I drove out to Colorado and met my buddy Mike(@artopium) at his place in Parachute. Mike had a great trip planned for us so we loaded up his van with camping supplies, gold prospecting gear, and all the doggies and then headed out on our adventure! Our first stop was Cache creek where we camped out in an Aspen grove for a few days and did some gold prospecting at the creek!

Roadside Scenery

The kiddos (Skinny, Pup, and Siris) all loaded up in the van

Heading up through the high country

Arriving at Cache creek

Running the Keene A52 sluice box at Cache creek

Feeding the sluice

Checking the sluice

We found some nice gold at Cache creek. So after a few days of digging we headed down through the Arkansas river valley and stopped in at the small town of Salida to sell the gold we found to help fund the second part of our adventure. That evening we setup camp there by the Arkansas river at the Elephant rock campground and then took a short hike up into the hills near the camp. There were a bunch of cool rock formations and we had a bunch of fun checking it all out. On our way back we watched a few rock climbers climbing around on one of the bigger cliffs before heading back to camp for the night.

Me standing on the banks of the Arkansas river

Taking a short hike near the Elephant rock camp

Mike and the kiddos on our hike

Some rock climbers near the camp

Then the next day we headed up to Clear creek where we spent a few days hiking around and exploring all the neat old mining towns in the canyon. We checked out Vicksburg, Rockdale, Winfield, and Hamilton! We didn't do any prospecting ourselves, but instead just spent our time hiking around enjoying all the absolutely incredible scenery!

Checking out Vicksburg

Mike with some old mining equipment at Vicksburg

An old wagon by one of the cabins in Vicksburg

Views from Clear Creek

A tailings pile in Rockdale that was full of quartz and pyrite

Cabins in Rockdale

Trail junction in Winfield

The Van in Winfield

Me enjoying the epic scenery

Old miners cabins

Mike checking out some old cabins at the base of Huron Peak

Epic Colorado mountain scenery

The Three Apostles

Huron Peak from Hamilton

Views from the meadow at Hamilton

Hiking up to an old mine

The meadows near our camp

Views from camp

Mike and Siris in the meadows by our camp

Camping by Clear Creek

Then after enjoying a few days camping and exploring at Clear creek we made one last stop in Leadville on our way back to Mikes place in Parachute. I stayed the night there and then drove back home to California the next day.

And that's it for this Colorado Adventure!

Big thanks to @artopium for inviting me out and for planning such an awesome trip!!

*all photos by @derekrichardson

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