Hugo State Wildlife Area
Dave and Helen Damouth
www.damouth.org
9/8/2009 to 9/12/2009
Click Photo Album for the photos from this trip.
Wednesday, Sept 9, 2009: This trip was a last minute replan. This morning, the RV was all packed to leave for a trail-building project when the project leader called to say that the project was canceled. We might as well go somewhere. Helen needed to be in Colorado Springs on Saturday morning for an all-day class, so we decided to go explore the State Wildlife Areas (SWA) in the southeastern part of the state. These have been on our to-do list for years, and this seems like the perfect time of year to go there. We'll plan for a night or two in the SWAs, depending on what we find there, and then then Friday night we'll stay somewhere near Colorado Springs. Helen will drive to her class with the Jeep Saturday morning, and I'll return home with the motorhome.
We weren't able to leave until 4 pm. The drive was uneventful. The first, very familiar, part was about 120 miles east along Interstate 70. At Limon, we turned southeast on US-40, and then south on CR-109 (the maps also show this as CR-32), new roads to us. CR-109 is a good blacktop road. After about 14 miles, we turned east on CR-2G, a smooth, well-maintained gravel road. There is a "Hugo Wildlife Area" sign on this corner. After about 2.3 miles, we saw the well-marked entrance road to the SWA on our right (38.99368? N, 103.43625? W.) This unmaintained dirt road immediately branches, and the left branch led past an old concrete-block vault toilet to several parking spots adjacent to a small (perhaps two acre) lake (38.9343? N, 103.4302? W). Elevation at our campsite is 5000 feet.
This is one of many such man-made lakes in the region. The land is gently rolling, drained by short, shallow ravines which end in small depressions that are filled with water during wet years and are probably nearly all dry in drought years. Small earth dams have been built across some of the ravines to capture additional water. This region is arid almost-desert, perhaps getting an average rainfall of 10 inches per year. This summer has been unusually wet and the lakes are nearly full. The hills have a good crop of grass, which is still green in some areas. A herd of over 100 cattle, mostly Black Angus, are wandering through the area, looking fat, happy, and lazy.
(Click the photo or the above
link for a larger image.)
The total distance from home to this site, according to Street Atlas, is 133 miles, taking about 2 1/2 hours of travel time. We arrived about 6:30 pm, with an hour of remaining daylight to set up camp and explore a bit. When we arrived, a family was fishing from the shore across the pond from us. They left at dark, so we have the entire area to ourselves.
Colorado State Wildlife Areas are managed for multiple uses, including public hunting, fishing, and camping. Some or all the land in an SWA may also be leased to local ranchers for grazing or other agricultural use. Detailed descriptions of the various SWA's, including permitted and non-permitted activities, are at http://wildlife.state.co.us. Within this site, interactive maps for locating specific SWAs are at http://wildlife.state.co.us/apps/swa/. Camping facilities, if any, are generally limited to a more or less level parking area, a poorly maintained vault toilet, and in a few areas, a sun shade. As far as I know, none of the areas charge fees for admission or camping.
One reason for coming here was to find an area that is quiet, with dark nights and an unobstucted view of the night sky. We've certainly found that. We can see a yard light at three ranches, each several miles away, and also a distant blinking light on what I presume is a radio antenna tower. Sunset was around 7 pm, and by 9 pm it was fully dark. The star show was wonderful. The Milky Way was very bright, from horizon to horizon. Once our eyes were fully dark adapted, we could walk around our campsite by starlight - no flashlights needed. We can see a very faint glow on the western horizon, and aren't sure whether it is the lingering remains of sunset, or the lights of Colorado Springs, 75 miles away. There is also a very faint localized glow on the horizon to the north. Perhaps the tiny village of Hugo (about 6 blocks square and 14 miles north of us) has street lights? Around 10:30, a gibbous moon rose in the east, so we didn't get a chance to see if the western glow would have disappeared later.
