The morning light wakes me even through the tinted windows of the truck. Its 6:20am; I try to wake sleeping beauty who responds with a great cry of Nooooooooo like the mating call of the bull moose several days ago. I sort out the truck whilst the she bear rises and we make our bleary eyed way to the gas station for 6:30am. Its not open yet and we’re guessing that being Sunday morning the staff may be bleary-eyed too.

Walking towards us in a black cowboy hat is a guy walking a greyhound dog. Here, in the land of hunting hounds and huskies, this picture seems a little atypical and in an un-nameable way distinctive. I get out to ask him about the gas station opening times and yes, it should be open. There’s something about the man that says “fisherman” to me so I show him my rod and reel from Croatia and the bits I bought yesterday to see if he can show me what knot to use to get this all sorted.

He invites us down to his house; a stunning log cabin on the shore of Shadow Mountain Lake. We enter his home and meet his wife who, like the cabin is lovely and warm. The couple’s names are Skip and Sam.  Despite not looking for house-guests before breakfast, Sam takes to Leslyn straight away whilst I and Skip do important man things like fishing and getting cold in the wind off the lake.

We chat and tell our different stories, skip owns an electrical contracting company and has also been successful in the property market. Sam is senior in an organisation helping drug abusers and the mentally ill. Skip’s owned this cabin for 20 years and this is their weekend get-away from the city life of Denver.

I come in from fishing empty handed to find a pot of coffee and that Sam has kindly cooked us all breakfast including beautifully cooked fish from the lake, bacon eggs and toast. It’s warm heaven for me and Les and we eat it all up sat at a table with a view of the lake – fantastic. Next we have bubbly on the veranda to celebrate – Not celebrate anything in particular, but maybe just meeting each other.

One thing that I knew before we set off on our nomadic travels was that we would be indebted to the kindness of strangers, like Catherine in China, Hilary in Turkey and many others too numerous to mention. Skip turns to me and says that he and Sam have talked and both agreed to let us use the cabin. We are both a little stunned by this and to be honest I’m looking for the catch. I look at Les who simply says “but we are strangers?”

A little latter Skip and Sam have driven off, me and les are stood on the veranda on the shores of the lake with our own private fishing jetty and a log fire-heated cabin. We still can’t quite believe the kindness and trust of this wonderful couple, knowing how rough we looked after a night in the truck I am hard pressed to think that these people let us into their home. No tents for us, hot showers and cable TV.

Its hard to find the words to say thank you for something like this, its hard to believe there are people that generous and trusting. I contemplate that Somebody up there likes us and tonight warm and toasty we snuggle down in a comfy bed. A lot can happen in a day and I’m very glad I asked that guy how to hook my line up.