Pawnee Campground –Brainard Lake

Another weekend of camping! This brings me to a total of 50 nights spent in my trailer this year so far…and I have at least four more weeks of activities planned between now and October.

The Bride and I left home of Friday morning at about 9 am and headed for Pawnee Campground to meet the rest of The Circle….Too Tall-Two Timing, K., Guitar and Pic-E. This campground is about an hour and a half drive from home and is at about 10,300 feet in elevation. With all the adventures I’ve had so far this year, this is the first time this season that I’ve camped this high and we picked the perfect time to do it! While The Circle camped in 70 degree weather, the Denver area sweltered in 100 degree temps!

It was an adventure to start with. The campsite I chose was listed as a 40 foot back-in site. Plenty of room for both my trailer and truck….if you could get into it! What the description didn’t say was that the access road was a very narrow rough dirt road with ditches on both sides and the area was heavily forested. To make a long story short, it took me about an hour to get the trailer into the site and once I was in, I was wedged between two trees both less than two feet from either side of the trailer.

In the picture above you can see the tree close to the door side of the trailer. I had to climb on the trailer roof and cut some of the branches off of the tree to keep it from damaging the roof.

After that adventure I was ready to chill for the rest of the weekend and we did just that. We had two days of pleasant weather, good food and good friends. The campground itself was peaceful but the surrounding area was crawling with folks from the front range getting away from the heat. It was so crowded that the park rangers were limiting the number of people coming in and when we left on Sunday morning we saw them allowing one vehicle in for every vehicle coming out.

It was stunning scenery but there were probably as many people on the trails as at the mall here in town. A little too “peoplefied” for my tastes.

I now have a break of about two weeks with no out of town adventures and then I’m off to Twin Lakes, CO for a Passport In Time project. This project will be an archaeological survey looking for prehistoric Indian sites east of the Arkansas River. There have been numerous reports of tepee rings, lithic scatters and other evidence of prehistoric occupation but the Forest Service has never done an official survey of the area. It will be fun and an adventure!

The week after that I’m off to Wyoming for another PIT, this time using a metal detector to find evidence of the Cherokee Trail. And the week after that I’m back close to home at Guanella Pass doing another archaeological survey with the Forest Service.

I have applied for three more Passport In Time projects in September and October that I have not heard anything about yet….and The Bride and I will spend a week camping in the Black Hills of South Dakota in September so the adventures definitely will continue.

Thanks for visiting.

The Adventures Continue

It’s been a while since my last post but that doesn’t mean that “his-self” has been bored or lonely. One of the reasons for the lack of posting is that I’ve just been having too much fun to sit down at the computer. This post is being typed in my trailer which is parked in Lathrop State Park in Walsenburg, CO….but more about that later.

Last weekend we three couples of The Circle had a 4th of July camping outing at Mueller State Park just to the west of Colorado Springs and on the north side of Pikes Peak. The Circle socializes a lot while we are in the Denver area but because of our diverse schedules, we don’t get to camp out together all that much so this weekend was a treat. It was a great weekend with liberal amounts of sightseeing, relaxing, group dining, laughter and fun. To add to the fun, Jamie and Betsy (part of Guitar’s extended family) joined us.

On Saturday we took a tour of the mining gold camps in the area. The picture at the top of this post was taken in the historic mining town of Victor, CO…birthplace of Lowell Thomas. For all you whippersnappers out there, Lowell Thomas was a very famous news reporter in the 1930s, 40s and 50s. Victor is also the home of some of the most famous gold mines in the United States. The Independence, the Cresson, the Gold Coin and pictured just to the left of the American flag above, the Portland. At it’s peak in about 1902 Victor had a population of about 17,500. Today the population is about 400 and it looks more like a ghost town than lively bustling mining town.

There is one active mine left in town and it is just over the hill from the Portland Mine in the picture above. The Portland represents the old hard rock mining of the past. The new mining is open pit mining and while I understand the necessity of this approach to mining it sure is a shame to see what happens to a mountain when gold is mined in this way.

To give you an idea of the scale of this type of mining look at the picture on the right. The dot that the black arrow is pointing to is a pickup truck!

The weather for our outing was just perfect with the exception of one night when all hell broke loose. We had just finished dinner outside at the picnic table when and evening shower commenced. The shower rapidly got ugly and it rained, hailed, thundered and lightninged, blew and every other thing for about two hours. At one point we had about an inch of hail on the ground and my trailer awning nearly collapsed. Since the entire group was eating outside my trailer we all rode out the storm in my trailer….all eight adults and five dogs! It was a might cramped but we all had fun as you can see by the picture to the left.

On Monday morning we had our traditional group breakfast…with Mimosas, before breaking up and returning home.

Now about my current location. I left the Denver area this morning (Friday, 7/9) and headed south to the little town of  Walsenburg. Tomorrow morning I’ll be meeting up with a number of people who are all members of the Pike’s Peak Adventure League (I’m a member too.) This is a metal detecting club based in Colorado Springs. About once a month during the good weather months they have an outing. Tomorrow we will be going to metal detect at an old coal camp site that is located on private land. This area of Colorado had numerous coal camps to supply fuel for the railroads and other industry from the 1890’s until the 1930’s and later. This will be my first outing with the group so I’m not sure what to expect, but it should be interesting. The person who set up the outing informed us that we would be in rattlesnake country so I have come with snake gaiters for my legs and I’ll be carrying a  .38 caliber pistol loaded with snake shot! Hopefully my next report will tell you about all the cool artifacts we dug up…and the lack of snake activity so stay tuned.

I’ve also been selected for two more Forest Service Passport In Time adventures which I’ll tell you more about after I get home next week.

