For weeks, my Xterra occasionally wreaked of something sweet yet foul.
The smell would come and go seemingly at random, and I couldn’t find whatever it was that was stinking up my Xterra. From the scent, I knew that it was a fruit of some sort, probably stuffed under the seat by my 15-year-old brother. But due to college and other obligations, I just never made the time to deep-clean my vehicle. Instead, I just drove with the windows rolled down.
That was until the semester ended and I finally made some time to clean my Xterra from top-to-bottom, as well as secure the heatshield to the Xterra’s frame, so it no longer made the most obnoxious rattling noise known to man as the engine idled. Donning rubber gloves and carrying a trashbag, on Monday morning I went to work looking for the rotten fruit. Under the seats I found several empty cans of Zevia Cola (which I’ve been drinking instead of Diet Coke), some melted Halloween candy, and finally a little green ball that was once an orange. I couldn’t help but dry-heave as I pulled it out from under the passenger seat and tossed it into the trashbag.
Moving on to the trunk, I pulled everything out: fishing gear, blankets and pillows from my previous trip to a cabin, bottles of water, shopping bags, my YakTrax ice grippers, extra hats and gloves, and a coat I’d been missing for quite some time. Once everything was out and tossed onto the front porch, I got the Shop-Vac and sucked up all of the dust and dirt that had accumulated in the trunk over the last year or so.
Finally, I put the pillows and blankets in the washer and dryer, put my fishing gear in the garage (I hadn’t renewed my fishing license yet), and started making a list of all the things I’d need for my birthday stay at a cabin near Steamboat Springs.
We’d only be staying there for a total of two nights, but knowing the remoteness of the cabin we’d be staying in, I topped off the gas in the evening before leaving, and packed liberally early the next morning. I packed enough supplies to last five days, and clothes heavy enough to keep me warm well below freezing. I also packed my own bedding, which took up almost half of the space in the trunk. Oh well… There was still plenty of room for my grandparents’ things (and, of course, us).
Minutes after I stuffed the last pillow against the side window of the trunk, my grandparents pulled up on the street behind me, with huge grins on their faces.
“Are ya ready to go?!” my grandma Connie called out as she stepped out of their silver Honda Pilot.
“Absolutely!” I replied as I went in for a hug, “I was too excited to sleep much last night!”
Indeed, I barely slept a wink the night before. I tossed and turned in bed, anxiously awaiting the morning. I eventually fell asleep, but woke up when my dog, Toby, started barking and kicking me in his sleep. After waking him up, I turned to go back to sleep, but not very heavily. As soon as my body registered an iota of sunlight in the dusky sky through one of my bedroom windows, I was up and at ‘em in seconds! I was just so damn excited to escape to the remote wilderness of Colorado for my birthday!
At exactly 10:00 AM, we drove off in my Xterra. My grandpa had the wheel, my grandma rode shotgun, and I sat directly behind my grandma with Toby by my side and my camera in my lap. After the Bald Eagle flew over my head at Chatfield State Park over Spring Break, I vowed to never be caught without my camera ready to go again. Only God knew what I’d see between my house and the ranch, after all.
Because it was a Tuesday morning, there was hardly any traffic (for Colorado standards, that is). Of course, the 470 to I-70 junction was a bit clogged up. But as soon as we got through Mount Vernon Canyon, the road opened up and it was smooth sailing from there.
We followed I-70 into Silverthorne, where we stopped for gas, snacks, and a much-needed bathroom break. Up there, it was cold. Not cold enough for the drizzle to turn to flurries. But certainly cold enough to warrant a coat, which I dug out from the trunk as I kept Toby’s leash tied to my waist. Toby waited patiently for me to put my coat on, before I led him across the parking lot to a line of yet-to-bud Aspens where he could mark his territory. It was there I took my first photo of the adventure using my beloved Rebel T7: A zoomed in picture of the snow-capped Keller Mountain.
After taking such a serene photo in a parking lot that was anything but serene, I leaned my back against the side of the Xterra and people-watched with Toby while I waited for my grandparents to return.
