Now in Colorado, the vegetation has turned decidedly drier. Fortunately, our campground is actually just below the dam of a good-sized reservoir. Lots of wildlife, including this turkey who was completely unbothered by us setting up camp. And I watched a very cute raccoon at the water’s edge paddling his paws in search of edibles.

The campsites are under lovely old cottonwood trees, so there’s lots of shade. Unfortunately, there’s also lots of flies. The flyswatter’s been getting a workout. Oh, and cicadas. This fellow overnighted on our tent (I wondered what that buzzing was).

Moe made a new friend—a little boy named Logan, who greeted me during our first evening walk with “My mom’s inside (their camper), but I don’t know where my dad and sisters and brother are.” So we chatted about possible places they could be until they returned (they were walking). He admired Moe, I told him he loves to fetch balls, and that’s all it took—Moe had a new best friend (or Logan did; I’m not sure which).

I brought Moe over to say goodbye the next day as they were leaving. Logan bent down to Moe, patted his back, and said “I love you, Moe. You’re so handsome.” Ever the Marshall, I immediately teared up. Sweet kid.

I wanted to do some birding, so set out early one morning to hike through one of the two sloughs near the lake. Both were, unfortunately, pretty dried up, so no exciting new birds. Beyond the slough was a portion of the old Santa Fe Trail, set aside by the DAR in 1908-ish. I’d been told that you could sometimes pick out the old wagon ruts by the different vegetation (maybe they’re mower lines, but I like to imagine, so I say they’re wagon ruts).

Later I had to drive back there so Russ could see it. He wanted to drive across the dam, which was very cool, but see his blog—russloomis.com—for pictures, because I was driving. On the other side I spotted a network of dirt roads that led to the south shore of the reservoir and off I went, with Russ hanging on in white-knuckled terror that we were about to get stuck up to our axles and die there. I finally pulled out onto what had been under probably 10 feet of water before the drought, but was now rocks and dried mud:

And THAT was worth it, because I finally saw a snowy plover!

And we didn’t get stuck (I was having great fun acting out my own off-road Subaru commercial in my KIA). Back at camp we had a catfish fry with fresh sautéed vegetables and holy moley was that good! They stock all the lakes in this region with channel catfish, and they are mighty fine eating.

Just before leaving the next morning, Russ pointed out a loose dog and a ranger trying to catch it. Ever helpful, I brought Moe out on a leash and BINGO, she came right over and I was able to catch her collar. She was very friendly, and we pointed out where we thought her people were, as we’d seen her before. Dog and owner were reunited, and we took off for Pueblo Lake State Park in Pueblo, Colorado.