Zebediah Gump - Grizzly Creek LbNA #8253
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Add Location| Owner: | Adoptable |
|---|---|
| Plant date: | May 15, 2004 |
| Location: | |
| City: | Glenwood Springs |
| County: | Garfield |
| State: | Colorado |
| Boxes: | 1 |
| Planted by: | Esmerelda  |
|---|---|
| Found by: | EVERCUR?OUS |
| Last found: | May 31, 2016 |
| Status: | FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFa |
| Last edited: | May 15, 2004 |
This here be the first chapter of the tale of my adventures.
Back in the fall of 1881, me and my partner at the time, Bob Ryan, was workin on our winter stores. We had us a little cabin deep in Glenwood Canyon and life was plenty good. To get to that cabin, we had to drive our mules down the wagon trail known around these parts as I-70. Me and Bob just called it the Big I. Anyways, after a bit we’d get to a crossroad. Some folks called it Exit 121. We think that was some kind of Indian name or somethin’. Bob and me? We called it Grizzly Creek. Anyway, once we hit that crossroad we’d follow along aside the settlement..but..the trick was NOT to go into the main settlement. Sure, they had them fancy newfangled outhouses and spring water running outta pipes in the walls.
Some crazy folks would set plastic canoes and rafts made outta some kinda stretchy stuff they call rubber into the Colorado River there and sail on down into Glenwood Springs. There was big flat areas covered with this hard black dirt and purty lines to park yer wagons on. But..stay away from that place! Bob and me would ignore that and take the branch of the road that ran north under the Big I and had it’s OWN flat area covered with hard black dirt and purty lines to park yer wagons on. Anyways, we’d park our rig there and head up to the homestead.
On this particular day, we was standin’ at the edge of the creek where it meets up with the Colorado and snaggin’ us a PILE of white fish. You ain’t never seen nothin’ like it! Ever fall them fish come back to spawn and lay so thick in the water you can walk across to the other side without ever getting’ yer boots wet! We was pullin’ them out even afore our lines got wet, one after the other, quick as a wink. After we got all we could carry, we hitched our strings full of fish over our shoulders, walked north past the wooden gate standin’ at the trail head, and headed north up the trail towards home.
It was a mighty fine day, the sun was shinin’ through the trees, the creek was dancin’ it’s way happily towards the Colorado River and Bob and me was tradin’ tall tales about our lives afore we joined up. We wandered up the trail a short ways, not stoppin’ at the fancy wooden table on the left what was tucked into the bushes on the side of the creek.
It was kind of hard to see, but those with keen eyes and good trackin' skills will spot it settin' off there to the side. Them fish had a right powerful aroma and we wasn’t partial to lettin’ them set in the sun for longer than we had to. Past the wooden table we went until we comes to a spot where the trail splits and forks around a tree. Not a split headed to the water, mind you, but a split around a tree.
We’d been this way a couple thousand times already, so’s we knew to stay to the right and kept on our way. But this is where the fun started! A couple of stomps up the trail we hear’s a ‘SNUFF’..and a ‘GRUNT’! Reeeeeal slow and careful like, we turned our heads to the left, and danged if there wasn’t the biggest Grizzly bear I ever seen standin’ on a big old flat rock next to ANOTHER fancy eatin' table! He looked at us… we looked at him….
He ‘HUFFED’….and we took off runnin’ like a couple of prairie chickens! On our right we seen a small natural clearing cluttered with some bushes and small trees 'tween us and it, and a big old pine tree reachin’ way up into the sky, higher than any other tree around sort of centered on the back side of that clearing.
“Drop them fish!”, I yelled at Bob as I headed for that tree. I scrambled up that tree so quick I was at the top in the shake of a wolve's tail! And Bob, fishless and scared was hot on my tail. Up the tree we went, crashin’ through the branches and breathin’ hard!
“HUFFF!”, grumbled that bear as he rocked back and forth at the base of that tree, shakin’ his head back and forth and swattin’ rocks this way and that.
“He don’t want to et them fish, Zeb.”, Bob yelled. “He wants to et US!”