The drive out of Silverthorne was uneventful as I watched rugged forests of Douglas Fir turn to rolling hills of sagebrush. Occasionally, I’d spot a herd of pronghorn hiding out in the sagebrush, too far from the highway for me to get a picture. So instead, I’d wait for the signs and telephone polls to disappear before I rolled down my window and shot pictures of the landscape.
My heart skipped more and more beats the more remote we got, not out of fear but out of excitement. Finally, after over a year of being pent up in the concrete jungle and the immaculate lawns of suburbia, I could be free from that for a few days. Of course, every forty miles or so, there was a mountain town of some sort. But every mountain town we passed seemed smaller than the last. Till we got to Steamboat, of course, which is a town roughly the same size and aesthetic as Breckenridge, and growing.
A giant crane stood almost in the center of Steamboat while construction workers repaved sidewalks, roadways, and added more and more concrete layers to the skeleton of a soon-to-be apartment complex. Every car coming from every direction was funneled through the town on Lincoln Avenue, which is where we parallel parked in order to grab some lunch.
As much as I didn’t want to stop, I was getting very hungry and didn’t like the idea of cooking anything once we reached our destination. After covering my camera with several layers of coats and blankets, I ventured out onto the busy streets of Steamboat Springs with Toby and my grandparents. Instantly, I could feel myself getting anxious and irritated by all of the noise and commotion going on around me. It felt much more like walking around the city of Denver on a Friday afternoon than a mountain town on a Tuesday during mud season.
Underneath the constant noise of construction machines and squealing brakes as a nearby stoplight turned red, I heard my grandma’s voice calling to me, but I didn’t catch what she was saying.
“What was that?!” I shouted.
“What should we get for food?!” grandma shouted back over the city ambience.
“Uhhhh…” I growled as I quickly scanned the area for food.
Because we had Toby, we couldn’t go to any sit-down restaurant. But, I did spot a Greek restaurant selling gyros directly across the road from where we parked. My stomach growled as I thought about having myself a delicious lamb gyro drenched in tzatziki sauce.
“Over there!” I pointed across the busy road, “There’s a Greek restaurant and some outdoor tables!”
“That sounds great!” my grandma smiled, “Let’s go there!”
We got to the crosswalk just in time for the red light to turn green again, meaning we had to wait a couple minutes for our chance to cross the ridiculously busy intersection. Again, it felt too much like Denver and not enough like the wilderness getaway I was hoping for, and I was getting increasingly anxious and overstimulated. Thankfully, the gyro restaurant was located on the sunken level of a small shopping plaza, where the noise didn’t travel so far and there weren’t many people. Once we got there, the sounds of traffic and construction were muffled, replaced by a rock radio station playing through quiet outdoor speakers.
Toby and I hung out in the shade of the building nearby the front door of the gyro restaurant while my grandparents ordered our food. I told my grandparents exactly what I wanted, so I was a little confused when they came out of the restaurant moments later with menus to show me.
“They don’t serve lamb here,” my grandpa Lyle said, “They only do chicken, beans, and falafel for the protein.”
“Huh.” I sighed, “Guess I’ll have the chicken then.”
“Alrighty. I will get that for ya!”
“Perfect. Thank you.”
Five minutes later, the three of us were seated in the shade with gyros that were almost too hot to hold, while Toby sat by my side hoping I’d share my meal with him. Unfortunately for Toby, I wolfed that gyro down so damn fast. After all, I just wanted to eat and get the hell outta dodge! But my grandpa, who also purchased a chicken gyro, was kind enough to give Toby some of that delicious grilled chicken.
Unlike me, my grandparents savored their meals, so I was forced to sit in my discomfort for another fifteen minutes or so. It was taking a lot of my energy to keep my anxiety from expressing outward, but when a wasp buzzed by my ear, my resolve failed.
“Woah there, granddaughter.” my grandpa laughed as I launched myself out of my chair (without trampling Toby) and glanced around wildly looking for that wasp, “It was just a bug.”
“Well… a wasp.” I corrected my grandpa between panicked breaths, “The thing went right by my ear!”
“Regardless, it wasn’t interested in you.” my grandma added, smiling.
“Still…” I sighed as I cautiously sat back down, “I don’t like ‘em one bit.”
