(I am chronicling our trip to Western Colorado in a series
of blogs this week.)
We spent the last couple of hours in Silverton going through
the museum that is located there. We
were walking down the street just looking around, killing time before our train
left, and happened upon the Silverton museum.
Known as the San Juan County Historical Museum, it is located in the
Northeast part of the town. Not much to
look at from the street, it appeared that the museum was housed in an old
building about the size of a small home.
We went into the gift shop in an adjacent building, and the
clerk there asked us is we wanted to see the museum. The cost was 8 dollars each. Before we answered, he quickly said, “It’s
not what it looks like from the outside.”
Intrigued, I paid the man 16 dollars and we went to the entrance of the
small building.
What a wonderful place this proved to be! Although a small part of the museum was in
the old building, they had built a lot of the exhibits underground, since much
of the museum had to do with the mining history of the area. The exhibits quickly opened up to spacious
and well-done areas that demonstrated mining of older days, as well as other
aspects of the history of the region.
The underground exhibit moved to other buildings on the
campus, and we exited at the gift shop after a wonderful, quick tour of the
museum. I can’t begin to tell you all of
the different exhibits and scenes that were on display. Suffice it to say, it was well worth more
than the 8 dollar entrance fee. But
since we had little time left, we had to rather quickly go through it.
We exited the museum, went back to the hotel, which was
holding our luggage for us until the train left, picked up our luggage, and
made our way to the boarding area. The
train wasn’t ready to board, though, and it was beginning to spit a rain
shower, so we went into an ice cream store and got something good to enjoy
while waiting. The price was rather high…$3.50
for one scoop, but it was good.
Finally, boarding the train, we began the trip back to
Durango in the same car…last one in the consist…but with a different host. I believe her name was Jennifer. She too was attentive, knowledgeable, and
helpful with comments regarding our return trip. I spent more time on the return trip on the
rear platform of the car. I really
enjoyed looking at the scenery as it went by, and managed to capture some video
and still shots of both the train and the scenery. I just camped out there on the rear platform
for a time. I gladly would have given up
my spot for someone else, but no one seemed interested.
Back at the station in Durango, we got off the train and
made our way in the rain to our car. We
went to the motel, checked in, and settled in for the night after eating at a
barbeque place not far up the road. It
was good, but not as good as we have found in the Wichita area. The ambience of the place was different, but
not uncomfortable. The folding metal
chairs we sat on, however, could have used some upgrading.
Next morning, we ate again at the breakfast place where the
nice man cooked eggs to order, packed up and headed out. As we were packing, I noticed an older man
also packing his car next to ours. I
struck up a conversation and found that they were on their way west to visit a
relative, and had been on the road for several weeks. They were working their way home to (I think)
California. He said, among other things,
that this may well be their last long trip…he was getting too old to do this
much longer. He was 86 years old.
I wished him well, as he did me, and we departed for
Silverton and points beyond…this time by automobile.
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