“Well, I don’t WANTS to get et!”, I yelled back and grabbed onto that tree so tight the sap oozed out into my skin.
Bob had his rifle slung across his back, but that old bear was under the branches of the huge pine tree and, good as he was, Bob couldn’t get him a shot off.
“You gots to git that bear out where I can git a shot!”, Bob yelled from his spot on the tree below mine.
Well, I knowed this was the truth and I thought for a sec about what I could use.
“Use that old journal you been draggin’ around with you!” Bob hissed as I waved gently back and forth with the top of the tree in the gentle wind blowin’ down the canyon.
Well, I hated to do it, but, I hated the thought of getting’ et by that big old bear even more! So I pulled my journal outta my pocket, took a deep breath, hauled back my arm and, with a grunt, throwed it into the air straight to the north of that old tree.
WHUMP! The journal crashed into a small group of trees on the north side of the clearing and hung up on the branches of a tree what was growin’ out of a split in the rock just a smidge left of north.
“WHUFF!”, that bear snorted, whirling away and loping towards the journal. Just as he reached the journal, Bob sighted along the cool blue steel of the gun, and, with a single shot, dropped the huge critter to the ground. As his heavy head fell, it snagged the journal out of the tree and I watched while the journal quietly dropped into the crack in the rock, left of the trunk of that little tree.
“That journal saved our lives, Zeb!”, yelled Bob as we scrambled back to earth.
We left that journal right where it lay and it still lays there quietly hidden neath some rocks, waitin’ fer friends to find it and be reminded of the day in 1881 when a man named Ryan killed the biggest grizzly bear in western Colorado and gave that creek it’s name. Grizzly Creek.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
Sincerely your’s,
Zebediah Gump
Placed by Esmerelda and Skeetch of the Splendid Buccaneers!
Esmerelda says - this is a very easy trail, good for strollers, wheelchairs, dogs, children and small woodland creatures.
Round trip about 15 minutes. The trail goes on past the letterbox for another 3 miles if you're up for a hike! This is a very beautiful hike.
Please be discreet...there is always a hiker popping up on the trail! Hand carved stamp, hand-made journal.
Also.. in the spring this is easy to find. Later in the summer when the brush has been growing, the landmarks are a little more difficult to see and you'll have to search a little harder to find it!
Alive and well on 4/16/06
Back in the fall of 1881, me and my partner at the time, Bob Ryan, was workin on our winter stores. We had us a little cabin deep in Glenwood Canyon and life was plenty good. To get to that cabin, we had to drive our mules down the wagon trail known around these parts as I-70. Me and Bob just called it the Big I. Anyways, after a bit we’d get to a crossroad. Some folks called it Exit 121. We think that was some kind of Indian name or somethin’. Bob and me? We called it Grizzly Creek. Anyway, once we hit that crossroad we’d follow along aside the settlement..but..the trick was NOT to go into the main settlement. Sure, they had them fancy newfangled outhouses and spring water running outta pipes in the walls.
Some crazy folks would set plastic canoes and rafts made outta some kinda stretchy stuff they call rubber into the Colorado River there and sail on down into Glenwood Springs. There was big flat areas covered with this hard black dirt and purty lines to park yer wagons on. But..stay away from that place! Bob and me would ignore that and take the branch of the road that ran north under the Big I and had it’s OWN flat area covered with hard black dirt and purty lines to park yer wagons on. Anyways, we’d park our rig there and head up to the homestead.
On this particular day, we was standin’ at the edge of the creek where it meets up with the Colorado and snaggin’ us a PILE of white fish. You ain’t never seen nothin’ like it! Ever fall them fish come back to spawn and lay so thick in the water you can walk across to the other side without ever getting’ yer boots wet! We was pullin’ them out even afore our lines got wet, one after the other, quick as a wink. After we got all we could carry, we hitched our strings full of fish over our shoulders, walked north past the wooden gate standin’ at the trail head, and headed north up the trail towards home.
