We left Karen home with Emerson, and I took Bodie and Jasper up to the Great Sand dunes. The mosquitoes weren’t bad while we played in the stream, but as soon as we moved away from the stream it was INSANE. It was the most mosquitoes I have ever seen. Swarms of them would attack the car, you could see them from twenty feet away through the windows. When the car stopped, they would swarm, before you even got out.
From the dunes tourist area, we left the crowds and pavement behind on the 4WD road up Medano creek, in search of a campsite (and higher altitudes). We ended up using the tow rope to pull out another vehicle that was stuck in the first sand trap (this is the second time now that I’ve pulled someone out of that sandtrap). Even getting out of the car for that was miserable with mosquitoes.
We drove farther up the valley, briefly exited the Xterra to consider camping, promptly discarded that notion to retreat back into the car. All three of us hunkered down in the car and I told the boys we were just going to keep driving until the mosquitoes disappeared, even if it took all night.
We ended up driving all the way to the top of the pass, left behind all the beautiful aspens, and came out into a dead-feeling pine forest, dense and unhealthy. But evidently unhealthy for mosquitoes too, because it was perfectly bearable bug-wise… which made it a wonderful camping spot for us.
The next day we drove back to the dunes for another session of dad-digs-a-big-hole and laying in the stream. We weren’t going all the way back up Medano for the second night of camping though. Instead I decided to drive towards home via a different route, up over Cumbres pass, so that we could camp at a spot that I knew west of Trujillo Meadows.
And would you believe it: at that spot the horse flies were awful. Bearable, if only just. It turned out to be a super fun trip, but the bugs were the worst part.
By the way in the video at the bottom I mistakenly repeatedly refer to Medano pass as Hayden pass. Also, fyi, “poop face” instead of “cheese” got me the smiles I needed for pictures…