Thanks for visiting.

Gold Mountain Mine PIT

I left Hudson-Meng early Sunday morning. The weather was fantastic and the dirt road had dried up in the four days I was camped at the site. It was about 150 miles to Hill City and I just enjoyed the drive and looking at the incredible prairie scenery. My route took me over much of the same road I had travelled for the field trip on Tuesday but I didn’t mind at all. It’s large country and the second look was as enjoyable as the first.

Once I got beyond Hot Springs, SD I was in the Black Hills and the scenery changed from sparse prairie to rolling pine covered hills. The temperature was about 65 degrees and the air was full of pine scent. My soul smiled as I drove, life is very good.

I reached Hill City right about noon and after a few wrong turns, found the RV park that was to be my reprovisioning stop. It was nothing fancy at all, about 15 gravel sites with grass between them and right on the main highway. It really didn’t matter because I was busy with dumping my waste tanks, taking on fresh water, grocery shopping and doing laundry. It fit the bill for what I needed for the night. I also was able to use my cell phone to check in with The Bride. I hadn’t talked with her for about five days. 

After doing the laundry I drove out to the designated camp site for this project in the truck. Well before I reached the camp site I realized that my rig was just too big for that place. It was a very narrow rough dirt road with lots of low hanging tree branches. When I got to the camp site there were only a few people camping there and most were in tents. There was one truck camper and one small trailer. The people at the site said that the road had been closed for several days because of rain and a lot of the other volunteers had found better boondocking places in the general area so I decided to do likewise and it didn’t take long to find an nice meadow next to a little stream about a mile from the mine itself. I figured that if I left the RV camp early Monday morning I could set the trailer up and be at the job site by 8 am which I did.

I think I had more fun on this project that just about any other PIT project that I have done. There were about 20 people working on the restoration. In addition to PIT volunteers there were six or seven Forest Service personnel and several members of the Black Hills Historical Society. On our first day of work the project leader asked for volunteers who weren’t afraid of heights to work up on the roof and I volunteered. Much of my working career had me on industrial construction sites so heights and climbing ladders is not an issue for me.

For the rest of the week I worked with three other volunteers replacing rotted roof rafters and then sheathing the roof. To get to the rafters we used a large crane with a basket…that’s me in the basket in the picture above. It was physically demanding work but a whole lot of fun and we could really see the results of our labor. Unfortunately we did not get the entire roof sheathed but what we did do will help protect the building until the project restarts next year.

I was pretty worn out at the end of the day and my body is covered with black and blue marks, cuts and scrapes but it was very much worth it. I was in bed and asleep every day, well before dark and slept wonderfully except for two nights. On those nights I was having a running battle with several mice that somehow got into the trailer. I woke up one night and heard a “scurrying” noise that at first I thought was coming from the roof of the trailer. After listening for a while I discovered it was coming from inside the trailer and when I got up to investigate I saw the tell tale signs…mouse droppings. That afternoon I went in to Hill City and got some traps and mouse poison.

The following night I heard the scurrying again and got up to investigate. One mouse had gotten into the trash can and was having a feast in the bottom of the can. I grabbed the garbage bag out of the can and tossed it out the door. One mouse down. At first I thought that might be the only mouse but when I got back into bed I heard more scurrying and then shortly the snap of the mouse trap…two mice down. I think that was the last of them but to be sure I’ve left several baited traps in the trailer, just in case.

The project wrapped up for the year on Friday afternoon and I moved the trailer to the Rafter J Bar Ranch RV Resort where I met up with K and Too Tall-Two Timing who were spending several days there and taking in the local sights. Friday afternoon we drove over to Mt. Rushmore and then had a great dinner, graciously provided by K and Too Tall.

Saturday morning it was time to head home and I was on the road by 8 am. The trip home was uneventful but the traffic on I-25 from the Wyoming state line to the Denver area was pretty heavy. I’ll have the rest of the week to recuperate and reprovision the trailer.

On Friday, The Circle is having a Circle The Wagons long weekend outing at Mueller State Park. This is a great park just a few miles from the historic town of Cripple Creek and is a very popular place. To get camp sites for the July 4th weekend we had to make reservations in January. It should be a fun time so check back for the report.

Thanks for visiting.

Don’t Know Why There’s No Sun Up In The Sky…

“Stormy Weather” is the title of the song that uses the post title for it’s first line. Originally written in 1933 and performed by the great Ethel Waters, it’s been covered by a gazillion of singers since. Here’s a particularly good rendition by Lena Horne in 1943…Despite the title it’s really a love song that uses weather as a metaphor.

The song and lyrics stick in my mind for an interesting reason. In the early 1980’s I had a routine outpatient bit of surgery done under minimal local anesthesia. It was so minimal that I experienced a bit of discomfort. To help overcome the discomfort I concentrated on the music that was being piped into the doctor’s office. You got it, Stormy Weather! Since that experience, whenever I’m trying to divert my attention from something unpleasant I think of, hum or sing the song. I’m thinking of the song now but the unpleasantness I’m diverting my attention from is…..stormy weather, not love.

Springtime in the Rockies has messed up my weekend adventure! The DOW project I was supposed to attend with The Bride this weekend was cancelled yesterday due to potential wet weather. The Bride and I decided that if the weather weren’t too bad we would go to Trinidad anyway and explore the town. Yesterday afternoon the system moved in with some pretty severe thunder storms. It would rain, thunder and lightning for a half hour or so, then clear up for an hour or so, then storm again. This morning we had some snow and heavy rain and the forecast had changed to the system not moving on until tomorrow afternoon and the mountains are expected to get 14”-28” of snow. Need I say more? The trip has been cancelled altogether.

