Let the summer begin!

We're back in Colorado after a long, but pretty pleasant drive here. We're staying the first night (or so) in the Boulder University Inn. I'm already happy to be here. Rory and I checked out the grass situation near the hotel only to find that we're right on Boulder Creek. The particular part of the creek near the hotel is really dark, but we crossed the street to see old familiar sights like the Dushanbe Tea House, the Farmer's Market Street and the Bandshell. The air in the room was a bit musty when we got here, but the air outside is cool and dry and clear. I love the air here. I don't exactly subscribe to the concept of a cleansing breath - except when I'm in Colorado. Sure, maybe it's that there just isn't enough oxygen in the air here, but I always think the air is just somehow better here than everywhere else. For even further cleansing, we've filled up on a couple of glasses of good old Boulder tap water on ice. I did double check with the hotel guys if the tap water was ok and they both nodded emphatically saying "It's goood" as if it were a more intoxicating substance. It's at leas addictive to me - I think I'll have a few more sips before seeing if sleep here is better than anywhere else too.

Fall in Colorado

We're back for a little taste of fall in Colorado. It used to be that we'd come to Colorado because Alex would have some kind of meeting; Wee and I would tag along and we'd tack on a weekend for fun. Now we book trips for the weekend and Alex thinks of some kind of meeting so we add in some work days too. Our trip on Wednesday evening was precessing faster than usual until the Super Shuttle driver had about a 2 hour fight with her GPS system on the way to Boulder. The whole Super Shuttle adventure was new to us; in the past we had always rented a car, but after the summer we kept our reliable Ford Explorer at Cabin Guy's place. It was nice to arrive to our own car even if it wasn't in our own home. We were also greeted by a friend at Cabin Guy's place. One of the workmen, Tim, was staying there for the last few days before his wedding. Congratulations Tim! After a little peek at our curved truss we headed for our old home-away-from-home-in-Colorado, the St. Julien. We have been staying at the St. Julien several times a year since January 2006, just a few months after it opened. A few of the staff recognized us and gave us an upgraded suite room with a view of the mountains. We luxuriated in the 1000 threadcount sheets and ordered room service. So nice to be home.

On Thursday and Friday, I worked from the St. Julien, Alex had meetings in Longmont and Colorado Springs, and Aidan went to backup care at Bright Horizons. Backup daycare is one of the best benefits that any company can offer. Wee has been to Bright Horizons in several locations, but especially likes the one in Longmont. He was so sad when Alex picked him up after only a half day on Thursday.

After our first Bo Staff class on Thursday afternoon we went up to The Land to see the cabin and just say hi to the Land. It's hard for me to see the destruction that the construction has caused. I can't wait for the digging and the heavy machinery to be done. Even the cabin seems so unnatural and big to me. But we did take a little walk to the Aspens and this summer's campsite which is still as natural and beautiful as ever. The wildflowers are all but gone, but the aspens are their beautiful autumn yellow.

We had dinner with Amy back in Boulder. We lunched with her again on Saturday and will see her on Sunday. So great to have friends to hang out with.

For the weekend, we've moved our base to the Best Western in Nederland. The staff remember us from this summer's Schoenberg family reunion. They asked about my mom and the rest of the family and say hi to everyone.

This morning we hiked the Hessie trail to Lost Lake. This is one of those trails that is so beautiful that it doesn't seem real as it winds past babbling brooks, through bright yellow aspens, displaying valley vistas, and ending up at an alpine lake. The horses and dogs that we met on the trail add even more extra credit and then the pièce de résistance was finding wild raspberries! We really didn't have anything else to do today, so we uncharacteristically took our time and meandered around and just relaxed.

In the afternoon we hit the trails again, this time on horseback from Sundance Stables. Another fabulous trek through Aspens and Pine forest with views of the Continental Divide. The big bonus on this trip was that the stables offered us horses for free next summer if we can set up somewhere for the horses to hang out in a pasture on our land. How cool would that be?!!!

In the evening we went to the movies at the Nederland community center. The movie was The Time Traveler's Wife, which was ok, but really we were going to check out the small town scene. Alex was all anxious about getting there right on time. We arrived about 5 minutes late, but still had plenty of time to hang out. The event started with community announcements - Pine Beetle classes available in October, the normal community announcer's hip replacement recovery is going well, adult floor hockey has started up, and Obediah someone will be doing a concert at the church on Sunday. Next was the ticket stub raffle where people won free candy, a local gift certificate, and a t-shirt. Then the announcers shouted back to the projectionist "Do we have any previews?" "Nope" "Damn! Well, let's start the movie then." We just smiled, happy with our sort of residence in this small town.

