[Journal entry for January 4, 2019; the Oro Grande Trail, Dillon Colorado] Dallas and I parked at the hiker’s lot near the big water tank along Road 51 in Dillon Colorado. We walked the Oro Grande (Spanish for “Big Gold”), a woods road that follows the open, lower flank of Tenderfoot Mountain, roughly paralleling the southeasterly trend of Route 6. The trail also parallels a big ditch, six feet deep at least, and twice as wide, that we suppose is some sort of firebreak. The trail crosses large fields of scrubland, now consisting of grey bushes, some with long-gone-by straw-colored flowers, amid windswept snow. It also occasionally passes through groves of Lodgepole Pine and Aspen. The views of the Greys and Torreys Peaks – two high and snowy mountains – are very nice. We hiked to where the trail crosses a valley full of reddish Willow bushes – plants that I associate with water, though no stream was evident - and then turned about. On the way back, we inspected what appears to be a set of spring houses, built on a mound below the trail in a second, smaller valley.

About two hours.