My weekend was not messed up near as much as the weekend for Too Tall-Two Timing and K. See the comment about “thunder and lightning” above? Well the lightning part struck Too Tall and K’s house and caught the roof on fire. K was in the basement at the time. Too Tall is out of town on business. The Fire Department responded and put the fire out but not before an undetermined amount of damage was done to the roof and top floor of the house. There are at least three big holes in the roof…see my comment about heavy rain this morning.

The good news is that The Circle is here to help them as needed. Two Tall-Two Timing will be back in town today and the insurance adjusters will assess the damage today as well.

“Don’t know why there’s no sun up in the sky………”

Thanks for visiting.

Chatfield Camping & Bosque del Oso

Our Circle The Wagons campout with The Circle was a success. Nothing spectacular but a low key fun time. We all arrived Friday afternoon and after setting up camp, (see photo above) we all got together for libations and a grilled dinner.
Since I have not had the chance to use the grill that came with my trailer, I volunteered my grill as the official cooker. I must say that I wasn’t very impressed and am thinking that I may just go back to my portable Coleman grill for future trips. I do like the fact that the trailer grill taps into the onboard propane supply so I don’t have to worry about bringing…or keeping up with a separate fuel supply but overall it was a pain to set up and I don’t think it cooked very evenly.
The highlight of the weekend, as far as I was concerned, was the Saturday afternoon/evening festivities. As I mentioned in a previous post, The Bride had already volunteered our trailer for the gathering spot since it was the biggest. She also volunteered to be the dinner hostess and provide the main course…made from scratch lasagna.
To get us all in the mood for Italian food we watched the movie, The Big Night before dinner. It’s a great movie that revolves around one terrific made from scratch, authentic as it comes, Italian dinner.
After watching the movie I think our guests had pretty high expectations for dinner and they weren’t disappointed. Maybe it wasn’t as fancy as the dinner in the movie but everyone enjoyed it. 
Sunday was a lazy morning and we got together late for a group brunch before we tore down camp and headed home. This will be our last Circle The Wagons trip for a little over a month. In July we have already planned two events in the mountains. More on that later.
The Bride and I are feverishly trying to empty cabinets in preparation for the contractor to start installing granite countertops and a new backsplash in our kitchen.
I say feverishly because on Friday we’re headed to Trinidad Lake State Park, just west of Trinidad, CO and about 200 miles from here. That will be our base while we do volunteer work for the Colorado Division of Wildlife at the Bosque del Oso Wildlife Area. We will return late Sunday afternoon and finish up preparations for the contractor then.
It should take the contractor about a week to do all the work and him done or not, I head out for a Forest Service gig a week from this Sunday. Busy, busy, busy….but more on that later too.
Thanks for visiting.

Another Passport In Time Project!

I received an email today telling me that I was chosen for another Forest Service Passport In Time (PIT) project! This one is in South Dakota and involves restoration of an old gold mine and mill.  The project actually lasts for two weeks but I signed up for the week of June 21-25.
This will be my seventh PIT project and will be the furthest I’ve ever travelled to get to one. The project is located about 35 miles south west of Rapid City SD and it will take me two days to get to the project site.  I’m already looking at the calendar and trying to figure out if I can add several days to the trip so that I can take in some of the other attractions in the area.
There will be plenty of adventures this summer!
Here’s the official write up for the project.

Black Hills NF

Gold Mountain Mine & Mill Restoration Project, Phase II

June 14-18; 21-25
Must commit to one full session; may participate in both
Please join us in the beautiful high country of the Black Hills for the second year of the Gold Mountain Mine and Mill restoration! The mill served the historic Gold Mountain Mine during the "Gold Rush" of 1875, and is the last "living" ore-processing mill on the Black Hills National Forest. The structure is one of many that stood here during a prosperous period of the gold-mining industry in the region. The wood frame of the mill still retains many of its original features, including its ore crusher, ore shoots, and distribution gates. Today, little else remains beyond the mill and its associated features, and the area's history is quickly slipping away. However, in 2007, the Forest Service and local volunteers began to explore plans to restore and preserve this unique site. In June of 2009, the plans became action. Phase I of our project consisted of a detailed survey to fully record the site and its features and preliminary restoration of the mill frame. Additionally, volunteers removed overhead hazards and emptied an estimated 12 tons of ore and debris from the mill, and planning crews began efforts to interpret the site for visitors.
During Phase II, we will continue to restore the mill structure and develop means for the site's interpretation. Restoration will focus on the mill-frame structure. The surviving original components will be removed, treated, repaired, and replaced using power and hand tools, though we will also bring in heavier equipment, such as cranes and bobcat tractors. Simultaneously, those assigned to interpretive crews will do historic research, develop trail plans, and design signage and other displays. This area of the Black Hills offers many popular attractions and boasts some of the best scenery to be found, and early summer here features warm days and cool nights, perfect for enjoying yourself around a camp fire! So, whether you're back for year two or will join us for the first time, we look forward to seeing you in June!
Number of openings: 20 (10 per session)
Special skills: Participants must have an interest in learning! Construction, carpentry, woodworking, art, and/or research skills helpful, but not required
Minimum age: 18 years old
Facilities: Tent and RV camping at no charge at nearby FS campgrounds; drinking water, toilets, no hookups; private campgrounds available nearby; facilities vary with campgrounds and may or may not include pit toilets, water, and/or RV spaces/hookups; reservations recommended; Hill City, Custer, and Rapid City are full-service communities with hotels/motels, restaurants, and a full range of other amenities; volunteers responsible for personal camping equipment, food, and transportation
Nearest town: Hill City, 5 miles; Custer, 20 miles; Rapid City, 35 miles

In a couple of hours I’m off to Chatfield State Park for a Circle the Wagons get together. Check back in a couple of days for a report!
Thanks for visiting.

