An Eve of New Year's Eve dinner at home

Mia's always kicking it up a notch. Let Emeril Lagasse beat this !!

Roasted elk, spaetzle, cranberry garnish, kraut salat with a nice bottle of 2002 Geyser Peak cab.

Thanks to Charlie King for the elk.

The hammer has stopped! ... I think

16" later .. see if you can spot the drive?

I went down to check on the paper .. yeah, I was dreaming. Total silence. The new snow absorbed all sound ...

Walking up Wild Horse Circle, I had a great easterly view over Boulder, see 2nd picture. Hard to believe we're only 4.5 miles from downtown, Canyon & Broadway.

Not all fun though. Lot of shoveling today. I took care of my critical work, then joined Mia outside - shoveling. At this point, it sounds like we won't get much more snow.

Secretly though, I hope for another 16" ...

The hammer has dropped !

Supposedly, the Front Range has never had 2 big back to back snow storms in December. We've been waiting for the hammer to drop. Forecasters have been sure we'll get snow but are not sure how much. Main streets are clear but many side streets are still pretty bad from the last storm. I still need 4x4 to get the truck up the drive.

Anyway, the snow started at 10 am and we're getting HAMMERED .. more later .. as it develops .. from your intrepid reporter. :-)

contemplative mood or ...

... sore back from shoveling. Sort of both, actually. I was beat from shoveling a few tons of snow. It was nice to relax wth a coffee and the new Rock and Ice magazine.

Cave man TV

Sometimes it's nice to just watch the fire ...

A bit of snow .. and a bit more

A pretty decent storm swung through over the last few days. Denver Int'l shut down, as well as most of the major roads in Central and Eastern Colorado. We got a bit of white at the house too. The picture shows the walkway in back of the house - or what is usually a walkway.

After chaining up this morning (yeah, luckily we used the redneck truck & chain snow pack method yesterday), we drove Julia to daycare. It took awhile to understand why there were so many snow covered lumps alongside of the road. They were PARKED CARS.

Driving around Boulder was eerie. Very few vehicles on the road or in the stores. People were just walking down the middle of the roads. I'm a crappy photojournalist. I forgot my camera. It would have made for great pics.

Deer Beggar or is it Dear Beggar?

Deer Beggar, go home! You're not getting any food here. You attract those nasty mountain lions like pine cones attract squirrels. Just go away ... please ...

I can't even get the groceries out of the car before the beggars arrive. Sort of sad to turn them down ...

A hike on Sugarloaf Mountain

I cut out of work early Friday and blew off some steam hiking up Sugarloaf Mountain (topozone.com link) above Boulder. I've wanted to this hike for a long time. It's normally too short for a real hike so I never did it until now. Real nice view in all directions from the summit. On this occasion though, I could not even stand up on the summit due to the winds. It was howling ...

The next day, Saturday, we needed a short family hike and we all did it. This time it wasn't windy and I could get pics from the summit. (As usual click pics to enlarge)

Photoshop Cloudscape without Photoshop

These clouds appeared out my office window yesterday. I grabbed the camera and ran outside for some amazing & daliesque shots. Definitely click to enlarge.

Hall Ranch hike

Nice early winter hike at the Hall Ranch (Boulder County link) outside of Lyons, Colorado.

More pics here.

Bobcat sighting !

I'd pretty much given up on seeing a Bobcat (outside of a zoo). I was working in the office when Julia came running down the hall, yelling "Papa, come quick, a bobcat!!"
Julia & I ran back to the dining area and there was the bobcat, slowly walking between the house and the shed. Mia opened the door and we walked along the side of house to watch it amble uphill to the West.

Julia had been the first to spot it. She told Mama there was a cat outside. Mia took a look and was amazed as I was. I have the camera ready for the next time.

More snow but no driveway shoveling

One day last week, we got 15 inches (click to enlarge). Mia had client meetings and needed out. Of course, my tire tread hasn't grown any since the last storm so she wasn't driving My truck. I had to work and didn't have time to shovel so I tried the new chains. Chaining up in the garage was so much nicer than lying in the mud & snow like last time.

