the Jeep.  All is now well again. Sigh......

We also did some reorganizing of the cabinet above the sink were we keep the dishes, cups, glasses, etc., so now it is much better organized and will hopefully stay in place better as we haul down the road.

After we finished this we drove over to Red Rocks so Jeri could take some pictures of the amphitheater and area with her good Canon camera.  When we got there we found the place pretty well shut down because there is a sold out Tim McGraw concert there tonight, so no entrance into the incredible amphitheater built by the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corp) back in the 1930s.  This is an awesome place to sit at a concert at night.  You are high above Denver and have this simply incredible view down into Denver and the surrounding area while you watch and listen to performers under a beautiful sky!!  Or so I'm told anyway--I've personally never been to a concert there, although Jeri has and I've seen some held there on TV.

Jeri and Sugar up in the Red Rocks area

Jeri and Sugar up in the Red Rocks area

 When we got back to camp after visiting Red Rocks we noticed we were having some pretty good gusts of wind, so again, in preparation for departing tomorrow morning I got some of the outside stuff, like the grill, packed up into the basement of the trailer.

Had some lunch and as I type this Jeri is taking a bit of a nap.  When she gets up we will go get our partially used propane tank topped up in preparation for some cold nights of running the furnace up in Grand Teton and Yellowstone.  We're getting pretty excited about getting up there since neither of us has ever been there.

Anyway, that pretty much sums up days 9-12 in Colorado.  It's going to be somewhat sad to leave it behind.  Did I every tell you how much I love, love, love Colorado??