Spring Has Sprung…For Now

Ah, the sound of songbirds early in the morning. Buds on the trees. Daffodils breaking through the soil….These are all signs of Spring but nothing is more telling about the departure of Old Man Winter and the arrival of that sweet nymph of Spring than the relative position of my snow blower and lawn mower in the garage.

The picture in the upper left shows the lawn mower promoted to a position of prominence in the front of my garage whilst the snow blower is now relegated to a back corner along with the snow shovels. If that is not a sure sign of spring, I don’t know what is.

Oh, we may still get some snow but my experience is that anything we get now will either not stick to paved surfaces or if it does it will melt in a couple of hours. If I weren’t reasonably sure of this, the lawn mower would never have been moved to the front of the garage.

Speaking of the lawn mower, I have to give credit where credit is due. This piece of Sears/Craftsman machinery is about 16 years old now. Unlike children of the same age, it has never been to the lawn mower doctor. It hasn’t had an accident or been pulled over by the police. It’s appetite is downright bulimic. The only thing it consumes besides some of my time, is a tiny amount of gasoline and in those sixteen years, about one quart of oil! To top it all off, it responds to me without argument in no more that two pulls of the starter cord…..every time, for sixteen years. If children could only be like this lawn mower, the world would be a far better place!!!

Even though spring has sprung life is not all green grass and daffodils. There’s still some iffy weather to contend with and unfortunately we will have some of that this weekend, just in time to threaten The Circle’s first Circle The Wagons camping trip. From this weeks highs in the 70’s with brilliant skies, we will descend into the low 60’s with rain.

The good news is that the campground is just minutes from the house at Chatfield State Park. Too Tall-Two Timing, Guitar and myself, his-self, made reservations for camping over a month ago. We knew the weather could be iffy but we decided that if nothing else we would watch movies, have some great dinners and conversation and generally chill out.

Since my trailer is the largest, The Bride and I will host the main dinner on Saturday night. The Bride has chosen an Italian theme for the dinner and we may precede the dinner with a showing of one of my favorite movies, The Big Night. It’s a relatively unknown film but is a great story and contains wonderful Italian music from the 1950’s. It should certainly get us in the mood for some Italian food. Check back next week for a report on our adventure.

Here’s some other signs of the springing of Spring in my yard today…

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for visiting.

Same Ole Same Ole

So we got 12-15” of snow early in the week and then we had two days of nice weather (high 50’s). Time for another storm! This one is not supposed to be as bad but the weather shamans are saying I may be looking at 5-10” on the ground by tomorrow morning. I hope they’re wrong this time because I haven’t gotten the parts for my snow blower yet and anything that ends up in the driveway will have to be dealt with manually.

While I don’t really mind the winters here or the snow, this time of year it’s hard because of the teasing that Mother Nature does. It would be one thing if it were just crappy weather all month long but the Spring weather that is wedged between the frequent storms gets my hopes up that it will be an early end to the snow and it will be RV season again.

Hopefully, this storm will be the last of any consequence because The Circle is planning on a Circle The Wagons camping trip in three weeks. This will be a local camp out at Chatfield State Park which is only a couple of miles from here…..about 8 miles to be exact.

The picture at the top of the post is a shot from the roof of my trailer “Bivouac”. It not only shows some of the snow left from the last storm but It shows the new wiring job on my solar panel. The original wiring was located under the panel and went through the roof and towards the back of the trailer. This new wiring goes to the front of the trailer and down the plumbing vent stack in the middle front of the roof.

The picture to the right shows the new Tristar TS45 Solar Controller installed in the basement storage area. The battery compartment is behind the wall to the left of the controller and the red “knob” on the left of the picture is a Perko battery cutoff switch that allows me to shut off or disconnect the batteries when the trailer is stored. That prevents the batteries from being completely discharged by things like the fire and CO2 alarms that cannot be turned off inside the trailer. 

Finally the picture to the left shows the remote meter that is installed inside the trailer. This digital display tells me all sorts of information about the charge state of the batteries, how much charge the solar panel is providing to the batteries and how much electricity is being used by all the electric things inside the trailer. It will also track this information over time. Cool stuff!

I expect that to be able to boondock for extended periods I’ll need at least one more solar panel but before I spend the money for that I will spend some time testing out the one panel system. The good news is that there is plenty of room on the roof for several more panels and it’s simple to add panels to the base system I now have.

Thanks for visiting.

Tripping The Light Fantastic – NOT!

I had my foot surgery…or more correctly my toe surgery yesterday. My little toe on the right foot is now somewhat shorter than it was yesterday at this time. It’s hard to believe because it feels like it’s about the size of a dump truck! The fourth toe is a bit skinnier too but feels like a sumo wrestler. The doctor assured me that the shorter toe would not cause me to walk in circles but she did say that walking of any type for the next couple of days might cause me to fall on my face and writhe in pain. Judging from the way I feel this morning I believe her.

So, I’m ensconced on an easy chair in my bedroom with the computer in my lap, surrounded by books, remotes for music and tv, and a large bottle of vicoden. I Will Survive….(a great golden oldie from 1978).

To pass the time I’ve been working on plans for the maiden voyage of my new trailer. That will hopefully occur in about two weeks. My original plans were to do a big loop from here down through southern New Mexico across to the Tucson, AZ area, up to Flagstaff and back across northern AZ and NM to I-25 and then north to home. Part of the plan was to have The Bride fly in somewhere for a few days too. We did a similar trip last year and really had fun. Last year The Bride and Pic-E flew into Tucson to meet up with Guitar and myself. This year The Bride wants to see the Sedona and Prescott area.