During windless intervals (rare), the silence is almost absolute. Most of the time, we hear no man-made noises at all. Occasionally, we hear the faint rumble of a very high jet aircraft. This night is cool enough so that even the crickets are mostly quiet - just an occasional faint random chirp.
Thursday, 9/10: We woke to a slightly surreal mist-shrouded scene.
(Click the photo or the above
link for a larger image.)
(Click the photo or the above
link for a larger image.)
We had nothing planned except relaxation. In the morning, Dave went for a long rambling walk across the prairie to the south of our campsite. Even a mile or more from the nearest road, there are human artifacts - beer cans, other rusty containers, short lengths of barbed wire, rifle and shotgun shells, etc. I expect that most of this country is walked over regularly during hunting season. Old windmills are spinning in many places, but the few that I looked at closely were not actually pumping water. One that I examined seemed to be in good condition, and was spinning briskly in the moderate breeze. The pump actuator rod was moving up and down, but had been disconnected from the rod that extends up out of the well head. It's likely that the water table throughout this region has dropped well below the reach of these shallow wells.
One interesting plant That I saw along the way is a vigorous ground-hugging gray-leaved vine, with branches radiating out about six feet in all directions, making a star pattern. Each branch had several 2" to 3" diameter hard melon-like fruits, striped like a watermelon - dark green with pale stripes. We subsequently saw more of these along the road as we drove around the area. I believe this is cucurbita foetidissima (also called buffalo gourd, calabazilla, chilicote, coyote gourd, Missouri gourd, wild pumpkin, and various other names. See www.delange.org/Buffalo/Buffalo.htm. It is edible when young, but too bitter for human consumption when mature.
cucurbita foetidissima
Missouri Gourd
(Click the photo or the above
link for a larger image.)
It requires little water, is fast growing, and has a massive underground tuber (which can reach 4 to 6 feet long and weight more than 100 pounds). Natives used the fruit for decorative purposes and musical instruments, and attributed mystical and medicinal powers to the root. It has recently been evaluated as a possible feed stock for bio-ethanol production.
Flowering plants this late in the season are limited. Lots of sunflowers, well past their peak, a few pure white prickly poppies, some small asters, both blue and white, a single interesting blue-purple flower from the liatris family, lots of yellow rabbit brush, sticky yellow gumweed, a big patch of white bindweed. There are many different kinds of grass. Two cacti - lots of opuntia and occasional clusters of 1" almost spherical cactus. Lots of yucca. Interestingly, very few of the yucca had bloomed this year, although battered bloom stalks from the previous year were in evidence. The edges of the ponds had vigorous growths of cat tails. Wet areas in the bottoms of the ravines and near the ponds had stands of cottonwoods and small brushy willows. Some also had tamerisk.
A truck and horse trailer has parked on a rise perhaps 500 yards west of us. A guy saddled one of the horses, and spend the entire morning trotting back and forth along a gentle ridge from the truck down out of sight to the southwest and then back to the truck. Couldn't figure out what he was doing - perhaps just training the horse? A family fished for a couple of hours on the other side of "our" lake and then left. There is a slight hill just south of our campsite, and from the top of this hill, the vista opens out into seemingly endless, slightly rolling, prairie
(Click the photo or the above
link for a larger image.)
Near noon when we drove out, we noticed an old minivan had just parked in that same area. When we came back later, the van was still there and we went over and looked more carefully. A handwritten note had been taped to the vehicle, announcing that the owners would be back with a trailer to pick it up in a few days, and that "nobody was hurt". One front corner was dented, and the entire front windshield, front corner roof pilars, and part of the front roof sheet metal had been caved in. My guess is that they hit a cow on the road at fairly high speed. One rear tire was mostly off its rim, and the other had grass and weeds trapped between tire and rim, but still had some air, suggesting that they had gone off the road and spun fairly violently, but stayed upright. I suspect that they were able to drive, and limped along on the rim until they saw the truck and horsetrailer on the hilltop, and then drove in and parked next to it to and got a ride back to civilization.
