Durango, Part 1

On our way home from Utah, we stopped at Durango, Colorado and stayed with Mike and Debbie.

Although they live in Wichita, they have purchased this house in Durango with hopes to eventually retire here.  They had planned to be here the same time we were passing through.


You can rent this beautiful home if you go to Durango on vacation!  Click here for more information!
 

While we were settling in, we heard the train whistle and we quickly jumped in the car and drove around the corner to see the famous Durango-Silverton train coming back to town.

Mike grilled a delicious meal for us.  

We don't look so happy below!  But we were!  Maybe we were just contemplating.

After a good nights rest, the next morning we went to the market to get a picnic lunch to take with us on our day's adventure.

They took us first just down to Honeyville, a local shop where they bottle honey and sell all kinds of honey products.

 Al watching them bottle the honey.

The Durango & Silverton train went by.  We were going to go to the same destination.  Someday I would like to ride this train, but today we were going with Mike and Debbie.

This spring is very wierd looking.  Here is what I found on-line.

"The spring was named after James Harvey Pinkerton settled in the area now known as Pinkerton Hot Springs during the summer of 1875. He raised dairy cows with his wife, three sons, and four daughters. Throughout the year they produced and sold dairy products in mining camps in the San Juan Mountains. In the spring of 1876 they sold 116 pounds of butter for a dollar a pound to the miners north of Silverton.


Hot Springs throughout the San Juan Mountains, like Pinkerton Hot Springs, are fed by ground water that percolates downward through the earth. As it descends, the water comes in contact with magma deep within the earth. The heated water then rises and returns to the surface in the form of hot springs.

This hot spring started out on the other side of the highway. It used to come out of the hillside and flow down the drainage ditch. In winter, you could see the steam rising, in summer it just looked like a rusty orange stream. When people stopped to examine it they created a traffic hazard because there was nowhere to really park on the west side. So a few years back when the state re-paved the highway they piped the spring water under the road and into a vertical section of pipe on the other side, so it flowed out the top of the pipe. Then they built a cone of cement blocks around the pipe so the water flowed over them. In time the blocks became totally covered with mineral deposits. It is quite nice looking, just not quite as "natural" as you might think."

I look like I'm freezing  -  I WAS!!  As you can see, Mike and Debbie are taking the cold air in stride.  They just love Colorado!   Although it IS beautiful, I still prefer the balmy oceansides!

And here is Silverton. 

We passed through this town and drove up the mountains on the other side.  More to come!