After looking every which way at the map, I decided to scrap the big loop plan and go with a much smaller loop that would eliminate southern NM and AZ. Right now the first half of the loop is looking like this….

Leave Denver area and spend the first night in either Las Vegas, NM or Albuquerque. Then travelling to/through, Acoma Pueblo, El Malpais National Monument, El Morro National Monument, Gallup, NM, Window Rock, AZ, Canyon De Chelly National Monument, the three Hopi Mesas and down to Flagstaff where I’ll meet The Bride. From there we’ll spend two nights at the Grand Canyon and a night or two each in Sedona and Prescott before dropping The Bride off at the airport in Flagstaff for her trip home. I haven’t decided exactly how I’ll make my way home yet but I’ve got plenty of time in the next couple of weeks to research it. I would love to go north of Flagstaff through Monument Valley and the four corners area but seeing as how this will be in February, the weather could be an issue.

In other camping news we’ve made plans for two Circle The Wagons weekends with The Circle. The first on the July 4th weekend, we’ll all get together at Mueller State Park. This is a gorgeous facility not too far from Cripple Creek, CO. The Bride and I have camped here before. In fact, the picture on the left margin of this blog entitled “Training for Retirement” was taken at this park. The second event will be the third weekend in July at Pawnee campground in the area of Nederland, CO. I’ve never camped at this campground before but it is rated as one of the top 100 campgrounds in the state with five star views of the mountains and a beautiful alpine lake. The campground is at 10,400 altitude so it will be a break from the July summer doldrums along the front range.

My toes tell me it’s time for a little medication so I’ll end this here. Stay tuned for more.

Thanks for visiting.

Colorado Cowboy Poet Gathering

What can I say, I love this stuff. A sawbuck ($20 for you whippersnappers) got me an entire day of great entertainment, music and western culture. I went to this event in 2008 with Guitar and we both vowed to do it again. I forget what happened last year but we missed it. This year I was determined to go and go I did yesterday a little after 9am.

Here’s the deal. There are about 40 different performers. Some are poets/humorists, some are musicians and some are both….God, this is hard to explain….groups of four or five performers, perform in a room, round robin style. There are four “sessions” per hour each with a different theme. Examples of the themes are, “Get ‘er Goin”, “Modern Ranch Life”, “Bunkhouse Banter”, “Cowboy Humor”, “Critters”, “Dancin’ & Romancin”. Each hour you have to pick the session you want to attend based on either the subject or the performers, or however you want. The performers switch between groups based on the subject matter so it gets pretty complex. I chose most sessions with the goal of seeing as many different performers as possible. After re-reading this paragraph, the easiest thing to do is give you this link so you can see the actual schedule

This year’s group of performers hailed not only from Colorado and most of the other western states but New Hampshire, Canada and Australia as well. The caliber of talent was amazing, especially considering that they are just “local”. You will not hear any of these artists on top 40 radio or see them listed on Ticketmaster for a concert but listening to a complex story told in rhyme and/or accompanied by guitar, banjo, or bones was one of those experiences where you told yourself, while listening, “wow, this is really good!”. I may have only paid a sawbuck for the entrance fee but by the time it was all over I spent three times that much on CDs to take the experience home with me.

It was after 5pm when I left and I had to face a vicious rush “hour” commute on a holiday weekend to get back home. One of the biggest “perks” of being retired is that I can normally avoid this unpleasantness but this day I had to endure. It was, however, well worth it.

This afternoon, The Circle will visit the yearly RV show at the Denver Convention Center. Even though I am NOT in the market anymore, I still like looking and all the different models. Both Guitar and Two Tall-Two Timing now have the “urge” to upgrade and I’ll have a large time goading them into it. It should be a fun time.

Monday morning I have an appointment with a sawbones….this is getting to be a theme post…sawbuck, sawbones. I didn’t even plan it! Anyway, I’ve got to have a bone spur taken off one of my toes. It will be outpatient surgery but I’ll be unable to drive for about two weeks. More to follow on this.

Thanks for visiting.

Bats, Bears And Burgers, Oh My

The post title is a take off on the famous line by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz. Hard to believe that this classic 1939 movie is still entertaining and being quoted some seventy years after it was released. I wonder how many of today’s crop of movies will have a similar stature in 2080?

Enough of that. On Saturday The Bride and I left early and headed to the Colorado Division of Wildlife Volunteer orientation. The orientation was in Colorado Springs about an hour drive from our home. About 15 people attended to find out what types of opportunities are available for volunteers.

It turns out that there are a lot of varied projects available to interested volunteers. I’ve mentioned previously that I participated in a waterfowl count last week and that it tame compared to some of the projects. One that interested me is the Bats/Inactive Mines Project. In this project, volunteers survey inactive mines to see if bats have taken up residence in them. First of all there a literally thousands of inactive mines in Colorado and they are extremely dangerous. These mines make perfect habitats for a number of species of bats and bats are of terrific importance to man. The dilemma is to allow the bats a place to live and to keep humans from entering these dangerous sites.

Volunteers go to the mines but not in them. They use electronic “bat detectors” to detect the ultra sonic signals the bats use. If bats are found the mine entrance can be closed with a grate that will allow access by the bats but prevent humans from entering. How cool is that??

Other projects range from helping clean up State Wildlife Areas to helping at fish hatcheries to collecting animal heads for chronic wasting disease testing. The collecting heads project gets the heads from hunter harvested animals. There is also a State Wildlife Area Host program where volunteers camp at the Wildlife Areas and help educate visitors about the area. Between volunteering for the Division of Wildlife and the Forest Service methinks that I’ll be pretty busy this year.