Bittersweet last week here

We're having such a good time here, we're going to be sad to leave!!!

This last week in Colorado has been Cousin Camp for Wee. My brother Ed's 19 year old daughter Hannah like Colorado so much during the Schoenberg family reunion that she jumped at the chance for a trip back. Hannah and Wee have spent the week sleeping in as late as 10, swimming, playing with the neighbors, feeding ducks at Wonderland Lake, playing on the playground, playing tennis, making cookies, making t-shirts, and generally just hanging out. Hannah has tried quelling some of Wee's silliness while imparting some of her own bootie-shaking-tootie-ta-singing silliness.

Meanwhile Alex and I have continued working remotely with east coast lunch time breaks for running, biking, hiking, and tennis followed by Boulder's farmers market bounty filled lunches. When we get back to our regular lives we'll have to establish a little working from home action just to keep this summer's spirit alive.

The evenings have taken us to see Annie at Boulder Dinner Theater, make dinner and check cabin progress on The Land a couple times (once including Amy), watch the movie Top Gun at Red Rocks, shop and dine at the Boulder Farmers Market, and people watch and shop on the Pearl Street Mall. Being able bring Hannah to her first viewing of the cinematic genius of Top Gun in a crowd of 9000 in the natural beauty and incredible acoustics of Red Rocks was definitely the highlight of the week. The cool side shot of that was that we went from watching the band Paper Bird open for Top Gun at the mammoth venue of Red Rocks on Tuesday and see them sing again in a doorway on Pearl Street the very next day.

Windy wake up to starry night

The summer really seems to be coming to a close. We'll be heading back "home" next weekend, so this last weekend was really our last chance for tent camping on the Land this year.

We headed up Friday evening after the end of drama camp. We put up the tent and took some pictures of the progress on the Cabin, but we didn't feel like the rigmarole of cooking and a campfire, so just headed to Back Country Pizza in Nederland for an easy supper. We made it back to the Land before pitch darkness, but not much. Wee fell asleep quickly under the serenade of my birthday Indian flute. Alex and I stayed up a little longer to do sword patterns in the dark and watch the stars then went inside the tent ourselves. We know it's been a long summer of camping since almost all of our lanterns and flashlights are dead and I had to read on my Kindle using my iPhone for light - how techie am I?

Sleep did happen for a little while. But then the winds kicked in. Our tent is 10' x 15' x 7'. We love it for all the space in all directions under normal conditions. But that's a lot of fabric to get whipped around by the wind. Wee slept like a log, but I lay frozen watching the walls and poles jerk and sway. I listened intently to the wind outside waiting for our temporary abode to either collapse or whisk us off to Oz. After a very early morning potty break Alex discovered that it was way less scary outside the tent than inside. With that news and with a little bit of dawn's early light I headed out of my own internal hell to brave the elements head on. Gusts of wind sent aspen leaves shimmering, but otherwise everything seemed to be staying more upright and calm than the environment of the tent. Plus, there was a beautiful double rainbow flying over the continental divide just trying to make me smile. I got Rory from the car and we explored the wilds above the Christmas tree a bit, then I came back to the tent for a couple more hours of reading and rest. When Alex went outside again at a more reasonable hour the morning was (temporarily) sunny and calm.

But storms were still looming so we chose a car centric day.

First stop breakfast at the Pioneer Inn (PI) in Nederland. Just us and a "gang" of middle aged motorcyclists riding Honda Gold Wings.

We drove down through Central City and even got out of the car to look at some of the antique stores. Central City/Black Hawk is a weird little town on Peak to Peak Highway. In the 1800's it had boomed with Silver Mining and does have that standard old west feel. But it took a different approach to modern times by allowing casinos. So mixed in among 150 year old store fronts are slot machines and gambling tables. I think the miners would have loved that. For us it was just a quick stop.

Next stop was Red Rocks. Famed amphitheater built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1941. But also amazing rock formations. We ran down and up the stairs and generally wandered all around. Then had our choice for lunch in nearby Morrison in a room filled with stuffed dead animals or a biker bar. We chose stuffed animals since we did biker bar for breakfast.

Dinosaur ridge was next. Footprints, fossilized bones, worm holes, and wave marks on this one cool "hogback" ridge. It was uncovered while building the road to Red Rocks, but protected for its scientific and educational significance. I'm not normally all that into dinosaurs, but it's pretty powerful to see footsteps that are millions of years old.

