Crossing the Mountains!

September 10, 2024

Tuesday, September 10, 2024

Up this morning and ready to head out about 8 am. We had originally planned to head east to the front range, and enter Denver from the south, like we did last year. It worked really well – just to stay off I-70 west of Denver, which has been a disaster for us the last several times we’ve tried to come that way - so thought we’d do it again. But, I Googled and found that the quickest – and supposedly easiest – way to get to Morrison, Colorado, was to cut through the interior of the Rockies and come out below I-70, and right into Morrison. Why Morrison, you ask? Well, a couple of months ago, I discovered that there were dinosaur tracks and a museum in Morrison that we knew nothing about – so – decided, as we were passing through this way, we should stop and investigate! We always like things that are old, and can’t get much older than the dinosaurs, can you?!

The drive itself was really beautiful! Mountains surrounding the inland valley between ranges of the Rockies, and lots of agricultural land in between. Also, many lovely creeks and streams along the way, including heading over Wolf Creek Pass (complete with ski area) and the Continental Divide Trail. We made very good time – it actually took less than 6 hours to make our way from Durango to Morrison, and out we popped – with downtown Denver in the distance.

Lots of beautiful scenery between Durango and Morrison!

Balloon over Pagosa Springs!

Finding the dinosaur tracks themselves, though, wasn’t easy at all! There are two visitor centers – one at either end of the mountain on which they are located. But to get from one to the other, you actually have to go onto the Freeway and wind around – very complicated – even though the physical addresses for both are on the exact same street – they are really miles (and a mountain ridge and a freeway!) apart! At any rate, we eventually wound up where we wanted to be – at the main visitor center, and we found out way to the gate for the trail up the hill.

I've never seen one "in the wild" before!

SO cute!!

Fortunately for us, though, we discovered that there was a bus that took visitors up and around the hill – stopping at all the sites and talking about them, and we were able to catch a ride on one heading up, so we could curtail the walking and get some expert guidance at the same time! We had a very nice guide, and she had some fun props to help make the explanations of what we were seeing more understandable, especially for kids – but to be honest, neither of us were at all impressed with the remains at the site. (Thinking that possibly once you’ve visited Dinosaur National Monument in Vernal, Utah, and the dinosaur tracks in St. George, Utah, they’re hard to compete with!)

Most of the tracks we saw were of Sauropods, huge brontosaur-type dinosaurs (herbivores) and of an ancient form of crocodiles, who lived in the marshy area of what was then this part of Colorado. They did have one very small print from a raptor, as well as theropod, both carnivores.

Hope you can read this! Dinosaur scratches!

Dino prints ...

More dino prints of different sizes

These are actually bulges left after the dinosaurs stepped in the mud

Dino bulge

They also had what they called a “bone yard” where some larger dinosaur bones could be identified, which was quite interesting.

The dark sections are fossilized dino bones in the rock

Hard to see, but in the red section, the raptor track

Once we got down to the bottom of the hill, we decided to head to our hotel for the night, a DoubleTree in Thornton, Colorado, a northern suburb of Denver. Made it here in about half an hour, arriving about 4:30 pm. Checked in, and decided to find a place for dinner, as we had not had any lunch.

Went to an Italian restaurant, right down the street, called Scalzotto’s, and as it was still early, we were seated right away. Place was lovely! We shared a really delicious frisée, pear and gorgonzola salad, with a balsalmic vinaigrette dressing. Robert then had chicken Marsala with fettucine alfredo and I had pasta bolognaise. R’s chicken was fabulous; my pasta okay but not great, washed down with a Montepulciano for R and a Sauvignon Blanc from Italy for me. Now, almost 7:30 and we’re back in the room and I’m getting ready for bed!