Day 171 - Silt, Colorado - January 23rd, 2004

Yesterday we drove the 50 miles onto Glenwood Springs. We are going west on Intersate 70. We are in an RV park (mobile home park) in a place called Silt in the state on Colorado. We are camped right next to the Colorado river (in which we were fishing further upstream) and at this point it is about 60 feet wide.

This RV park is part long term residents and part overnighters like ourselves. There are a variety of caravans and RVs from a little shack thing up to a $150,000 RV coach type thing (very large bus turned into an RV). Some of the long term residents are clearly those unfortunate enough not to be able to live in a home of their own or who have chosen to live the nomadic caravan lifestyle (gypsies). Many of the caravans and RVs have very dirty 4 x 4 pick up trucks by their sides that contain heavy welding equipment and the such like. Working people scratching a living.

The town's name (Silt) kind of sums up the motley assortment of homes and business units in this little enclave nestled in a valley with the Rocky mountains towering either side. The main road has 3 bars a beer store and a gas station. This tells us something of what goes on here. I walked into the beer store (to replenish my own supplies) and it was a least 3 minutes before a lady appeared to serve me. The cash register (right next to the door) was on full view and the store was without video surveillance. Nice to know that even though they may drink they can be trusted not to rip off the beer store. Makes a big difference to the fortresses that shop keepers build around their tills in London.

We have found a baptish church right next to the school that kindly supplies me with my wireless internet connection. A fiend of ours from the US (Nick Haberman from Pittsburgh) advised me to find any school or university and sit outside it (which is easy to do in an RV) to get a free internet connection.

The church is a baptist church and operates from a nissan hut type of building. We took the RV to a local car wash (just next to the RV park) and hosed down the bikes and cleaned the RV as it was looking distinctly dirty. The boys and Julie cycled back to the RV park. We are all going to church on our bicylces today. Then we are going to Glenwood Springs (about 10 miles back east) where we are having a restaurant lunch and then going to the spa pools for an afternoon of relaxing. We will then get back on the road and do 2 or 3 hours driving to find our next RV park.