Tuesday, June 22, 2010 – Departure Day-Drive to Indian Creek Horse Camp

Contrary to our original plan, we didn’t go for a ride on Saturday, we just had too much to do in preparing for our departure today. Got up early, said good-bye to our client, and headed out before 9:00. We had many stops to make, starting with going to the vet so our dogs could get boosters for their flu vaccines, which the vet required before we could board them. Very unhappy with the final bill, charged the same for the booster as they did for the original vaccine, plus an (brief) office charge that’s more than my regular vet charges for a regular visit, especially considering that canine flu is isolate to just a few places in the country, Colorado being one of them. Most money I’ve ever had to pay just to board two dogs in the same cage for two nights! Next stop was at the RV store, which had promised to get us a door handle for our patio door, but once again, disappointment when they didn’t have it in, didn’t know where it was, didn’t know if it had been back-ordered, didn’t know if it was going to be arriving at all. Not a lot of enthusiasm to serve customers there. Next we drove to Pueblo, with stops at the gas station, the liquor store and Wal-Mart, then west 20 miles to Penrose to pick up some certified weed free hay, required in most Western National Forests and State Parks. After the feed store, we headed north again, along a lovely road toward I-25, then north to Sedalia where we headed west again to the Indian Creek Horse Camp (not to be confused with the Indian Creek Trailhead in the San Isabel National Forest near LaVeta where we went riding before). Started climbing about 3-4 miles from the campground, slow going but made it with no trouble. The campground is right off the state highway, so no dirt roads except the one into the campground. Hubby went into the campground first to reconnoiter, then I moved in. Once again, rather disappointing. We were told there was water in the campground, but of the three water pipes, only one had a spigot on it (the other two had no head, just caps), and the only functioning one had been cut in such a way as not to allow a hose to be fitted. When you turned it on, water went everywhere! Even with the huge tubs we use, we couldn’t get the stream just into the tub. What a waste! Fortunately, we still had some water in our tank, enough for the two days we planned to spend there, anyway. Almost no site was level, and almost no site was shaded, and no sites were both. We ended up on a site that at least provided some shade in one of the corrals, though we were really not at all level, both front to back and side to side. We felt like we were in a listing yacht! Quite disappointing, especially for $17/night (though with Hubby’s Golden Age Passport it was $17 for both nights)! There was one other family in the campground, with two young girls and a new golden lab puppy in tow. They had outfitted a livestock trailer with boards placed in the slots and a mattress on the boards, providing an interesting “tent” for the girls to sleep in. Anyway, we settled in after a long active day, looking forward to a ride day tomorrow, having moved my horse into the second corral once the hot sun had passed behind the trees.