All of that information about opportunities made The Bride and I hungry and fortunately the DOW orientation broke up at noon. We had previously made arrangements with The Circle to meet them at Conway’s Red Top burger joint. I learned about this place from a Christmas present book given to me by Cajenn and Cajon and my curiosity took over.

As you can see by the picture above, the restaurant is a non-descript little place but it serves decidedly non-non-descript burgers. These behemoths are eighteen inches in diameter! Now they are not your typical two or three inch thick gourmet burgers but are relatively thin allowing that artery clogging grease to really flavor the burger. The burger is a bit thinner on the edges and their frying technique renders them crispy at the very edge. A great taste.

As hungry as I was I was not foolish enough to order a whole burger but settled for a half burger which was more than sufficient. I had mine without cheese most of the rest of The Circle ordered theirs with cheese. Guitar and Pic-E also sampled the chili while K had a hot dog and a bowl of bean soup. All pronounced their meals worthy of the trip.

After a leisurely lunch we all headed back towards the Denver area. On the way back we stopped at the little town of Monument, Colorado. Monument sit astride Interstate 25 and I’ve passed by it hundreds of times without taking the time to look past the ever present gas stations and fast food joints. It turns out that there is a quaint little historic town a few blocks off the Interstate. We did a little looking and following the ladies of The Circle and then Too Tall-Two Timing, Guitar and I retired to the local cantina to have a cold one and watch football while the ladies completed their exploration.

We were back in the Denver metro are by late afternoon. It was a great day. I had learned a lot and had an adventure or two. Life is good.

Thanks for visiting. 

Christmas Dinner With The Circle

Saturday the full Circle got together for our annual Christmas dinner. The six of us have been doing this for about five or six years now and it’s something we look forward to. Prior to the dinner itself we normally gather at one of our houses and exchange gifts. This year we gathered at K and Too Tall – Two Timing’s home. They provided atmosphere, hors d’oeuvres, and champagne….can’t have a Christmas get together without a little bubbly.

The gifts rely more on imagination than dollars spent and we usually have a fine old time in exchanging them. Some of the gifts are practical and some just plain silly. One year Too Tall gifted the guys with coonskin caps and playing on that theme this year I gifted the guys with some Rasta hats I found while on our cruise last month. I’m not sure when we will wear them but I’m working on a theme camp out for this summer.

Among other things the ladies of the group usually exchange Christmas tree ornaments. It’s fun looking at our tree and seeing these ornaments that represent some really good times.

For the past three years I have been giving everyone a calendar for the following year. Each month of the calendar contains a picture of The Circle or some of us on one of our past adventures. I have enjoyed doing it and I think the rest of the group looks forward to getting it. I never tell them which pictures I am going to use so everyone is anxious to make sure I haven’t used a particularly silly image of them. 

This year’s dinner was had at La Dolce Vita Restaurant in the small community of Castle Pines which is just a little north of Castle Rock, CO. It was a very nice restaurant and it’s hard to go wrong with Italian food. As we were dining a very talented young lady wandered around the restaurant singing to the different groups of diners. For our table she sang a wonderful rendition of Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” that was written by Willie Nelson in 1961…..I thought it fit the group pretty well!

Dessert, coffee and after dinner drinks completed the evening. It was another great get together and we’re already searching for that next Circle adventure.

Thanks for visiting.

We’re Havin’ A Heat Wave!

Things have been pretty low key this week. It’s been a frigid week with light snow and very cold temps which started on Tuesday. Right now it’s 11 degrees but we’re fixin’ to have a heat wave! The weather shaman says it will break the freezing mark today and get all the way up to 33 degrees! ….And, be still my heart, it will get all the way to a balmy 39 degrees on Saturday!

The title of the 1938 Irving Berlin song I used for the post title is right on point…even if the rest of the lyrics don’t follow my subject line too well.

We're having a heat wave,
A tropical heat wave,
The temperature's rising,
It isn't surprising,
She certainly can can-can.

She started a heat wave
By letting her seat wave
In such a way that
The customers say that
She certainly can can-can.

Gee, her anatomy
Makes the mercury
Jump to ninety-three.

We're having a heat wave,
A tropical heat wave,
The way that she moves
That thermometer proves
That she certainly can can-can.

In contrast to my last post in which I referred to a terrible song (These Boots Are Made For Walking), this is a classic song that I have enjoyed over the years. First sung by Ethel Merman, it was also sung by Marylin Monroe in the 1954 movie, “There’s No Business Like Show Business”. Her version is typical Marylin….

The heat wave is only going to last through Saturday however and then we’re in for another blast of cold weather so it looks like next week will be low key as well.

This evening The Circle is scheduled to get together at a local restaurant for their happy hour specials. It’s a nice restaurant and the specials include not only half price drinks but half price hors d’oeuvres. About two months ago we did the same thing and with a couple of glasses of wine and enough food for a good dinner, the cost was only $25 a couple!

On the  RV front, I’ve had a Pullrite Superglide fifth wheel hitch installed in the bed of my pickup truck. These hitches are a bit pricey but have a reputation for being one of the best. The model I bought allows the hitch to “glide” towards the back of the truck when turning corners. This prevents the cab of the truck from crunching the trailer in tight turns.

I am now waiting for the delivery of a retractable tonneau cover for the bed of the truck that will allow me to leave the hitch in the bed of the truck and still be protected from the weather. The cover is also lockable for the security of the hitch and whatever else I may carry in the truck bed. I ordered the cover over two weeks ago and was told that it would only take 3-5 days for delivery but something obviously went wrong because I’m still waiting. The store swears it will be here by today but I’ll believe it when I see it.

