Taylor and Salli’s journal recollections day-by-day-ish of our camping trip travelling from Georgia to Colorado.

September 25th, 2025 – September 28th, 2025

The previous couple of nights, we had checked availability of the Leadville train ride, but there were not many options. We decided to get up early today, and check the availability once more. Only 2 tickets were available at 2 pm, so we packed up and headed out of Fourmile. After Fueling up and getting a freshwater fill at Snowy Peaks, we were off to Leadville to board the train. We arrived at the station about 10 minutes before departure, and had to take the seats that were available. Overall, the train ride was pretty good, but if you do decide to do the ride, make sure that you arrive early enough to sit on the left side (downhill.) The views were pretty awesome, and the aspens were at peak.. But so was the crowd. 

Since it was getting later in the day, after the ride we took a look at Campendium and decided to stay at Twin Lakes at the base of Mount Elbert. (south of Leadville) The dispersed area was quite spacious with plenty of room between sites. There were probably 25+ good sites around the lake. We settled in and relaxed for the next couple days. The foliage was really awesome (probably the best yet), and we couldn’t believe how clear the lakes were. Over the weekend we took several walks to the dam and around some trails, soaking in the views with plenty of photo ops.

Sunday, the 28th we decided to leave out and have a “reset” day. If you have spent a lot of time off-grid (boondocking) you will know exactly what these days entail. Today, it was laundry and groceries once again in Buena Vista. By early afternoon, the tasks were complete and we set our sites on a camping area around Taylor reservoir, west of Cottonwood pass. The road took us by some amazing scenery, with aspens at full peak, and cottonwood trees along the Taylor river. As the road got a bit more windy and steep, we slowed to a crawl and eventually made it to the continental divide at over 12,000 feet. The views were amazing, as all of the landscape looked like tundra at the top. Slowly, but surely, we headed down the pass and eventually we stopped at a general store near Taylor reservoir. Since there were not many dispersed options around, we opted for a paid campsite at Lake View Gunnison, rather than pay $20 for the water fill at the general store. The sites were very nice, as well as the host. We posted up for the afternoon and got some cleaning done, as well as an inspection of the truck. Everything checked out, and we would be ready to keep moving to the next destination in the morning.

We’d seen a video online about the Leadville train ride that had us considering going, since the foliage was likely near peak, however there weren’t any tickets open for today (we’d looked online the night before and nothing was available.) We had everything loaded up and ready to head to a new destination this morning, but Tay had been looking at tickets again and found that they’d either added more seats, or had a cancellation so we decided to snatch up a 2pm opening and head that way. 

We had just enough time to refuel anything we needed to refuel, top off the water tank again at the RV resort, and dump our trash. The water was slow to fill, but we managed to make it to the Leadville Train Depot about 15 minutes before departure. The tickets were $65 a piece or $130 for the two of us in general admission seating. The train also had open air seating and some other options available. We stopped at the first 2 seats we came to, because that train was already packed full. Unfortunately, we chose the wrong side of the train to see the best views, but we were able to stand comfortably most of the ride to be turned toward downhill, where the most picturesque sites were to be seen. I’d say the colors in the area were close to peak and the weather was perfectly warm. 

After finishing the ride, we landed at a scenic, panoramic view dispersed site along Twin Lakes. We stayed all the way through Sunday, mostly just chilling at the camper or walking around the lakes to take in the views. One of the days we made turkey tenderloin in our little crockpot and paired it with mashed cinnamon sweet potatoes and broccoli cheddar mac, and we just knew the whole area could smell that delicious goodness when we opted to eat outside while watching the sunset.

Sunday we got up early with the intention to head to Buena Vista to do another little reset on laundry and groceries before we headed towards Cottonwood pass. The approach to the pass was slow and curvy, but we made it up to see some spectacular views along the continental divide. After taking a few photos, we eased ourselves down the other side of the mountains towards Taylor reservoir. We stayed the night at Lakeview Gunnison campground for $35 – partly because the general store where we were going to refill our water was going to be $20-30 dollars by itself, so we thought we might as well stay at the beautiful, easy access campground for the night instead of searching for dispersed camping this late in the day. Getting ourselves set up is incredibly easy, so I chose to do a good camper cleaning, as we were past due to do so. While I vacuumed and wiped everything down, Taylor checked on a handful of things on the truck to make sure we were still running right and all the maintenance was good to go for the next little leg of the trip.