Field Notes from the Road — Day 2: The One with the Great Escape
If you missed Day 1, we rolled into Amarillo sick, tired, and holding enough Buc-ee’s mints to cover a season of The Bachelor. It wasn’t the smoothest start, but a Texas sunset at our little barndo Airbnb reminded us why we set out in the first place.
Day 2?
Well, let’s just say that at 3 a.m., with a dog, a hole in the tent, and a whole lot of cold air, things got interesting fast.
And the funny thing is… that wasn’t even the most memorable part of the day.
3 a.m. Chaos
It was sometime around 3 a.m. when I heard the zipper.
Not ours.
Just a soft zip-zip and a low swoosh — the kind of sound that barely registers unless you’re sleeping beside a bear box, your kids zipped up like burritos, and your breath turning to fog inside the tent. The air was freezing, slipping through the zipper of the sleeping bag. I remember needing to use the restroom, but being too afraid to step out into the dark night. Then I heard a noise — a shuffling outside.
I didn’t move. I just listened.
Bear or wind?
Bear or wind?
Please, Lord, let it be wind.
Turns out — it was neither.
Cody had stepped out to… well, do whatever it is you do outside a tent at 3 a.m. Normal stuff. But just before he unzipped the tent to come back in, Stover — our seven-month-old, seventy-pound golden retriever — panicked.
In a heroic but poorly calculated attempt to reach his human, he dove headfirst through the zipped tent door, tearing a massive hole in the bottom.
I remember thinking, “The heck was that?!” Cody whisper-shouted, “He tore through the tent!”
I looked up to see Cody crouched outside, holding Stover mid-launch — keeping him from barreling down the ravine and into the Rio Grande. Big head out, body in, zipper somehow still fully closed.
The kids? Completely undisturbed.
I scrambled off our slowly deflating air mattress, grabbed Stover by the haunches like a wild animal, and dragged him back inside while Cody, teeth gritted, shoved the dog bed over the gaping hole and muttered,
“If he leaves, he leaves.”
Reason went out the door that night. Literally. And possibly downriver.
But that wasn’t how the day started. Let’s rewind a bit.
Earlier That Day
We woke up in better spirits — sniffles fading, energy slowly returning — and decided to fuel up before heading out.
That’s when we found Butter n’ Beans in Hartley, Texas — a little building tucked into a neighborhood that turned out to be a hidden gem. Highly recommend the Happy Texan and any of their breakfast sandwiches if you ever pass through — hearty, flavorful, and exactly the kind of breakfast that makes you feel ready to take on the day.
With Butter n’ Beans in the rearview, Pepperdust, our trusty SUV, carried us down long, open stretches of New Mexico highway while the kids invented a game called Mountain or Volcano? Every bump, rise, and mesa became a hot debate.
They were all convinced they could spot Capulin, a dormant volcano we’d hiked the year before — but none of us could remember exactly what it looked like. Apparently, when you’re ten and under, every hill has volcanic potential.
Eventually, we spotted it for real. There was no dramatic gasp — just all of us going, “Oh yeah! That’s it!” And then, just as quickly, the excitement fizzled. The volcano was in the rearview, the road stretched on, and someone asked the inevitable:
“Are we in Colorado yet?”
Somewhere during that came the coffee stop. I won’t name the place, but it tasted like misery — the kind of coffee that makes you wish you’d just eaten the grounds instead. We’d been disappointed there before, debated giving it another chance, and this visit cemented it: never again.
After an hour of Mountain or Volcano? and one very regrettable cup of coffee, we finally reached Marshall State Park just as the sun began to dip.
Camp Setup at Marshall State Park
Marshall was as remote and primitive as they come — vault toilets, no water, no electricity, no showers. Just the Rio Grande flowing next to us, a steep cliff face, and that sense of being really out there.
The river was crystal clear, running over smoothed rocks with slick stepping stones breaking the surface and creating soft rapids. Mostly ankle to shin deep, with a deeper stretch across the way. Perfect for rinsing off dirty feet and shoes from exploring camp.
You could see fish darting past, and fishermen in waders upstream — the kids swore they were Sasquatch. We set up our tent facing the water, just a few feet from the drop-off. On the other side, huge evergreens climbed a mountain, with the sheer cliff face wrapping around the bend.
We missed the moment the kids first splashed in, but they were quickly soaked from the top down. Blue lips, teeth chattering, but absolutely thrilled to be out of the car.
Cody and I tried it too. It was ice water — straight out of the freezer. Just an inch, then two, was all I could take before the splash to the face stole my breath. I mustered one more splash and called it good. The freezing water seemed to wash out the remainder of runny noses and soothed coughs. Cody and I could both feel inflammation going down. Definitely worth the freezing discomfort.
As the sun dropped, the air turned crisp. We layered the kids like lasagna — Snuggies over pajamas inside sleeping bags — and zipped them up for the night.
We climbed into our own setup: a shared sleeping bag on a slowly deflating air mattress. We knew it was leaking. We just didn’t talk about it. Denial was the only insulation we had left.
And a few hours later… well, you know what happened next.
Wandering Wisdom
The chaos of that night absolutely made for a core memory.
Sure, it was the absolute worst after a long drive and the exertion of setting up camp at high altitude. Add in the stress of not knowing if bears were nearby, and trying to figure out Stover even before he broke through the tent… it was a lot.
But we’d chosen Creede because we love the little town, and we were thrilled to be back. Dinner was from The Yard — a food truck with truly great burgers. Nathan had a tough time with the altitude, and for a moment we worried he was getting something worse than the bug we left Louisiana with. The nearest open medical facility was an ER two hours away. Cody gave him a hit of oxygen, and he perked right up — especially after playing in the river.
We didn’t pack extra tent fabric. We didn’t bring a backup mattress. We packed our people. And somehow… that was enough.
Scripture for the Trail
“In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety.” — Psalm 4:8
Even in the chaos — cold, deflation, and canine rebellion — we were held. He kept us, half-asleep, half-deflated, with a hole in the tent and all.
Coming Up Next…
Day 2 taught us that sometimes, the wildest parts of the trip happen when you’re not even moving. But Day 3? That was a whole new kind of adventure.
Think snowball fights in July, coffee worth writing home about, and mountain views that made us forget we were still a little sick.
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