30 June – Dinosaur National Monument: We had a stunning 4 days at the Flaming Gorge reservoir, it was exactly the white wine and feet in the water spot we needed.
Today’s drive was stunning along the edge of the Flaming Gorge and then over some pretty mountains before dropping down into Vernal where we needed to shop, fillup water, find a state liquor store (becuase we had crossed back into Utah).
Vernal is your typical American small town – very clean, spacious, a main shopping street with only two-story buildings etc and this one had all its spring bloom out (flowers in hanging pots on every lamp post. And it had a traditional style breakfast diner, something we have been looking for over the last few months, so naturally we pulled in – Pricey but an experience.
On the way out to our camp spot we stopped at the dinosaur national monument for an interesting tour of their visitor centre. This area was home to many dinosaurs and many fossils have been dug up – over 400 whole dinosaur. Camp is a very dry, dusty and hotspot in the valley.
1 July – Buffalo Mountain, Steamboat Springs: After last nights very hot, dry and dusty campsite complete with millions of miggies there was no doubt we would be moving today. Original idea was to only go about 120km but the trailer trash/methbhead looking dwellings at the turnoff to where we wanted to go put us off even though the camp spot was still 7km away.
A check of iOverlander showed nothing desirable until Steamboat springs so off we set for an additional 170km across vast grass and scrubland of western Colorado. In the end it worth it even if the last 10km was a very slow 4×4 climb up the mountain.
3 July – Off Rabbit Ear Pass, Forest road 302: The mosquitoes and flies chased us away from our last spot, literally swarms of them!
After descending back into town we went on an admin mission, firstly to purchase some tin snips (for Stuart to modify our geyser box and hopefully wind proof it), then to find water and finally a trash can (the last item being very scarce in Steamboat springs so it took multiple stops to eventually dump our trash).
With admin done we headed out of town over a huge pass (poor Mr J) to our current spot in the Medicine Bow-Routt Nat Forest, were we are hoping to have less mozzies. Could be cool at night as we are at 3000m and there are still remnants of snow/ice in the trees opposite our parking spot.
7 July – Bakers Tank Trailhead (near Frisco): Only about 150km but a typical long admin day (shopping, water, rubbish disposal) made more tiring by the crazy busy single lane road for the first 80km – clearly many people waited until Monday to head home after July 4th long weekend. American drivers are generally quite good but in our opinion they often drive too fast for the conditions and are delayed in the decision making to overtake resulting in closer calls than necessary. 70km in today we had a close call when one such delayed driver overtook when he shouldn’t have, if we and the oncoming truck had both not slowed down it would have been a disaster! Thankfully there was a town only a km further up were we could pull over and have a meltdown.. Camped tonight (3300m high) near an old railroad water tower, it must have been one hell of a railroad as the climb up here on its old track was steep.
9 July – Pikes Peak, Rampart Range rd: The plan was for a simple 2,5hr drive across to Colorado Springs so that Tania could buy a Trader Joe’s shopping bag, each state has their own style bag SO it makes sense that you should collect them 😳🫣.
Garmin however had other ideas and took us more westerly towards Denver and then down instead of diagonally across the triangle, so it made for a long day.
11 July – Near Eleven Mile Canyon reservoir: A nice short little hop today as we start heading west across Colorado(the start of some zig zagging for the next 4 weeks). Tried to get water today at a paid public spigot but was all locked up – the first time we have tried to pay for water in the states and the first time we have not found water at all. Seems Colorado could be a challenge for that
12 July – above Buena Vista town: Our happiness yesterday to have people camped around us and therefore the sounds of family fun quickly dissipated in the night when some partied until late and one particular party’s teenagers spent the whole night talking loudly. With little sleep we were happy to leave this morning. Stumbled upon a really cool car show in Burna Vista which is a surprisingly funky town that you don’t know about until you turn off the main road.
Intitially we had thought to grab a pizza in town for lunch but when a pizza and a single drink would set you back in excess of ZAR600 we decided to rather just find a camp spot outside town. There are some funky little spots along the river and for free but of course all taken, thankfully as we headed further up into the mountain we found tonight’s spot which is quite nice and best of all has no big groups anywhere near it = a hopefully good nights sleep ahead 🤔
14 July – Near Turquoise Lake & Leadville: Another pine forest at altitude (nearly 3000m) as we try and do short hops to change the scenery and use up time towards our flight date.