It was a mighty fine day, the sun was shinin’ through the trees, the creek was dancin’ it’s way happily towards the Colorado River and Bob and me was tradin’ tall tales about our lives afore we joined up. We wandered up the trail a short ways, not stoppin’ at the fancy wooden table on the left what was tucked into the bushes on the side of the creek.
It was kind of hard to see, but those with keen eyes and good trackin' skills will spot it settin' off there to the side. Them fish had a right powerful aroma and we wasn’t partial to lettin’ them set in the sun for longer than we had to. Past the wooden table we went until we comes to a spot where the trail splits and forks around a tree. Not a split headed to the water, mind you, but a split around a tree.
We’d been this way a couple thousand times already, so’s we knew to stay to the right and kept on our way. But this is where the fun started! A couple of stomps up the trail we hear’s a ‘SNUFF’..and a ‘GRUNT’! Reeeeeal slow and careful like, we turned our heads to the left, and danged if there wasn’t the biggest Grizzly bear I ever seen standin’ on a big old flat rock next to ANOTHER fancy eatin' table! He looked at us… we looked at him….
He ‘HUFFED’….and we took off runnin’ like a couple of prairie chickens! On our right we seen a small natural clearing cluttered with some bushes and small trees 'tween us and it, and a big old pine tree reachin’ way up into the sky, higher than any other tree around sort of centered on the back side of that clearing.
“Drop them fish!”, I yelled at Bob as I headed for that tree. I scrambled up that tree so quick I was at the top in the shake of a wolve's tail! And Bob, fishless and scared was hot on my tail. Up the tree we went, crashin’ through the branches and breathin’ hard!
“HUFFF!”, grumbled that bear as he rocked back and forth at the base of that tree, shakin’ his head back and forth and swattin’ rocks this way and that.
“He don’t want to et them fish, Zeb.”, Bob yelled. “He wants to et US!”
“Well, I don’t WANTS to get et!”, I yelled back and grabbed onto that tree so tight the sap oozed out into my skin.
Bob had his rifle slung across his back, but that old bear was under the branches of the huge pine tree and, good as he was, Bob couldn’t get him a shot off.
“You gots to git that bear out where I can git a shot!”, Bob yelled from his spot on the tree below mine.
Well, I knowed this was the truth and I thought for a sec about what I could use.
“Use that old journal you been draggin’ around with you!” Bob hissed as I waved gently back and forth with the top of the tree in the gentle wind blowin’ down the canyon.
Well, I hated to do it, but, I hated the thought of getting’ et by that big old bear even more! So I pulled my journal outta my pocket, took a deep breath, hauled back my arm and, with a grunt, throwed it into the air straight to the north of that old tree.
WHUMP! The journal crashed into a small group of trees on the north side of the clearing and hung up on the branches of a tree what was growin’ out of a split in the rock just a smidge left of north.
“WHUFF!”, that bear snorted, whirling away and loping towards the journal. Just as he reached the journal, Bob sighted along the cool blue steel of the gun, and, with a single shot, dropped the huge critter to the ground. As his heavy head fell, it snagged the journal out of the tree and I watched while the journal quietly dropped into the crack in the rock, left of the trunk of that little tree.
“That journal saved our lives, Zeb!”, yelled Bob as we scrambled back to earth.
We left that journal right where it lay and it still lays there quietly hidden neath some rocks, waitin’ fer friends to find it and be reminded of the day in 1881 when a man named Ryan killed the biggest grizzly bear in western Colorado and gave that creek it’s name. Grizzly Creek.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
Sincerely your’s,
Zebediah Gump
Placed by Esmerelda and Skeetch of the Splendid Buccaneers!
Esmerelda says - this is a very easy trail, good for strollers, wheelchairs, dogs, children and small woodland creatures.
Round trip about 15 minutes. The trail goes on past the letterbox for another 3 miles if you're up for a hike! This is a very beautiful hike.
Please be discreet...there is always a hiker popping up on the trail! Hand carved stamp, hand-made journal.
Also.. in the spring this is easy to find. Later in the summer when the brush has been growing, the landmarks are a little more difficult to see and you'll have to search a little harder to find it!
Alive and well on 4/16/06