Thanks for visiting.

Taking Care of Bidness

Numerous times over the past year while on one of my adventures, I’ve met new people and exchanged phone numbers, addresses, etc with them. It’s always inconvenient to find a piece of paper and pencil to record this stuff with.

It was easy in my work a day life. I just traded business cards….so I recently thought, why not have a retired card instead of a business card. I have met several other people that have adopted this idea. About a week ago I went online and found a place where I could design my own retired card and for about $16.00 get 250 of them printed and mailed to me……….on the picture below I blocked out my personal info but you get the idea.

In other news, The Circle had another Circle The Wagons trip this past weekend. We all met Friday evening at Golden Gate Canyon State Park about an hour and a half from here. We had a very relaxed weekend with group dinners and a nice fire every night. Sunday morning we had a late breakfast and then all headed home.

This week is a catch up week doing chores around the house and starting to prepare for my next adventure starting a week from this Saturday.

Thanks for visiting.

Home For A Day

Well actually it’s two days but you get the idea. The Bride and I returned yesterday afternoon for a Circle The Wagons camping trip. It was just a weekend trip, not nearly long enough but we take what we can get these days with everybody's busy schedule.

Guitar, Pic-E, Too Tall-Two Timing and K left mid day on Friday and got the campsites….and dinner all prepared for our arrival at 8pm. Guitar made a stew in his Dutch oven and I was impressed. It was not only tasty but it hit the spot because there was a chill in the air once the sun went down.

Saturday morning we all rode over to Bishop’s Castle which was only a few miles from the campsite. The castle is a bit of major kitsch right in Colorado. For 41 years, Jim Bishop has been building away on his creation…and creation is the word for it. It is a castle that conjures up images of knights and dragons and sorcerers. It’s a fantastic bit of construction, all done one stone at a time and with the use of only the most primitive of equipment.

Jim allows people to explore the castle on their own, as much as they like. He doesn’t charge admission but accepts donations to help him continue his work.

I visited this amazing building about 7 or 8 years ago and was amazed at what Jim had completed since my last visit. I don’t think Jim has an end point in mind so he’ll just keep adding on as long as he is physically able.

Saturday afternoon, K and Too Tall-Two Timing took a little ride in their kayak on Lake Isabel while the rest of us did a little hiking. I even found time to squeeze in a little nap in the afternoon. At dinner Saturday night we posed for the picture at the top of the post. Nose wardrobe compliments of Too Tall-Two Timing. The young lady with us is Guitar and Pic-E’s great-granddaughter.

Today and tomorrow is re-provisioning time for me. I need to empty the waste tanks on the RV and refill the fresh water tank. A trip to the grocery store is also on the list to get food and snacks for my trip to the Pecos Conference. Tomorrow morning I have a dental appointment and a doctor appointment. The doctor appointment is to hopefully, once and for all to take care of a wart problem on my foot. The doctor has twice before…unsuccessfully tried to freeze off a wart between my toes on my right foot. If she is not successful this time, I’m going to be in a lot of trouble as my Forest Service volunteer project starts in a week and a half. It’s pretty painful walking right now and a 13,000 foot mountain isn’t going to make it any better.

I am leaving for the Pecos Conference first thing Wednesday morning and spend the night at Great Sand Dunes National Park. Thursday is the registration day and the programs begin on Friday morning. It looks like the weather will be somewhat hotter than it has been so far this summer with temps in the 90’s. There is no power hook-ups at the conference campsite so it may be a bit uncomfortable during the day. There are several field trips on Sunday to local archaeological sites. After the field trip I’ll probably head to Durango and find a commercial campground so I can dump tanks and get fresh water….and even take a shower in a full sized facility. I’ll be back home on Monday and then turn around and leave on Wednesday for my Forest Service gig.

I’m not expecting to have any internet connections until I return home a week from today so this may be the last post for a while.

In other news I was accepted to one more Passport in Time project. This is another archaeological survey in far southeast Colorado. This is a continuation of a project that I did last year and really enjoyed. Read about that one here. It will be at the end of September and I’ll tell you more about it in a later post.

Thanks for visiting

Circle The Wagons

The Bride and I will be leaving this afternoon to join the rest of The Circle at La Vista campground which is about 2 1/2 hours southwest of the Denver area. The will be the first The Bride has ever ridden in the RV. I’ve had this RV for about 1 1/2 years now and every time The Bride has “camped” she has driven or flown to where I had driven a day or two before and met me at the campsite. This time she will get to occupy the co-pilot seat. This should be interesting because it takes a little getting used to, especially on narrow roads. The seats of the RV sit right over and a bit to the outside of the front wheels so if your close to the edge of the road, it looks like you’re actually off the road.

Guitar and Pic-E are leaving before us and will be responsible for dinner for the rest of us tonight. Guitar has been dying to try his Dutch Oven out and today is his chance. Too Tall, Two Timing and K. will leave about the same time as The Bride and I so we should all be in place by 7pm.

I’m not sure what the plans are for Saturday but you know we’ll find some type of adventure to keep us busy. Check back on Monday for a report.

After getting back I’ll just have time to re-provision the RV, do a dental and doctor appointment and head for the Pecos Conference on Wednesday. After returning from that, I have one day to re-provision again and head out for the Fairview Peak PIT.

Posts will be spotty at best for the next couple of weeks but I’ll update everyone as I can.

Thanks for visiting.

Back From A Mountain Fix

It’s amazing what two nights and three days in the mountains can do for the soul! It was a great trip and I found even more new places to explore.