Stopped at a auto parts store this morning to see if we could source an expansion tank for Mr j as his is leaking and not holding pressure which is affecting the coolant temp but no chance even though Stuart had them haul a few different types from American vehicles out to see if we could make a plan.
15 July – Muddy Creek pass (near Vail): Basically had to move today as we were running out of water and we have not been able to find water supply’s anywhere in the region so headed north again towards Vail as some of the fuel stations there allow water fill ups.
The drive was pretty easy and nice and quite which made a pleasant change but before hitting the road proper spent some time outside another auto parts store trying to figure out if any of their plastic glues would work on the coolant tank (it helps having a person with chemical background in the car) and then when we decided they wouldn’t, did some research of options on the internet for ordering a replacement – the big challenge is “what shipping address could we use????” as we are always moving… ultimately we couldn’t decide how to proceed so we hit the road instead
17 July – Lincoln Gulch (above Aspen): A relatively long detour today to come and check out the famous Aspen.
The turnoff to the valley up to Aspen is at Glenwood Springs, which looked really cool so we made a quick decision to park and have a walk around. Was such a good decision, as it turned out to be a really funky spot with lots of eateries (most beyond any price we would like to pay) but we did share a big cookie jar sundae (only $9 🤣).
After our walk-around we thought to camp up above town at a free spot but it turned out to be a bit creepy so decided to head up to Aspen as per our original plan.
Tania remembers Aspen as being quite small and funky from when she was here in 2002 but it certainly isn’t now, it heaves with dense housing, traffic and pretentiousness. As it was late we drove right through but don’t think we will be stopping on our way back either, Glenwood Springs looked way cooler.
Camp is 20km out of Aspen and roughly 600m in altitude higher, another night or two at 3000m…. Although the 600m altitude gain could just be the height we had to raise Mr J back tyre in order to get level 🤣
19 July – Pyramid Rock – Grand Junction: From “Bear Aware” to rattlesnake and scorpion aware country.
We decided to take the longer way around via Grand Junction towards Telluride rather than through the mountains hoping for less climbing and therefore an easy time on Mr J coolant system. Also, we weren’t sure of restrictions on the mountain route as there is a wildfire in that area. We have certainly swopped cool for very warm having dropped from over 3000m this morning to 1500 this afternoon. Overall though an easy drive and pleasant day.
21 July – Gunnison River Cliff Edge: We woke to full on load shedding at Mr J, the fridge last night had been acting up and got itself into a tizz from the heat and over cooling the fridge and under cooling the freezer which caused it to run hard all night. Somewhere around 1am, everything just shutdown including all “house electrics”. We had a similar issue on our last night in Guatemala just before the border which took hours of troubleshooting for the solution to ultimately be a quick swop of the “load” wires from one solar regulator to the other BUT of course this morning we couldn’t remember what that solution was 🙈 thankfully it did dawn on us not too far into the problem-solving process so we didn’t waste as much time as before. The bad news is that most meat had partially defrosted so we are going to have to run the “freezer” as a cold fridge now until that’s all used up, thankfully we only have around 2 weeks of meat in anticipation of the trip ending soon.
Once we eventually left camp this morning we set off to see if we could find any wild horses as we were in the Little Bookcliffs wild horse area, but when the track started to have a steep side slope and not knowing what was ahead we called it quits on the search. Some careful reversing in low range eventually got us to a point we could turn around at.
A simple cruise followed into Grand Junction we we refilled water tanks at Maverick, then Walmart and then laundry.
And then finally a short 30min hop out of Grand Junction to a free camp spot on the edge of the Gunnison River canyon. It’s a spectacular location but big rain/rhunderstorm is rolling in so for now our afternoon sundowners are being taken inside Mr J.
22 July – Corkscrew Gulch (above Ouray): Last night, perched on the cliff, we had the most stunning sunset and a super chilled evening but this morning we woke to our fair share of drama.
