April 27th, 2023
On Monday, April 17th, I left the Los Alamos area and headed north. I backtracked first to Santa Fe to catch I-25 and turned north. After an overnight stop at a National Wildlife Refuge south of Raton (lots of Pronghorn grazing in the grassland), I entered Colorado and a short while later, pulled into a campsite at Trinidad Lake State Park.
Trinidad Lake is a reservoir furnishing water to the city of Trinidad and Purgatoire Valley. The water level was very low due to drought. I stayed 5 days, doing a few hikes around the area. If you visit this park, be aware that the trails are steep and made up of broken rock, gravel and sand. Footing going downhill can be treacherous.
I was taking a chance on weather, by heading into Colorado in April. A front came through and dropped night time temperatures below freezing. I dealt with this by turning on my tank heating pads and because the site had an electrical hookup, I plugged in a small ceramic heater to keep the inside temperature warm. I had not used the heater before, so it was a guess as to the fan speed and setting I should use. I felt restless at 4 a.m. the first night and discovered it was 95 in the trailer. The heater had plenty of output for the camper!
It looked like Pueblo, Colorado was a few degrees warmer, so after 5 days, I again moved north with a reservation at Lake Pueblo State Park. I might add, that of the state parks where I have camped, Colorado has the nicest and best kept facilities. Trinidad had very nice hot showers as well as a laundry room with 2 washers and dryers.
Starting All Over 