It was only about a 15 minute drive to another scenic spot
that included pine trees, mountains and water. Lake Nighthorse
is a reservoir created by the 270 feet high Ridges Basin Dam
southwest of Durango in La Plata County Colorado.
It was built by the Bureau of Reclamation in
2003 as part of the Animas-La Plata Project, which pumps water
from the Animas River to fill a 123,541-acre-foot reservoir
for tribes and water rights holders.
As you can tell, it was full to the brim!!!
It was named after Ben Nighthorse Campbell
who is American Cheyenne politician who served as a U.S. Representative from
1987 to 1993, and a U.S. Senator from Colorado from 1993 to 2005.
He serves as one of forty-four members of the Council of Chiefs of the
Northern Cheyenne Indian Tribe. He was born in Auburn Ca and
went to Placer High School at the same time Don’s older brother Bill was there.
He is also a gifted artist & jewelry maker. and I purchased one of his signed
rings when he was at a show in Old Sacramento in about 1973, and
I still wear it often!!!
Was this hug, gnarly Pinion tree a pine or a fir?
Well, if a twig bares needles in groups of two, three, or five, you can
safely call it a pine. If the twig carries its needles singly,
it's a good bet you've got a fir.
I used my PlantSnap app again to verify the identity
of this tree. It is an unusually large Pinion Pine.
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A colorful setting on the way back to Durango,
which had a locked gate and a new home off to the left,
so we didn't search any farther.
And Don did do some geocaching along the way. He
found the 8 he was looking for, but his was my favorite as you
had to find 4 numbers in the correct order and
enter them on this device, in the right order
to open the pill bottle container which held the log book!!!
Congratulations to the to the geocacher who hid
this... Don said he'd never seen one like it before.
The Animas River is a 126 mile-long river that feeds the
Animal-La Plata Water Project.
There is concrete/asphalt trail that stretches over 7 miles through
Durango, along the edge of the Animas River, so we took a walk
and enjoyed the rafters as they passed by.
The current flow was 2230 cubic feet per second so
they got a fun ride.
Then it was about "beer thirty" so we stopped by one of
the local breweries for "linner", a late lunch early dinner
and tested out the beer, this time at the Animus Beer Garden
in Old Town Durango.
There are 4 local breweries in the area and by the time
we headed to Carvers, I got wise and
switched back to ordering wine. We opted to sit inside this
time because outside seating was right on the edge of
the main fume-filled main drag!!!
The food was tasty but fattening, but who counts
calories while on vacation?
Of the three we visited during our stay, the Ska Brewing
Company was our favorite.
The ambiance, food and service were excellent
and they didn't give me a dirty look for ordering wine, and
it was the most impressive!!!
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