Scouting

Saturday, Clark and I headed out about 11:30 AM on our way to scout out our route for our hike.   
Our first stop was at Brush Hollow reservoir.  We dug out the fishing poles and fished off the bank for about an hour.  No luck so we moved on. 


Made our way over to Phantom Canyon drive.   Our plan is to start about 5/miles in, where the dirt road begins.  We kept track of our distance on the way so we could start looking for camping spots at about mile 11 and beyond.  As we drove we found a place to pull over and eat our lunch.  We hung out and goofed around the creek.  Pebbles loved it and she even got into the creek to cool off.  Clark chose to use the log cross the creek.   We tried to get Pebbles to follow up but she wasn't up for it.

We found a great spot, but we will have to get a full 15/miles in on day one to get to it.

We are going to be sleeping in hammocks instead of a tent.   This will be a first for me.   Today I set up my hammock so I could see what is the max distance I can have between trees.

The spot we found is off the road a bit, and there are some great trees that we can tie up to.   We stacked some rocks for a fire pit and we spotted some good wood close around for us to use for our fire.

We continued up the canyon and ended up in Victor, CO.  We stopped in town and parked in front of a beer joint.   Went in and had a cold beer and sat and talked about our plans and things we will need to pack with us.

Then we headed over to Cripple Creek to hit one of the casinos.  Clark had never gambled on a slot machine so we thought we should give it a try.   I think he dropped $20 in and he ended up walking away with $52, pretty decent for a first timer.

We got back to the house just after 6 PM and grabbed Candy and went and had some dinner.   Now that we have driven the route I am even more excited about a trip.