If you have ever seen an alpaca, you’ll likely agree that they are cuddly little creatures. We had the opportunity to get up close to these adorable animals when we stayed in our Airstream at the Pleasant Journey Alpacas ranch in southwestern Colorado. This was a Harvest Host alpaca farm, which you can learn more about below.
Harvest Hosts Program
The Harvest Hosts program is a unique network of over 5,000 wineries, farms, and attractions.
Self-contained RVs can visit and stay overnight at no charge.
The idea is that RV’ers stay for free but support the vineyard, farm, or attraction by making a purchase to support their business.
Campers are expected to dry camp, meaning that you do not connect to the business’s water, electricity, or sewer connections.
(If you are interested in joining Harvest Hosts, follow this link to Harvest Hosts and you’ll receive 15% off an annual membership. A discount code will be displayed at the top of the page when you click the link.)
Pleasant Journey Alpacas
We were graciously welcomed to the Pleasant Journey Alpacas ranch in Hesperus, Colorado by its owners – Susan and Glenn.
The ranch is located about 16 miles south of Durango, Colorado with beautiful scenery overlooking the La Plata mountains, which were snow-capped during our visit in October.
They gave us a tour of the 35 acres of the ranch and we got to meet the charming ranch inhabitants, including an adorable baby boy alpaca that had been born only four hours before our arrival. He is named PJA Cold Front.
His mother watched our every move to protect her little boy in his tiny blanket to help keep him warm in the cold October winds of southern Colorado.
The alpaca ranch has about 80 alpacas, about 50 percent of which are owned by Pleasant Journey Alpacas, and 50 percent are boarded for two other alpaca ranches.
Pleasant Journey Alpacas own only Huacaya alpacas, which have short, dense, and crimped style fleece, which is highly reminiscent of teddy-bear type fur. They have about 40 of these fluffy little cuties.
The ranch also boards about 23 Suri alpacas, which have more of a silky, dreadlock style fleece.
Alpaca Maternity Ward
We spent a good bit of time meeting the female alpacas in the maternity ward, where mothers and babies were kept together.
The babies ranged from one baby alpaca that was just hours old to larger adolescent alpacas that were soon to be weaned from their mother.
The babies tended to stay close to their mothers, but there were several that were very outgoing and friendly that wanted to stay hello.
This adorable female alpaca was very interested in the camera, and posed for this special closeup of her beautiful face and eyes.
Other Adult Alpacas
In general, the males and females are kept separate from one another, unless they are sent for a “date” with one another.
The alpacas are guarded by three friendly Maremma sheepdogs, which are similar to the Great Pyrenees dog breed.
The dogs live with the alpacas and help protect them from any predators that may be in the southwestern Colorado area.
The young males are kept separate from the other males, as male alpacas can sometimes fight with one another.
One of the most entertaining aspects of the alpacas is their “top knot” fleece hairdo that does not get sheared during their annual fleece shear.
I couldn’t help but be reminded of 1980s New Wave haircuts popularized by bands such as Duran Duran or Aha. Check out these fabulous alpaca hairdos!
Alpaca Fleece Shop
One aspect of the Harvest Hosts program is that farms, wineries, and other attractions allow you to camp in an RV on their land for an evening for free.
In exchange, guests are expected to make a small purchase from the farm or attraction in order to show their appreciation for the host’s hospitality.
In our experience with Harvest Hosts thus far, this has never been any sort of issue for us as we’ve enjoyed fabulous bottles of wine from a vineyard in Georgia, feta cheese from a goat dairy farm in Wisconsin, as well as now enjoying incredibly warm alpaca fleece clothing products from Pleasant Journey Alpacas!
The ranch has its own shop that includes products made from the alpacas that we met at the ranch, as well as other high-quality alpaca fleece products from other alpacas.
Pleasant Journey Alpacas produces award-winning alpaca fleece, as evidenced by the many award ribbons on display in the shop.
For people who like to knit or crochet, they’ll love the selection of handspun alpaca yarn available in the shop at the ranch.
One of the things we loved about our visit and shopping at the little store was that we were able to track the alpaca that we’d met previously with products made from that alpaca’s fleece in the store.
One of the products we purchased was a pretty (and incredibly warm!) scarf that was crocheted by Susan, one of the ranch owners.
Seminole is a cute fluffy Huacaya alpaca whose fleece turns out to be incredibly soft and warm.
There were so many beautiful options to choose from at this Harvest Host alpaca farm.
Camping at the Alpaca Ranch
We parked our Airstream next to a large barn on the alpaca ranch.
We were fortunate to overlook the “maternity ward” section where the mothers and baby alpacas were kept together. We enjoyed watching their antics from the windows of our Airstream trailer.
Join the Harvest Hosts Program
If visiting an alpaca ranch and staying overnight in your RV is something that interests you, consider joining the Harvest Hosts program with its more than 5,000 locations in all the lower 48 US states, Canada, Alaska and Baja California.
(If you are interested in joining Harvest Hosts, use this link to Harvest Hosts and you’ll receive 15% off an annual membership. A discount code will be displayed at the top of the page when you click the link.)
Read more about some of our other Harvest Hosts visits.
