As busy summer turned to less frenetic fall, the road beckoned me and I was off on a tramp. My wandering brought me to Great Sand Dunes National Park (first eight photos above) and Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park in Colorado. Last year Gary and Phyllis took us to the Dunes Park when we visited them in Red River. Until then I didn’t know it existed. Our visit was little more than a drive by and I wanted to go back and do a little exploring, which I did. I didn’t do the park justice but I did scramble up the dunes which would have tuckered out better men than me. Spending the night there, I got to try out for the first time the tent I bought. It is designed to go on the back end of an SUV such as the Pathfinder, with the rear door up. When I camped out in the Pathfinder last year in Big Bend, I found the back of the Pathfinder a little cramped. When I found this SUV tent, I thought it might give me just enough extra room so I could stretch out. It did, but the wind got up during the night and made me think I’d made a mistake. I backed into my space in the campground so the vehicle rear end wasn’t facing other campers. The afternoon and evening were calm but the wind picked up during the night. The prevailing south winds form the dunes as they blow sand up the San Luis valley and dump it when they encounter the little Sangre De Cristo mountains cul de sac. My tent was facing the mountains but the wind kicked up out of the east blasting down the mountain side directly at the tent. I probably didn’t secure the bottom part of the tent that goes under the rear bumper as well as I should have and the wind, which didn’t blow steadily but came in terrific gusts, would pull the tent bottom up and join me. I could have tolerated the wind whipping around the inside of the Pathfinder, snug as I was in my sleeping bag, but the loosened tent flapped around all to be damned creating a lot of noise and I finally had to get up, take the tent down and button up in the cramped Pathfinder. I had no such problem on the next three nights, though, and found that the tent performed as I had hoped. It also allowed me to get better ventilation when I tied back the solid outer flaps and just zipped up the inner mesh insect screen. Continue reading “October tramp” →
by rakeeter 
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