Finally the weather was getting pretty stable, but I still didn't want to spend another night in a windy tent. We drove back to Nederland through Coal Creek Canyon past scenic Wondervu to get our stuff from the campsite. Then we headed to Lyons' Planet Bluegrass mini-woodstock-esque venue to see a little of this weekend's Folks Festival. The woodstock feel jumped right out at us as we walked past the rows of campers and tents - I guess the wind doesn't bother these stoned campers crammed into a valley and tired from three days of festival antics. We paused for a few minutes to do some hula hoop in among the craft and food stands. Then we found Amy (who had an awesome spot, chairs, and a tarp to sit on - thanks Amy!!!), got some food and settled in to watch a little Susan Tedeschi. Wee fell asleep in our arms as Don McLean played communist/populist old songs, he was asleep before Starry Starry Night and had already said bye-bye before American Pie.

Aspen weekend

Most of the summer that we've been here we've stayed pretty close to "home" exploring and really familiarizing ourselves with the area around Boulder and Nederland. We've eaten at pretty much every restaurant on Peak to Peak and hiked many of the shorter trails too. This weekend the wedding of my old DC friend Alek who moved to Boulder many years ago gave us the opportunity to go a little farther afield.

We actually just back into Boulder on Friday night immersing ourselves back into Colorado with dinner on the rooftop deck at West End Tavern on Pearl Street. Dogs, hippies, Colorado homeless, and college students welcomed us home. Saturday morning we took full advantage of our jet lag by waking up at 6. We had just enough time to repack for the weekend, go for a run, pick up the dog from her weekday farm abode, pick up some fresh veggies and stuff from the farmers market and get started on the 4.5 hour road trip right on schedule around 9.

The first half of the drive from Boulder to Golden onto I-70 up til Idaho Springs is inside our sphere of recognition. Just last weekend we made it as far as Georgetown. And in snowboarding days of yore (before Alex's knee issues) we'd gone as far as Keystone, Copper, Breckenridge, and even once to Vail. But Aspen is another two hours beyond that.

When driving in other parts of the country it seems like when you take the highway you whiz by so quickly that you miss the feel of the place. But Colorado's mountains command attention and show their beauty at any speed. On the way there we took I-70 all the way to Glenwood Springs. For some weird reason I actually drove the last two hours and got to jump into a scene out of the movie Cars and wind through an awesome canyon right on the highway with our half of the road cantilevered above the other half. On the way back we drove over Independence Pass from Aspen to Leadville slaloming up over 12,000 feet (above treeline) along a road in parts so narrow that oncoming collision seemed imminent.

But the weekend wasn't all about the drive. We ate lunch both days at a couple uberchic restaurants in Aspen. Rory and I went for an early morning run (almost saw a bear). We had a lovely morning swim and hot tub at our hotel. We all went for a nice hike at Maroon Bells. We went for a nice bike ride along the Rio Grande trail following a river through town and beyond. We wandered through the town browsing through overly expensive art and other stuff (we did see a bear in a tree near the McDonald's right in the middle of town). Aidan played on the rock and rope structure a block or two from the bear.

And of course we went to a wedding. The wedding was at a farm in Carbondale, CO. The happy couple is very active and outdoorsy, so it was just perfect to have incredible views of the mountains behind them as they said their vows. Many good wishes to Alek and Julia for a long and happy life together. We have very bad timing in trying to get together with them - they are always in DC when we are in Colorado and visa versa - but hopefully that will change soon. And many thanks for them for being the trigger to bring us to more of Colorado.

Paragliding Birthday

Starting when I turned 20 and went skydiving, every year for my birthday I do some kind of "extreme" sport or otherwise sort of death defying activity. Birthday events have included hang gliding, ballooning, parasailing, pilot lesson, bungee jumping, surfing, rock climbing, and trapeze. This year's adventure was paragliding - a combination of a few of the previous attempts (like hang gliding with a parachute).

My birthday is typically either completely windless and muggy or stormy, both of which tend to hamper my adventure attempts. This year there was a little bit of both. The day before and my birthday were both rainy, yucky days. Not good flying weather. The plan had been to start ground school the day before with the first flight on the actual day. The weather threw off the schedule a bit, but it was still all accomplished eventually.

Training started the day before my birthday with "Ground School". The first day ended up just watching videos learning about the physics of flight in the instructors basement. Birthday was a total washout. Then the 31st was almost completely calm and relatively yucky by Boulder standards, but worth a try. The task for the day was for each student to run successfully across a field wearing a harness and helmet tied to a paraglider over head. That may sound easy, but paragliders are strong, ornery devices loaded with strings that are not easily tamed by small, people like myself who have only rough motor skills. The other two students were midsized men who seem to have no problem. But I spent several hours taking just a few steps and watching the glider fall to one side. I never really did figure out on the two good attempts what I had done differently to make it actually work, but I had little confidence that trying this game while running off the side of a mountain would make me more comfortable. The instructor assured me that he would bring along a tandem harness in case anyone just couldn't fly. I think he just said that to make me feel better.

