Father's Day Weekend -- Bogan Flats Campground Marble, CO

It seems like Father's Day weekend marks the beginning of summer fun in the Colorado mountains.  The snow has melted and the Grand Valley is too hot to do anything fun outside.  This year we were organized and made a plan with our friends, the Dorrs, to camp West of Marble, Colorado.  Mike and I have been "eyeing" the area since we've been camping around the Aspen area for the last few years.  We reserved a campsite at the Bogan Flats Campground which sits right on the Crystal River.  We opted to reserve one that was removed from the river since four kids, one of whom can be a bit single minded, and the ranging torrent of the snowmelt fueled Crystal River was too scary.  

Mike was on-call on Friday so the girls and I went up  earlier in the day.  Thankfully Mike didn't get called in and was able to pack the car and come up as soon as his call period was over.

When we arrived we were greeted by the campground host and introduced to the brand new bear boxes.  We are very fond of these ever since camping outside of Lake Tahoe in 2013.  They keep the bears and us safe and are a nice way to stay organized.  The girls spent the first hour or so organizing our bear box.  Mostly this meant Alma sorting the food and Emma sitting in the box disarranging the food much to her sister's chagrin.  

While the girls sorted food, I attempted to put up our tent -- the big one!  It turns out that in the last twenty years I haven't set up many tents and don't have much practice.  More than once I was wishing Mike could descend upon me to fix my mistakes.  At one point I was trying to help Emma get some crackers because she was "ungry" and Alma is yelling "MOMMY I NEED YOU!"  My response was to wait a minute.  She fired back with, "BUT THE TENT IS BLOWING AWAY AND I CAN'T HOLD ON ANY LONGER!"  Sure enough the tent, which I hadn't finished staking down, was upside down in the trees with Alma holding one small strap.  With a little teamwork -- an eight year old on one corner and a two year old on another -- we got the tent set up and it was a nice spot for us to spend the weekend.

Not long after we built our home away from home, the Dorrs arrived and set up their camper. The girls thought the beds inside the camper were pretty fantastic.  They also thought the arrival of their friends was pretty fantastic too.  Emma let Elli pack her around and Alma and Avery disappeared in the grass and trees behind the campsite to be scientists.

A couple of years ago the girls and I bought Mike this hammock for Father's Day.  We thought he would like to relax in it but mostly the kids spend endless amounts of time playing in it.

Sadly, Saturday morning Avery woke up with a tummy bug and they had to go home but they left Elli to play and camp with us for the weekend.  After they got on the road we went into the town of Marble.  We went to the ruins of the Marble Mill which is a National Historic Site.  This is where the marble for the Lincoln Memorial and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier came from.  We walked among the remnants trying to imagine what it must have been like.  The mill was built at the base of an avalanche path that more than once ran to the mill and caused destruction.

Evenings brought yummy camping food which included brats and s'mores.  It isn't hard to drum up smiles from everyone when that is the menu.

On Father's Day we went on an "aventure" to quote Emma.  There is a hiking trail on the map that leaves from the campground and heads upstream between the road and the Crystal River.  It turns out that it really just follows the location of the buried phone line.  We ended up on a quintessential Mike "walk about" where there isn't a destination just a wander.  All three girls got to eat a mini-wild strawberry and we had a fantastic lunch of apples, p.b. and jerky next to the river in the shade of the trees.  Our feet got wet and the girls discovered that trusting Mike and his off-trail travels is fun!

We got back to camp and we were all melting.  Emma was melting because of a lack of nap, the ice and I were melting from the heat so we decided to drive to Carbondale.  I promised the girls a treat and they were more than game to cool off.  It offered another couple chances to check out the Redstone castle from the road too!  Emma napped, I bought ice and we found ice cream.  Everyone was happy.  Poor Em doesn't look too happy because of her swollen mosquito bites.  The mosquitos thought that all three girls were delicious and left me and Mike alone.

On the drive from our campground to Carbondale I noticed a few people playing on a gravel bar next to the Crystal River.  It was right near the Redstone Campground so on our way back up the valley I decided to check it out.  Some cold water on my feet would do the trick to really cool me off.  We found what we came to understand was called Redstone Beach.  It is a gravel bar upstream from a pool of slackwater that is created from a large boulder and a down tree.  The girls spent an hour and a half making sand castles and dipping their feet in the frigid water.

I spent the hour and a half chasing Emma to keep her out of harms way.  She is more than daring in water.

Meanwhile Mike decided that he would drive up towards Schofield Pass and then ride his bike or fish.  He didn't fish but he did have a chance to ride.  He found Lizard Lake and the iconic Crystal Mill.  He vows to take us to Lizard Lake to camp sometime but I'm not much for 4-wheeling and I'm really not for 4-wheeling on deadly passes.

Crystal Mill

Lizard Lake

For Father's Day night Elli and Alma put together the present that we had been planning to give Mike.  He can't stand selfie sticks and his disdain for them was solidified in May at the Grand Canyon when he was clotheslined on multiple occasions.  We decided that we would duct tape a play phone to a stick so he could have a selfie stick.  Emma managed to stash the little play phone we brought in an undisclosed location only to be found when we were departing so Elli and Alma made a paper phone.  We had Mike close his eyes ...

and we presented him with his stick.  It took a while for him to realize that it was a joke.  As you can tell he just loves to take fake selfies with it!

Monday morning meant that we had to pack up and head home.  Not without a picnic and some time playing in Sopris park in Carbondale.

We have camped out ten nights of 2016 so far!  We are pretty proud of our little camper crew.  They were all sad to go home.  We thought about our highlights from the trip.  The Alma and Elli felt like Redstone Beach was the best.  Emma thought everything was pretty great but she was very intrigued by the deer that resided behind our campsite one of which had an injured leg.  Mike and Alma thought seeing an Ermine drag a chipmunk into its hole for lunch was pretty cool.  Mike and I were really impressed with how cautious Emma was around the campfire.  We all agreed that we needed baths and that we needed to camp with the Dorrs again!