Then intention for the day was a leisurely cruise down to Ouray where we hoped to walk around and enjoy the sights of what is meant to be a very pretty town but when it come time to start Mr J we had zero dash lights or instruments (lights, indicators, horn etc) and while the starter would turn over he would not kick in. And occasionally the starter wouldn’t even turn over. And so started a problem solving exercise…
After checking the obvious culprits (battery voltage and fuses), Stuart was convinced it had to do with the ignition key – but had no clue where to even start looking. Thank goodness for starlink as we could get on the internet and Google plus ask questions of Defender owner groups. Armed with a little knowledge, the instrument panel was removed and the wires on back of ignition switch fiddled with which was when we spotted the “white plastic thingy” pushing away from the housing when the key was turned. This didn’t look right so with a glove on his hand (to avoid getting shocked), Stuart held it in place while Tania turned the key and voila Mr J started and stopped as soon as pressure on white thingy was removed – problem identified now how to fix it???
Zip ties and an old piece of aluminum bashed into shape to hold the zip ties on and we had a solution. Just to make sure we didn’t get off too lightly, putting the dash back together didn’t go as smoothly as normal, thanks to the new bracket obstructing it a bit but after 3 hours of frustration we had a running Mr J and hit the road just before lunchtime.
Now to hope the fix can hold for a couple of weeks until we reach Phoenix and can receive a replacement part.
Ouray greeted us with lots of rain and cold weather, so no walking around which is a pity as it looks like a very pretty town along with a hot springs complex. The water must have been warm as despite the rain and cold weather the pools were full.
The town is well and truly tucked in and surrounded by towering mountains and cliffs which limits camping close by, so we headed up the pass out of town and are camped in the forest. In theory we could head down into town tomorrow but Mr J might not appreciate having to climb the pass twice and Tania certainly won’t appreciate driving it a second time – zero guardrails, narrow lanes and huge drops don’t make for a happy passenger.
23 July – Durango area: The road from Grand Junction though to Durango via Ouray is probably the most “scenic byway” we have driven in all of America and we have driven our fair share this last 5 months. Towering cliffs and hills around Ouray followed by spectacular mountain passes over the continental divide on the way to Durango. All in all, a very nice drive.
Both Ouray and Durango impressed us from a town perspective, Durango in particular had many cute cottagy houses on the streets set off from the main road.
Mr J behaved pretty well considering the mountain passes and his coolant tank issue and started okay with the fix to his starter switch although he did cutout in two instances on starting but then fired straight back up again. The fix is working but may not be sustainable, so long as he can get us to Phoenix all will be good. In the mean time have placed an order for a replacement via Paddock in the UK to be delivered to Tatum in Phoenix
24 July – Rio Chaka recreation area: A slightly bigger hop south today towards Santa Fe. Mr J ran nicely although we are having to be a little cautious with the temps thanks to the coolant reservoir not holding pressure and therefore heating up quicker.
Camped below the Chama dam which is a US Army Engineer Corps facility and as with others run by them it is always well maintained and often in stunning locations. We even have gravel underfoot instead of dust and of course it is free
28 July – Santa Fe BLM land: While we were drinking our coffees this morning a Swiss couple cruised past and stopped to say hi, resulting in quite a nice and long conversation. One takeaway, it’s not just us feeling like you never really get to have conversations of substance with Americans, anything beyond an elevator speech makes them uncomfortable – they have had the same experiences.
Santa Fe is a really pretty town, famed for all its art and galleries. Initially we struggled to find parking as street parking requires an app to pay for the meters but the app is only available if your phone is a USA phone – grrr! Eventually we found a municipal parking lot which had a normal pay meter.
At this point it was well past lunch and a storm was brewing so we opted for a sit-down lunch of a delicious margarita, nachos and quesadillas. $60 later and we had a nice wander around town before driving 30min through initially a very nice country estate and then onto BLM land for a free camp spot.
Tomorrow we will go back into town for more exploring.
31 July – Tumbleroot Brewery, Santa Fe: It’s been a great few days in and around Santa Fe. Firstly exploring the old town, art galleries and so forth and then camping last night with Daniel & Gabriela from Switzerland who had spotted us camped on the river a few days ago.