I had no idea chains would make this much of a difference. I made a few runs to pack the snow down for Mia. Yeah, a redneck plow job. Ugly but fast. Mia had no problems driving out. We'll leave it at that ;-)

Who names these towns?

This last trip we drove through most of the mispronounced towns in Colorado. There's Buena Vista, pronounced Bieuna Vista - not like the normal Spanish Bu-ena. There's Saguache, pronounced Sawatch. Montrose is Mont-rose, not Mon-trose. Finally there's Ridgway. They forgot the damn 'e'. It's Ridgeway folks. Get a clue!

Actually the abnormalities are fun. Easy to tell whose been around too .. by the way folks say the names.
Yep, head on South down past Bieuna Vista. Drive over Poncha Pass. Turn West at the junction to Sawatch. Head NW to Gunny and Mont-rose. Then kick South to Ridgway without an 'e'. Yep. That's all folks.

Thanksgiving, ice climbing, skiing and biking

We met at Chris, Sarah & Emma's place in Ridgway. Bob, Inga & Garett were already there. The kids played while Sarah pulled us out on a 20 mile bike before the meal. Nice ride on dirt roads under the San Juan mountains.

Bob cooked an excellent turkey while everyone else contributed the side dishes. Great meal! The camera fritzed out so couldn't get any pictures of the happy crew.

Next day, Mia, Inga and Sarah skied South Telluride Peak, 13,500, while Chris, Bob & I climbed the Ribbon. The Ribbon is a 3 pitch, WI4 line in the Ouray area. Being my first decent ice climb since I lost my leg, I seconded. Chris & Bob did great on their leads. What a riot to not be on the sharp end .. I need to fix up an ice/crampon foot though. It was too much fun .. and seconding gets boring fast. We couldn't believe it when the rope stuck at the top rappel. It's ice. Ice is slick. Bob headed down out of the ice fall zone while Chris re-lead the last pitch. A freak little loop hung up just at the anchor. It could never happen again. Just on our climb ...

We drove to Fruita the next day for more biking. Another dream day. Wish I had another week of vacation ..

Pre-thanksgiving in Crestone

Spending time in our Crestone place is always nice. This was the first time working down there though. The next renter needed an internet connection. Good for us since we can work here now too! The install of the wireless antennae, and modem, was pretty painless thanks to Fairpoint Communications. All we needed was a line of sight to Cedar Park, about 10 miles away. The wireless broadband speed was faster than I expected and fine for work. Not much privacy working from the kitchen table but it's nice to turn my head and see Kit Carson and Challenger Point. (See image.)

Luckily it wasn't all work. Riding our bikes around the Baca Grande was a riot. The architectural styling of the houses are from upscale-and-don't-belong-here to I-want-that-place-now to you've-got-to-be-kidding-me. There are no building codes in Saguache County which adds to the house viewing fun. We also went to Zapata Falls for the first time. Not much water or ice this season. Still worth the views. Of course we had to stop at the Sand Dunes hot springs pool in Hooper on the drive back. Nice soaking up the views of Blanca Peak while soaking in the hot water.

Closer to Thankgiving, Julia helped Mia make an apple pie - which was for Thanksgiving eating in Ridgway. Here's a picture of Julia & Mia in action.

Thursday / Thankgiving morning we cleaned up for the renter and sadly drove off. Our home should be rented until next July. Long time for us to wait for a visit.

We drove to Saguache and took 114 over through the Cochetopa Hills and over North Pass to Gunnison and Ridgway. We haven't been on this road before. Amazing due to the variation in landscape. Beautiful also. I'd like to spend some time around here exploring. Definitely some rock climbing between North Pass and Gunnison.

Busted on County Road T

"why were you going so fast" said he. I said "I had no idea I was going fast". This was a bad beginning to a great Thanksgiving week in Crestone, Ridgway and Fruita. Click on the image to get a better view of an appropriate stamp accompanying my payment. I selected the best from my Superhero stamp sheet. Yes, it's an official 39 cent stamp. I have to say the officer was very courteous & friendly.