“You never have.” my grandpa said, “You’ve always been pretty fearful of those little flying critters. I remember the time you nearly took out the entire coffee table because of a little miller moth. Don’t you?”
I knew exactly what my grandpa was talking about.
“Uhhh… yeah…” I mumbled, “How could I forget?”
“You were trying to be brave by facing your fear of the moth… and you were so close to swatting it with your flyswatter. Then, it took off towards you, and you jumped straight back into the coffee table and broke a glass as you fell onto the floor!” my grandpa reminisced, “You then got up and bolted out the front door, where you waited for me to take care of it. I thought, sheesh, all of that drama over a little miller moth.”
“I mean… at least I tried, right?” I shrugged with embarrassment.
“That, you did.” my grandpa agreed, “And you were very brave for twelve-year-old-you for doing that. I’m just glad you didn’t get hurt when you rushed into the coffee table so fast.”
“Mhm.” I nodded.
“Goes to show that it wasn’t the moth that was the problem. Your response to it was the problem.” my grandpa explained, “Same could be said to how you just responded to the wasp buzzing by a few minutes ago.”
“Mhm.” I nodded again, hoping the subject would change.
Suddenly, my grandma finished her meal by loudly crumpling up the aluminum foil that once held a bean gyro, which made me jump yet again.
“Oh, Maya…” my grandpa laughed, shaking his head, “You remind me of your great uncle’s horses.”
“Well, I’m ready to get outta here.” I announced as I stood to my feet, “Clearly, I need to get away from the city and anything resembling it. I should calm down then.”
“Ah, so that’s what’s getting you.” my grandma commented as she brushed bits of our food off the table into her hand, “Good thing we’re headed out, then.”
“Off like a herd of turtles!” my grandpa yelled.
We arrived to Elk River Guest Ranch right on time. On the ranch were five cabins in a row, with ours being sandwiched in the middle of them, directly behind a hogan-like building with a sign that read “The Saloon” above the door. While it wasn’t as remote as I was picturing (given the proximity of our cabin to the others), I was still satisfied. After all, we were alone, as nobody else had booked any cabins due to it being the mud season. We were also surrounded by acres and acres of untouched wilderness. The ranch itself had fifty acres of land, including about an acre or so down by the Elk river, and surrounding that in all directions was public land in the Routt National Forest.
I was so excited to spend the next 48 hours practically alone, with nothing but the wildlife and wildflowers to keep us company.
But as we pulled up to our cabin to unload our things, a huge German Shepherd came trotting towards us from the furthest cabin in the row. He was looking straight at us, his ears and head up high. But he wasn’t barking and his tail was wagging, so maybe he was friendly. Toby, on the other hand, instantly erupted into screams and barks the moment saw the German Shepherd (yes, Toby likes to scream at other dogs for some reason). As he’s grown older, Toby has gotten more reactive towards strange dogs, and I knew it would be a bad idea to take Toby out around an unleashed dog of any kind, let alone a strange German Shepherd.
After sniffing around the Xterra while I held Toby’s mouth shut, the German Shepherd trotted back to his cabin and disappeared around the corner. Cautiously, my grandpa and I stepped out of the Xterra while grandma called the ranch owner to ask about the dog. I kept my head on a swivel while I unloaded the Xterra, still unsure of if the German Shepherd would be back, and if he would be friendly.
Last time I ran into an unleashed German Shepherd, I was staying with Clarke at his house in Elizabeth when, out of nowhere, an aggressive German Shepherd with a beautiful black coat came around the side of the house and lunged at me. I don’t recall the details (it was five or six years ago), but I do remember holding up my duffle bag like a shield to block that thing from ripping my face off, right as his incredibly apologetic owner came sprinting around the corner to rescue me. Turns out, the dog belonged to one of Clarke’s roommate's friends, and I just needed to shake his owner’s hand to show that I was a friend.
That memory remained at the forefront of my mind as I brought all of our stuff in, with Toby being the last to leave the Xterra. However, Toby had to pee again before I brought him inside the cabin. I took him to the giant spruce tree growing along the front porch, and dragged him inside as soon as he was finished.
