Almost June and still cool and wet ..

Mist over the front yard on May 29th. Still cool and wet. The grass, flowers and trees love it. We've had a few decently warm days this spring but not many.

Climbing above Boulder :: A great spring weekend (Sunday)

A day like this is what Boulder is all about. I spotted a little flatiron a few years back and thought - what a great easy climb for kids.

It was 3 shorter pitches and has an easy scramble off. Ideal for a first climb. We're calling it the Little Guy Flatiron. It's below Shanahan Crag. The hard part was the hike up. We were both worried when Julia wanted to be carried 10 minutes into the hike. Luckily, the bribes of skittles candy and whipping pine cones at the forest gnomes and fir cones at the elfs got us to the base of the flatiron.

I belayed Mia and Julia at the same time so they could climb together. Mia could assist Julia if needed also. We were all smiles as we reached the summit. What a fun day !!

More pics here!

Biking in Boulder :: A great spring weekend (Saturday)

Saturday morning we cruised East, on our bikes, along the Boulder Creek path. Julia was on the trailer bike behind Mia. The water was high and smell of new growth filled our noses. We enjoyed the nice views of the mountains and flatirons as we rode South. I've been in Boulder for 27 years but I still love the views!

After the ride, we strolled through the downtown farmer's market, bought some veggies, listened to the band and had lunch.

Later, we stopped by Sally Moser and her roomate, Mike's, party. South Boulder was rocking. The band was way more than good. The other draw was roasted pig. The hog tasted way more than good too. Ron was the roast meister. Sally, Ron & Mike - Thanks for the party!

Cheesebox Canyon - BoyZrUs Canyoneering Trip

The West Fork of Cheesebox wasn't a gruntfest of slotness (Hmm, that doesn't sound so great. Oh well.) like some of our recent trips but it was a winner in variety and beauty. The water was cold though and we used many tricks to stay out of it. We still got wet. Real wet. Don't let the pics fool you you. Both Bob Wood & Charlie King wore wetsuits under their clothes and were happy about it. Luckily there was only one real swimming section. Of course, when Charlie or Bob went first, they'd say - Only chest deep, no problem. This translates to nose deep for me!

There's a lot to exploring to do around here. Without trying we bumped into an Anasazi ruin and Charlie found a nice arrowhead point.

After the canyon, we continued driving on Cheesebox Road. It became much rougher and turned into 4WD before we hit a decent dirt road. Another half hour of wondering where we were driving and we found a good camp. Here's a great view from close to camp. Wooden Shoe Canyon is in the distance. There's roads all over the place around here and they ALL go to cool places that need exploring. It's a definite problem! Since I strained my foot in one of the pools and Charlie hurt his knee, we decided to explore by vehicle. Gorgeous country ... Saw turkeys too.

Here's part of the route we took. Red is road. Blue is our canyoneering route. At our most northern point, the snow got too deep so we backtracked for 1/2 hour until we could travel East to Blanding (not marked).

All the trip pics are here!

A spring weekend at home

Spring is a busy time. The last two weekends, we away on climbing trips to Shelf Road. We had a breather this weekend. Mia & Julia planted. I cut down and trimmed trees and we all built and repaired bird houses.

Tally: 1 new bird house & 3 repaired bird houses for a total of 7 houses. We're hoping for bluebirds in at least one house. Our normal occupants are nuthatches, chickadees and tree swallows.

I dropped 11 trees and low limbed a few also. All the trees but one were under 12" in diameter. Getting ready for fire season. Ponderosa Pines like to be well spaced which allows for more water per tree. In the absence of fire, I have to play god. Healthy trees are happy trees ...

A Peek at Spring

I know we'll have some hard weather before it smoothes out for summer but right now it's spring. This last weekend we climbed at Shelf Road. Climbing was a bit cool to rainy on Saturday (see Julia climbing at right) but great on Sunday. When it started raining, we checked out the Marsh [Felch] dinosaur quarry .. which every climber drives by on the way in. Julia found a dinosaur tooth, Mia found a Stegasaurus fin plate and I found some dino skin. (Not really but that's what we told Julia.) Julia was really excited because she wants to be a palentologist and can even say it correctly. :-)

Sunday, I was feeling my oats and tried climbing Purple Toe Nails, 5.11b/c. Unfortunately, my oats bag spilled on the way up. We did some great routes though especially after I decided to stick with 5.10 .. for now.

Spring was popping up at home too as evidenced by the daffodils sprouting and hammock testing.