Tuesday morning however, I was sure that my soul was damned. When I began final loading of the RV first thing Tuesday morning, I opened the RV door and the electric steps came down and stuck in the down position. When the steps are in the down position it is impossible to drive the RV….unless you want to tear the steps off of the RV body, and I did not. I fiddled, fumed, fought and festered, but nothing would get the steps to operate correctly. I finally had to disconnect the arm from the electric motor that powers the steps and then use two ratchet straps to hold the two steps in the up position. A little thing like electric steps was NOT going to keep me from my date in the mountains.

After I resolved the steps issue, I started to load the scooter on the rack that fits on the front bumper of the RV. Well started is not the correct word because I couldn’t get the scooter to start! The engine would turn over, run very roughly for a few seconds and then stall. I fiddled, fumed, fought and festered with this for about an hour and decided just to load it with sheer muscle power (It only weights about 100 lbs.), take it with me and see if I could get it to start once I got to my campsite. It took about another hour for the remaining preparations and just as I was getting ready to drive off, I decided to try the scooter engine one more time….while it was sitting on the rack. To my surprise it started right up!

I was on the road at about 10 am and got to my campsite a little after noon. The campsite is a “dispersed” camping area which means that there are no designated sites and you camp where ever you want. I found an area about 5 feet from Clear Creek, the stream that feeds the reservoir, and was delighted at my luck.

“Luck” might not be a good word to use in selecting that camping site. I later learned that because this is the hottest part of the summer, even in the mountains, and because I was so close to the water, I would be attacked by millions of mosquitoes, the instant I left the protection of the RV. It made it pretty much impossible to enjoy the view of the stream anywhere except from the inside of the RV.

After hearing all that you’re probably thinking that this was a terrible trip, but it wasn’t. After getting all of the above stuff out of the way, things started to click in a good way. Tuesday afternoon I rode the scooter about 12 miles further up into the mountains on a small dirt road, scouting for possible adventures. I had been up this road in a car 8 or 10 years ago and remembered that there were two small ghost towns way back in the valley. Riding on a scooter gave a completely different perspective to the surroundings. I could feel the cool wind in my face and smell the aspen trees. Everything seemed more beautiful and more fragrant on the scooter!

I rode until the road became a four wheel drive trail and decided that on Wednesday I would come back and hike up that trail. I also spotted numerous boondocking campsites for future reference.

I returned to the RV at about 4:30 pm and decided to try fishing for a while. That didn’t work out too well because about the time I got the belly boat pumped up and into the water, the wind started blowing like crazy. I toughed it out for about a half hour and caught one small trout. The wind didn’t seem like it was going to quit, so I did.

The next morning I was up early and headed out for my hike. Even though I was anxious to start the hike I took my time and stopped numerous places along the way to explore and take pictures. I got to the four wheel drive trail about 10 am and figured I would walk up the trail for about two hours and then turn around and come back. Summertime in the mountains brings afternoon thunder showers and more dangerous, the lightning that accompanies them. Colorado is a top state in the category of people killed by lightning and I certainly didn’t want to add to that reputation. 

With all of the stopping, exploring and taking pictures, two hours only got me 2.5 miles up the trail. That 2.5 miles however was 2.5 miles of soul cleansing, Rocky Mountain beauty. (See picture at the top of the post!). About two miles into the trail, I came upon the ruins of the Banker Mine. According to my research this was a silver mine started in the 1890’s and it shipped ore until around 1927. The tunnel has been closed but you can see the tailings pile in the background of the picture to the right. The mountain in the background is aptly named Granite Mountain.

I spent a good deal of time poking around the four or five remnants of buildings and trying to figure out what each building was used for. It was so picturesque that it was hard to leave and continue the exploration.

The exploration continued only for another half mile when I ran out of time and the four wheel drive road turned into a hiking trail. According to my map there are several more old mines and another ghost town about two miles further up the trail. I decided to leave that for my next trip.

I had lunch sitting on a boulder in the shade of a large fir tree and just let my soul giggle. Normally when you hike round trip over the same route, the return is a bit boring but this scenery was so spectacular that it was great in either direction. I was back at the RV by about 3 pm and decided that I needed a nap.

Napping was accomplished in a professional way and it was time to fish a bit more. This time I decided to forego the belly boat and fish from the bank. I really didn’t care if I caught a fish or not because I was still enjoying the glow of the morning’s adventure. It’s a good think I didn’t care….because I didn’t catch anything.

While eating dinner that night and planning my activities for Thursday I heard on the radio that this was the weekend for the Fairplay “Burro Days”. I’ve always wanted to attend this event and have never gotten the opportunity. Fairplay is a small mountain town and it’s 3 or 4 motels and one small RV park are normally booked months in advance for this event.

I decided however, to give it a chance and drive back to Fairplay Thursday morning. Maybe I could luck on to a place to camp for the weekend. If I did my plan was to call The Bride and get her to drive up and meet me for the weekend. If I couldn’t find a place to camp I was halfway home anyway and would just continue on home.

Luck was not with me on this endeavor. I found one business that would let me park in their parking lot right on the main highway…no power or water and just a gravel parking lot. I called The Bride to see if that was to here liking even though I wasn’t too crazy about the idea. The Bride was of the same mind a me, so I called it a trip and drove back home.

The RV is now at the lot and the repair guys are going to look at the steps this week. I will need some type of fix for this as The Bride and I leave on Friday afternoon for a Circle The Wagons trip with the rest of The Circle to La Vista Campground about 3 hours southwest of the Denver area.

The Wednesday after we get back I take off again, this time to the Pecos Conference, which I posted about earlier. Two days after returning from this trip I start on another Forest Service Passport In Time project which I’ll tell you about in a future post.

Thanks for visiting.