Inside, the cabin felt way smaller than it seemed online. Its main room contained a living area, a cast-iron gas stove, a small dining table, and an equally cramped kitchen. Still, it didn’t feel claustrophobic in any way. I felt much safer now that I was in the cabin, with a thick metal door between myself and the prowling German Shepherd.
All of the furniture was small yet comfortable. There wasn’t too much clutter on the walls or the bookshelf. And everything was neatly organized and smelled slightly of Pine-Sol.
The bedrooms were just as clean and cozy. While my grandparents took the bedroom with the queen-sized bed, I took the bedroom with the bunk bed and stripped off the bedding on the bottom bunk to replace it with my own. Like the rest of the cabin, my bedroom was small, with log walls and a rustic red door. It had one window facing out towards a treeless pasture, which backed into a mountain forested with barren Aspen trees.
“I bet that mountainside’s just beautiful in the fall…” I thought as I made my bed and set up Toby’s kennel next to it.
As soon as the ranch owner got back to us about the German Shepherd, which she explained belonged to a woman who lived at a cabin on-site full time, grandma Connie and I ventured outside together to get a lay of the land. I had my camera pack slung over one shoulder, and my tripod pack slung over the other. We left Toby with grandpa Lyle just in case the German Shepherd, that was said to be friendly, made his reappearance, and started walking towards the east, where the pasture and river access were said to be located. But before we explored the wilderness, my grandma wanted to meet the owner of the ranch, who was just pulling up next to the Xterra in a lifted F-150 with a winch mounted to its grill.
As soon as the truck parked, two people and two (much friendlier-looking) dogs jumped out of the truck at once. The woman who was driving didn’t look much older than me, and she called out to us, “Hello there! You must be grandma and granddaughter!”
“Yes!” my grandma Connie nodded, reaching out to shake the ranch owner’s hand, “Nice to meet you finally. What a beautiful place you’ve got here.”
“Aw, thank you.” the woman smiled, “I’m just here with my tech guy setting up the internet in our largest cabin, so you guys should have connection after all!”
“Oh, how neat.” grandma said, “Not that we really need it. Maya insisted we got as remote as we could to get away.”
“Yeah, that’s what most guests say when they come here.” the owner answered as she reached out to shake my hand, “And I’d say you came to the right place to get away. We’re blessed with fifty acres of land that backs into thousands of acres of public land, all of which you’re more than welcome to explore.”
I reached a closed fist out towards one of the mutts that came to say hello, while the ranch owner continued, “Across the road are the stairs to access the river. We have about an acre of land down there for guests to enjoy. During the summer and fall, people come here to fly fish all the time. But right now, the waters are extremely violent due to all the snow and rain we’ve been getting this year, so be careful but don’t be afraid to go down there.”
The woman then turned to pasture behind us and began, “In the summer and fall, we keep horses and run an all-inclusive dude ranch here. But in the winter and spring, we keep the horses on their winter and springtime pastures and allow guests to access all fifty acres. If you follow that tractor trail through those orange gates, it’ll take you all the way down to a spruce grove where we have picnic tables set up near a creek. We also have a hunting shed and a shooting range for hunters to use in the fall. Again, you’re more than welcome to explore all of it. Just beware of the mud.”
“How fun!” my grandma clapped her hands together.
“Yeah, this place sure is beautiful.” I muttered as I gazed over the whole eastern horizon.
“Oh, it is.” the ranch owner agreed, “My grandparents had very good reasons to come here from Wyoming way back when. In fact, in the hogan labeled ‘the saloon’, we have several booklets in there explaining the story of the Elk River Guest Ranch, along with a bar, board games, and cable TV. The TV is also hooked up to a Roku with access to Netflix and some other channels if you’d like.”
“You’ve just got a little bit of everything.” I chuckled.
“Yes we do!” the ranch owner laughed, “I’ll leave you guys to explore it for yourselves and make this place your home. Once again, thank you so much for staying here and don’t hesitate to reach out if you need anything… I’ll make sure the German Shepherd stays on his leash while y’all are here.”
With that, grandma and I bee-lined it to the stairs that led down to the river. The rickety stairs were marked with a bright red “NO TRESPASSING” sign, and the river was already deafening.