In the afternoon, we took a long, rambling, drive around the area in the jeep. Fourteen miles to the south of us, Karval SWA (road turnoff from CR-32 at 38.7184? N, 103.4966? W) has a much larger reservoir than the little pond at Hugo, with an earthen dam that looked 50 feet high and several hundred yards long. On a hilltop above the lake, a picnic area had been built, with a couple of permanent canopies providing shade (but no picnic tables under the canopies - bring your own table.) There was sufficient level space to park several large RV's. One spot, right at the edge of the hill, had a great view out over the lake. The road leading to this picnic area was gravel, but well maintained. The last few hundred yards up the hill is steep - but would not be a problem for most RV's. Smaller roads, unmaintained and suitable only for high-clearance vehicles, led further back into the SWA and around the reservoir to other shore access points (but did not quite circumnavigate the water.) We saw no vehicles or people in this SWA.
We also found Kinney SWA a few miles North of Hugo SWA, accessed from CR-2J, about a mile east of CR-32 (turnoff from the road at 38.9660? N, 103.4596? W). Like Hugo, it has a small pond and a couple of small parking areas, at least one of which would be accessible to a large RV. One couple was fishing, and might have been staying overnight in their van.
As we drove around, we noted an interesting detail that attests to the severity of the winters and the strength of the wind out here on the plains: Nearly all of the fenced pastures (which may be half a mile square) have a large windbreak in the southeast corner of the pasture. Construction varies - some are a hundred-foot length of tall solid wood fence; others have an earth berm of the same length, buldozed up to 6 foot or more tall. A few are partly roofed over, providing some shelter from deep snow as well as wind. All are oriented perpendicular to the predominant northwest wind. In a storm, the cattle will drift downwind until stopped by a fence, hence ending up at the windbreak.
In the evening, we went for a leisurely walk along the road, and up some two-tracks into private ranch land to the north. Half a mile or so from the road, we came to yet another hidden ravine, with a fairly large lake in the bottom - which had been totally invisible until we were a few hundred yards from it. Along the way we saw some fairly fresh tracks that I believe were from a herd of pronghorn crossing the road. We had been watching for pronghorn all day, but never saw any.
The entire day was pleasant for exploring - moderate temperature, partially cloudy, with a high haze - nice for being outdoors, but not so good for our solar panels, which achieved less than half of their normal battery charging. The clouds lingered after sunset, so star watching was not good.
Friday, 9/11: Shortly after dawn, the wind swung to the northwest, started increasing, and a cloud bank appeared in the north. By 9 am, the little pond had whitecaps, the motorhome was swaying in the gusts, and tumbleweeds were bouncing across the prairie around us. Soon, clouds moved in and became a solid overcast.
Time to leave. We've pretty much used up our available time anyway, since we need to find a place to stay in or near Colorado Springs tonight so Helen can get to her morning meeting tomorrow. We do have cell phone service here - surprising. I called Garden of the Gods RV Resort in Colorado Springs and made a reservation for tonight.
The 90 mile drive took about 2 1/2 hours, mostly along SR-94 and US 24, narrow two-lane highways with a good asphalt surface, but little or no shoulders and no traffic. For the first hour, a very strong and gusty crosswind from the north made driving on the narrow roads somewhat difficult.
Garden of the Gods RV Resort is a pleasant place - friendly competent employees and lots of trees. It's large (196 full-hookup RV sites, plus tent sites and rental cabins), is close to the Colorado Springs tourist attractions, and has by far the best Trailer Life rating numbers in the urban area. So it's relatively expensive (about $40) and was nearly full in spite of the price.
Saturday, 9/12. We rose early, and Helen headed off to her 8:30 class while I took the motorhome back to Denver, getting home in Golden at about 10:30 AM.