The beautiful sky-blue San Isabel Lake above Pueblo has been a tradition in my family for 55 years. The lake is located above Pueblo. Our custom began when my Grandma Wilson rented a cabin for a week on a mountainside above the lake. To earn a little extra money Grandma took care of the books for an insurance man and that year she brought her son, my uncle who was 18 and my 16 year old sister to stay in a small cabin high above the lake. My sister and uncle made friends with other young people who were staying there. They explored the empty barracks of an abandoned CCC camp located behind the cabins.

I didn't get to go with them that week, probably because money was short, but I was with my parents when they drove from La Junta to San Isabel to pick up Grandma and the two teenagers. At that time there was only a narrow, dirt road that took us to the clear blue lake. Surrounded by heavenly smelling pine trees, I was enchanted with the lodge and the rustic little cabins.

Five years prior to that time there was no San Isabel Lake. In 1933 H.R. Asley and Associates built a lodge and 15 cabins in the San Isabel National Forest. The depression was raging that year and as part of President Roosevelt's New Deal the Civilian Conservation Corp was established. The CCC gave work to young, unmarried men.

In 1935 close to San Isabel Lodge labor began on a 90-foot high dam that would catch the waters of the St. Charles River. Workers were provided by the Civilian Conservation Corp, under the supervision of the United States Forest Service. They were provided with food and lodging and were given a small monthly salary. The Civilian Conservation Corp was abolished in 1942. The abandoned barracks that my sister and uncle explored with their friends were the old CCC quarters.

The Forest Service began to build Highway 165 from Rye and on May 28 of 1938 the 35-acre San Isabel Lake was filled with water.

From the time we made that first trip to that mountain retreat my idea of a wonderful honeymoon was to spend it at that lodge on the lake and my hope came true a few years later. The rustic little honeymoon cabin had a bed, a table and chairs. Bathrooms and showers were in a separate building a few yards away from the cabins. In a little store across the street from the lodge we rented a boat to canoe around the lake and ate our meals in a small restaurant in the lodge.

As the years passed we kept our tradition and on a couple of occasions my daughters Linda and Lorraine and I rented cabins at San Isabel. Those were the good times. We worshipped in a little church that meets on Sunday afternoons on a hill above the lake. The girls and I read and rested while my ten-year-old grandsons, Larry and Bill hiked, played and fished in the lovely clear San Isabel Lake. We rented a canoe and took turns paddling across the water.

Fifty-five years have passed since that first trip to that pine country and another generation has been added. When my sister and her family came to Colorado in July of this year we spent a few days at San Isabel Lake. Lorraine, Bill and his family joined us. For me it was a time spent remembering, drawing and writing. We hiked around the lake, visited and once more ate in the lodge. Four-year-old Ronnie and two-year-old Alyssa threw rocks in the lake to see the ripples that they made and tossed pebbles in the stream. They loved San Isabel as much as I did 55 years ago. Ronnie draws pictures of mountains.

But everything changes as it grows older and so has San Isabel changed. The little rustic cabin where I stayed on my honeymoon is still there. It looks the same as it did 48 years ago, but it has been improved. Now it has a bathroom. Six cabins on the hill were recently torn down and there is only one left where my grandmother and the two teenagers stayed. The lake is hidden now because private homes have been built. It is a family-owned business and the owners have tried to keep it as simple as possible but it is a busy place.

A large room has been added on to the lodge to expand the popular restaurant. There is good food and many people around the area eat there. Fishermen bring their poles to fish in the lake. The pines smell as sweet as they did in days of yore. The little store is bigger and sells almost anything you want.

But some things, such as tradition, don't change. It's been 55 years and we're still going. It's nice to have a family heritage like San Isabel Lake.