“Are your legs healthy enough to bring ya down here?” I asked my grandma over the sound of the river, knowing her legs occasionally went numb due to some neurological issue, “They’re pretty sketchy.”
“Oh yeah…” my grandma brushed me off, “I’ll be fine, especially with this railing here.”
“You can grab ahold of me if you need.” I offered.
“Oh, no. You go right ahead. I’ll meet you by the river!”
“Alright, then.”
My grandma went down those stairs with little trouble while I skidded down ahead of her. I first glanced up at the 200-foot-tall Douglas Firs, not just to admire the trees, but to make sure no bears or mountain cougars were up there waiting to pounce on us. Then I moved to the rocky banks of the river and my heart filled with excitement as fast-moving water roared past with such speed that I could feel its breeze.
Those waters were definitely way too swift to stand in and fish from, so I didn’t feel bad at all about not having my fishing gear or my fishing license. I did, however, have my camera and a filter to take long-exposure pictures of the moving water.
Aside from the breeze generated by the waters, there wasn’t a puff of wind. That made it perfect to take seconds-long exposure shots of the water moving past, while the trees and camera stood still.
I set my bags of gear down on the rocky, river-washed beach, and set up my tripod and camera to face a dead Douglas Fir stump directly across the water. Then, I put a filter on my 55 mm camera lens to darken the light so I could take seconds-long shots of the water as it rushed by. Finally, I connected a remote to my camera, took my seat on a smooth granite boulder nearby, and started clicking the remote to take multiple, 20-second-long exposures of the Elk river.
Meanwhile, I could hear and see my grandma exploring the beach further, keeping an extra eye out for any wildlife that may be around. As soon as I was done taking a set of pictures, I decided to join my grandma in exploring the rest of the beach. As quickly as I had it set up, I had my camera put away and slung over my shoulders. But just before I scrambled my way up some rocks, I heard a strange cracking noise coming from upriver.
Chills shot up my spine as I wondered what could make such a tremendous noise that not even the river could drown out. My mind immediately went to the worst-case scenario: a mama moose charging at us through the trees to protect her calves from us. But before I could panic (yet again), I noticed a full-sized Douglas Fir coming down the rapids, crashing over rocks and smaller logs that had piled up along the shore.
“Wow! Look at that!” I heard my grandma call from the rocks above.
Meanwhile, I just stood still in awe of this massive log as it passed by almost as fast as the water. It was closer to the other side of the river, so I wasn’t in any danger of being wiped out by it. Still, I could hardly believe what I was seeing. All I could do was stand on the shoreline astonished by the power of the Elk river in the springtime, while being glad I was standing on dry ground.
That was until the floodgates in the sky burst open, and began spitting heavy, wet sleet on us. Oh well… it was getting close to dinner time anyway.
Here, I removed my Theology discussion with my grandparents, and jumped immediately to after dinner to keep the tone as-is.
Nothing but the distant rush of the Elk river filled the air as I took Toby out one more time before bed. It wasn’t yet completely dark; the sky was a deep, navy blue except for some pink and gold clouds near the western horizon. But it was dark enough to keep me a little on edge while I followed Toby around the yard. It was very damp and cold, and I could taste the crisp, mountain mist in the air. If the sky wasn’t blanketed in clouds, I would’ve been able to see the entire Milky Way. Perhaps, I would’ve even seen the Northern Lights.
However, instead of staying up and waiting for the skies to clear, as soon as Toby was finished doing his thing, we went to bed in the warm, safe cabin. I fell asleep when the sky was still a tinge of blue, and woke up again to the same-colored sky. Except for it was much colder in the cabin. I rolled over to check the time, and my phone read 5:35 AM.
“Welp, might as well get up, Toby.” I yawned as I stretched.
Toby poked his fluffy head out from underneath my bright red comforter and wagged his tail. It was so cold that neither of us wanted to leave the bed, until I finally decided to just rip the covers off and get dressed in my warmest clothes as fast as I could.
