Charlotte and George's Great Summer Adventure 2017: June 7th-9th, 2017 - Denver and the Great Sand Dunes of S. Colorado

G&C Summer 2017

Blogpost 013

July 7^th-9th

“Denver and the Great Sand Dunes of S. Colorado”

I find it conveniently amusing that both Charlotte and myself have a certain level of familiar connection to the state of Colorado; home of the Rocky Mountain range, the Denver Broncos, and the comedic duo that is Matt Stone and Trey Parker. It was also the birthplace of my mother and current residence of my fiancé’s Great Aunt Lynn and second cousins. If not for the later fact, we probably would have avoided the city of Denver altogether as there was no entomological value in this visit, but Charlotte’s connection with her family is powerful and I was more than happy to meet them as they are soon to be my family in a year or so.

Our drive from the Red Desert Rose RV Campground of Rawlins, CO spanned just over four hours, but as we pulled into Charlotte’s Nana’s cul-de-sac-home driveway our energy hissed out of us like a decade-old bounce house at a fat kid’s birthday party. Fortunately, our collective constitution held firm throughout initial introductions and the amazing taco-salad Chot’s Great Aunt Lynn whipped for us. Lynn must have sensed our depletion of stamina for after lunch she insisted we head upstairs to one of the bedrooms for a nap. As we’ve grown steadily older both my fiancé and myself have learned that while adulthood possess many freedoms and perks, what we often covet above all else is the chance to nap undisturbed. So, how could we refuse such an offer? Our heads were full of dreams before they even hit the pillows but it was not to last; Lynn had plans to keep us busy for the rest of the afternoon/evening.

As it turns out, one of Charlotte’s second cousins (Molly) works in radio advertising, which proved to be mutually beneficial for friends and family when a client-company happened to throw a big PR event. One of those client-companies happened to be a local brewery throwing a double-stage beer festival at the brewing plant. Tickets were open to the public running from fifty to a hundred dollars a pop. Molly’s work gave her eight with two having our names on them. Not at all what one can expect after an hour-long slumber of the “deep” and “heavy” variety.

Charlotte, like always was in good spirits to meet up with more family and spend the next five-hours among crowds of alcohol-frenzied free-spirits. I was groggy and in no mood to drink but mustered what little energy I’d regained from the nap to exchange pleasantries with the family while playing sober-observer with the crowds. My fiancé and I often play this game when we’re together in strange settings like these where the majority of occupants are dressed to the teeth in their finest LOOKATME-LOOKATME-ARN’T-I-INDIVIGUALIST costumes. The game involves one mentioning something unusually characteristic of an unusual character they see and the other successfully locating the culprit by announcing where they are:

For example, Charlotte might say something like, “Brotatos,” and after a quick scan I might say, “six-o’clock” at the trio of young men (who resembled a diet John Snow and Samwell Tully) wearing matching red-shirts with corncob patterned breast pockets stuffed with raw potatoes offering them out to anyone who would touch them like a person offering FREE HUGS but earthier. There were many exchanges like this throughout the festival and while there were far too many intriguing weirdoes I could go on about, the potato-boys were by far the most memorable. And yes, we both agreed to caress the potatoes.

George enjoying the pig roast

We spent the last few hours of the night back at Lynn’s house playing Oh-Hell! A strategy-based card game popular in Charlotte’s family which is like a mishmash of poker, war, B.S, and go-fish. There’s really no apt way to describe it other than it’s as fun as it is ferocious and by playing with Charlotte’s great aunt I’d discovered where she gets her borderline Mongolian warlord-like competitive nature. Unfortunately, despite the burning passion for victory harbored in both female card players I won by a landslide, which was only made more ironic as I was playing half-asleep. The games conclusion was made even more ironic when it became clear that my prize came in the form of insomnia, which lasted until the early-mid hours of the morning. After a couple hours of nightmare-infested dreams involving obsidian-eyed body snatchers and screaming phantoms we were awaken by the incising aroma of homemade pancakes and bacon made fresh by Lynn; her last gift to us before our travels to the Great Sand Dunes of southern Colorado.

The Great Sand Dunes are apart of the American National Park circuit, so of course I was completely oblivious to their existence and subsequently flabbergasted that not only were there dunes of sand in this state of such enormity to be considered Great. But as we crossed the flattened valleys of sage and wild horses to the park, the Great became more and more fitting for we could see from miles away the towering mountainous dunes stretching over the horizon like a panoramic 70mm screen-shot from Lawrence of Arabia.

We landed on the campgrounds in the early-mid afternoon and set up our tent with enough daylight hours to complete our mission for this particular visitation. As Charlotte would be pleased to tell anyone who asks; most robber flies (and especially the species/genus she’s studying) thrive in hot and arid environments like this one. So Charlotte armed herself with her favorite hunting net and I, like an infantry officer supplied the huntress with specimen vials for every successful capture.

As soon as we stepped foot onto the dune forest trail closest to camp, we knew we were in for an insect-rich experience as we became immediately swarmed with legions of kamikaze mosquitos. We were like top-of-the-line Tickle-Me-Elmos on Black Friday sought after by mobs of ravenous consumers. I know I’ve mentioned before that one of the chief reasons for my disdain of camping (as a whole) stems from the fact that blood-sucking parasites LOVE my blood and so as the first literal cloud of bloodsuckers came into my airspace I promptly flailed my arms like a stroke victim and ran off screaming in my most masculine high-pitched terror-voice. Charlotte had accounted for this and brought heavy-duty N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide or DEET bug-spray and after a quick poison-shower I we were ready to start the hunt over, free from mosquito interference, for the moment.

Once we crossed over the initial threshold of microscopic horror Charlotte spotted her first asilid; a beefy Promachus followed shortly by a massive Stenopogon and then another and another and another. We had hit what fishermen often refer to a particularly plentiful fishing spot as “in the zone.” Everywhere you looked there were robber flies of monster proportions, making them perfect for venom dissections, and even easier to spot-n-catch. We powered up and down the trail snatching asilids left and right. Even I managed to catch a couple, literally, I caught a pair of Efferia in the process of mating. They were not happy about it and upon their capture and containment proceeded to fight with the female coming up victorious, being the strongest of the two as insects typically are. No wonder my future bride is obsessed with these creatures, thank God we never fight.

As we finished our hunting hike we returned back to camp where we spent the last few hours drawing and writing. I woke in the morning to a mountain range of irritated bumps and bite-marks up and down every limb of my body. Charlotte was left untouched. Perhaps I should invest in an airtight skin suit for the future. We have so many more campgrounds to cover before summer’s end and at this rate I might not make it.

Hunting Stenopogon