Our first touch of winter continued overnight. This morning there was a light dusting of snow on the ground and the temperature was 27°F. As we dropped down out of the mountains to the town of Dolores (SW Colorado) the scenery confirmed the approaching winter, the remaining leaves are deep red colors, the Aspens are mostly bare, and temperature stayed in the low 30s. Along the way the countryside changed from mountains to sandstone canyons. From Dolores a short drive took us to Hovenweep National Monument were we walked around the rim of a small canyon and looked at the ruins of stone buildings from the 1200's. The people that built these are the descendants of the people of Chaco. While at Hovenweep the sun made an appearance and the temperature climbed into the 50s.

From Hovenweep we traveled west over gravel country roads to the town of Blanding, UT. We planned on spending a couple of days in this area trying out the Mog on some forest trails. After a resupply of food and fuel we headed out into the Manti La Sal National Forest and a narrow forest road. We found a simply spectacular camp site for the night on a ridge top. We sat around a camp fire (the first in a long time), in 60° temps and watched the sunset color the clouds in the west.

The cold and altitude this morning was a good opportunity to test both the truck and generator for cold weather starting. The truck engine, with the help of the block heater and air intake heater started without a complaint. The generator however (which does not have any heating) required a number of attempts and ran rougly with lots of blue diesel smoke until it warmed up. I think I need to find a way to pre-heat the generator for cold weather.