I decided to layer up for the day, meaning I wore leggings underneath my jeans and a long sweatshirt over a T-shirt, and a hoodie over that sweatshirt. I then pulled on a pair of my warmest socks, brushed out the knots in my hair, and headed out into the main room of the cabin to turn up the heat.
Once again, I found myself tasting the air outside as I waited for Toby to finish sniffing around. That time, it was much colder and crisper than the night before. Overnight, glistening frost formed on every surface exposed to it, and none of it had been warmed by the sun just yet. Above, fluffy, wispy clouds moved eastward in the mountain-blue sky. To the east, the sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon, waking up the robins who noisily chirped in the trees around me. Soon enough, the sun would be high enough in the sky to burn away the frost.
But before the frost could completely disappear, I put Toby in the cabin and rushed back outside with my camera, already equipped with the macro-lens to get up close pictures of the frosty foliage. Before I even made it past the line of cabins, I came across a cluster of bright yellow flowers poking out of the grassy soil. At first it was the color that caught my attention, but what kept it was the fact that the oddly-shaped flowers opened downwards instead of upwards, and seemed totally unbothered by the frost that had encased them.
I later found out that these peculiar little flowers were called Glacier Lilies, and they grew all over the place by the cabin. Those Glacier Lilies thrived on the dark, saturated soil found in the floodplain on which the cabins were built. Because Glacier Lilies are high-altitude flowers, they evolved to survive springtime frost. So long as their roots didn’t freeze solid, they wouldn’t die.
Among the numerous Glacier Lilies, I found an equally bright-yellow flower, though it opened up to the sky like most other flowers. I knew that the four-pedaled flower was called a Sagebrush Buttercup. That meant that sagebrush had to have been growing nearby.
I found the iconic Big Sagebrush growing in the far pasture, towering over the Glacier Lilies, Sagebrush Buttercups, and Spring Beauties that grew beneath each bush. The ground squelched beneath my feet as I carefully stepped around flowers and found a place to kneel down and grab a big handful of sagebrush leaves. I could already smell the sagebrush before, but as I stripped the velvety leaves off a small branch, the scent of sage was almost overpowering.
Oh, did I love the smell of fresh sagebrush in the morning!
As I relished in the scent of sage and muddy soil in the morning light, something white caught my eye to my left. When I turned, I noticed a huge collection of sun-bleached bones scattered along the ground. At first, I thought maybe I came across the remains of a cow or a deer. But then I found the skull resting under a huge mop of rounded, silver plants. Clearly, I just stumbled upon the remains of a horse.
I didn’t dare disturb that horse’s final resting place. Instead, I simply knelt down by the skull and started snapping pictures. Even in death, that horse was a work of art.
The noise of rushing water caught my ears as I stood to my full height after taking artsy photos of the sun-bleached skull. I followed the noise into a grove of tall Douglas Firs, which sheltered a log picnic table adjacent to a waterfall of spring-melt rushing down the leeside of the mountain. Dotting the muddy, mossy ground where even more Glacier Lilies and Sagebrush Buttercups. As much as I tried not to step on them, it was impossible not to as I found a seat on the log picnic table.
I wasn’t there for long, as I could feel myself getting hungrier by the minute. I figured my grandparents would be up and making breakfast by then, so I gathered my things and carefully stepped my way towards a splintered log bridge, crossing over the stream of spring-melt and following a barely-visible tractor path back towards the cabin.
That tractor path banked towards the mountain base and into the aspens. The robins and the scrub jays kept me company as I carefully stepped over rotting logs and mossy granite boulders that stuck out of the darkened soil, all while the Aspens stared me down with their eerie, eye-like knots. There, I saw only a handful of Glacier Lilies, as well as the occasional patch of Short-styled Bluebells, which I stopped to get up-close pictures of.
Right as I approached the gate heading out of the pasture, something grey to my right caught my eye. I glanced over my shoulder and spotted the feathery remains of a bobcat’s dinner. At least, that’s what I assumed it was, because all that remained were two Dusky Grouse tail feathers stuck into the soil, surrounded by tiny bone fragments and fresh bobcat scat. The tail feathers were in perfect condition, so I snagged them and brought them back to the cabin to be thoroughly cleaned with rubbing alcohol.