Last night the 4 of us come to Tumbleroot Brewery hoping to catch some live music and good beers. We got the beers but sadly no music on a Wednesday evening. The other big attraction of the brewery was they allow overlanders to sleep in the car park, so no worries about drink and driving.
31 July – Manzanita Mountains, Albuquerque: The beginning of ticking off the miles towards Phoenix. Basically, just cruised down the interstate, with some holding on tight when a truck bore down on us – most trucks appear to exceed the 120km/h speed limit and with Mr J only doing 85 on the flats and substantially slower on the uphills it can get a bit hair raising…
Other than that it was a pretty easy day (some groceries, water refill as our second tank was dry, chat with the kids over lunchtime) and then a 30km hop into the mountains to this spot
1 August – El Malpais National Monument: A relatively short hop today of 150km, sticking to the interstates as we think that routing will be flatter and therefore friendly to Mr J and his coolant/heating issue.
Our campsite is an absolute score! It’s located in a very pretty spot below sandstone cliffs, each site has a big metal shade roof, with a braai and fire pit area along with pit toilets and even trash bins AND it is all for free.
The logic of which state/BLM campsites are free and which are not continues to baffle us.
2 August – Cibolla National Forest, Gallup: A short hop today before the free camping options run out and we need to do a bigger hop after that.
It’s quite amazing how yesterday we quite enjoyed our ride on the interstate (highways) and today was the opposite, lots of trucks going way to fast, pulling out from behind us later than necessary and in the worst case, tailgating us with possibly only a 3m gap. We were very glad to get off the highway and head into the forests. Hoping tomorrow, being a Sunday is a quieter day on the roads as it will be a much longer drive
3 August – Flagstaff National road, Sedona: A bigger hop than we planned, as there is really nothing around Holbrook (where we had hoped to stop) and despite it being early it was already very hot so we pushed on.
The Interstate 40 just got busier and and busier with trucks, all driving at 120km/h or more, often with a following distance of only a car! which made for a very stressful 100km or so.
Anyway, we have made it safely to another pine forest camp and are closer to Phoenix. Probably only 200km to go and 3 days to do that in, perhaps tomorrow we can find a slightly less sandy/dusty spot and even chill a day.
4 August – Red Rocks Rim (Sedona area): A very hot, dry and dusty camp spot! So much for our wishes of yesterday.
We had been hoping to break our last days into small legs, so today we walked around the very touristy town of Sedona. It is in a beautiful location, surround by red and yellow cliffs and sandstone formations but given that it is the end of our trip and we have already seen so many such formations we weren’t “in awe”.
Our camp spot has lovely views and a breeze which with temps in the 40’s helps but with fine red sand around everything (including ourselves) is coated in red sand. On the positive side Stuart has a defined six pack from where the sand has stuck to a sweaty stomach while sitting but left the folds white 🙈🤣.
Tomorrow we flee for Phoenix
5 August – Gilbert, Tatum & Bryce pozzie: And that’s a wrap for this trip, 9 months and 20 000km. All that remains is to prep Mr Jones for storage before we fly home for a much needed break.
Mr Jones has once again been a true officer and a gentleman, never leaving us stranded (although he did give us a some grey hairs) and now we owe him a new coolant reservoir and starter switch. The latter shall wait until our return in 2026 as it is a finicky job and we can’t afford for something to go wrong at this stage, anyhow the zip tie fix some 1400km ago is still holding up well. 44 Deg C temp today!!
6 August – Phoenix: Yesterdays entry “jinxed” the zip tie fix! Today we went to the stroage yard, to complete paperwork, get access, etc. When trying to drive away from the office, our zip tie fix for the starter packed up entirely – couldn’t even turn the key. A little bit of cursing, a lot of cajolling and a bit of force allowed Stuart to start him and keep him running if he held the key in place (which meant driving with one hand). It was thus an easy decision to park him and catch an Uber back to Tatum & Bryce. We will come on the weekend and try do a bit of clean and drain of water tanks etc, but what we will be able to do will be limited considering the excessive heat. At least Mr. J got us and himself to his holiday spot. We now know the first problem we have to solve when we return….