Saturday ended up being flight day number one. A good change in schedule so Alex and Wee could watch. Each student donned a giant backpack containing a paraglider, helmet, and radio and we hiked about 30 minutes up the hill. According to Google Maps it is a rise of 400-600 feet due West from North Boulder Park .
View Larger Map I got to the top realizing that I had the digital camera and Alex refused to come get it, so all my first flight pics are from his iPhone. The first task for today was to get a good run in and abort. Ugh. I had spent all afternoon the day before trying to get a good run and my arms, legs, and confidence were bruised and aching from the memories. Fellow student, Peder, did his first run perfectly. OK. I can do that. Nope. Collapse to the side. Then Luke tried and he had a collapse too. Well, my ego was happy to have some company in its misery, but I still was no closer to going down. Peder and Luke both had successful flights before I was able to even get one good practice run in. But eventually I was cleared for takeoff. Apparently my skill is in the air. As soon as I left the ground I got much more lift than the other two had and I was soaring. Bumping around and moving at about 20 mph I didn't trust this flimsy fabric that had collapsed on me so many times on the ground, but it held its own to land me within just a few feet of my cheering sweetie and Wee One. Yay! So much fun!

I did one more flight that day with a little less lift and a blurry video. Then the next day I only had like 3 failed ground attempts before each of my two flights, which seemed like a bit of an improvement. Overall my flights were uneventful and fun. My fellow students each had slightly more adventure. On the first day Peder had one attempt where he never really got off the ground and had to hike a few hundred feet through the cactus and rocks to get back to the launch pad. Luke had one flight where he sat back too soon and whacked his butt into the ground (but still flew). Then right before my last flight Peder flew and the guide's radio wasn't working so he was up there and landed safely completely on his own. Meanwhile I had great lift again on my last flight to end the day right.

Of all my adventure attempts, this one is seeming the most appealing to try again. It's a great combination of hiking and floating. It's exciting, but not quite as death defying as sky diving (I think). I'm sure I can get over my uncoordination on the ground with a little practice. Apparently there are great places to paraglide all over the world and the equipment is small enough to fit into a luggage checkable backpack. An interesting idea, but I'm not totally hooked yet.

More pictures and some seriously blurry video can be found here:
A better view can be found from another student at the same location with the same guide here:

Yee ha!

To prove that Colorado really is still the wild west, they still have plenty of rodeos here. We went to the Estes Park Rodeo with my family when they were here and then Cheyenne Frontier Days with our friend Avis just this weekend.

The Estes Park Rodeo is a three time winner of the Best Small Rodeo in America and lived up to this award nicely. It wasn't that the rodeo part was small, but the stuff around it was small. Most of the rodeos I've been to in the past have been enormous events like the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo that was always held in the Astrodome and the National Western Livestock Show and Rodeo in Denver, the New Mexico State Fair, and even the Greeley Stampede. Those were not just rodeos, they were state or national level agricultural fairs and entertainment as well. But Estes was just having a rodeo. They had a few hat and boot sales out front and a little dance group for Mexico Day, but the real entertainment was the rodeo itself. They started with the display of the sponsor flags ridden around the arena on horseback, then the rodeo princess rode around in their sparkly outfits, then they had a great pre-game show of trick riding. I could see myself doing stuff like riding sideways, or backwards, or maybe even standing up. But the part where they jumped off the galloping horse and then jumped or flipped back is definitely a trick left up to the experts. The main rodeo had all the standard events - steer wrestling, calf roping, saddle bronc and bareback bronc riding, team roping, barrel racing, and of course bull riding. We had signed Wee up to ride a sheep in the Mutton Busting, but there were too many entrants, so he thankfully just got to watch the rodeo and not paricipate. Of course my favorite thing to watch was just the tall, lean cowboys walking around in Wranglers, boots, and hats.

Cheyenne Frontier Days, ten times voted the Best Large Rodeo in America, was more the type of event I was used to. It had a midway and western shops all around. But it also had some areas that made it seem almost like the Cowboy equivalent of a renaissance festival where it seemed like you really were in the old west with people dressed in and selling period clothing, food, and furnishings. The first thing we encountered were the Chuckwagons. They were in competition creating a meal of chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, beans, biscuits, and blueberry cobbler all using old west cooking techniques such as pit fires, hanging cauldrons of soup, and dutch ovens. The wagons and the people were also done up in old west style and must have been judged as well. A few of the participants explained to us about the various specialized woods they used for different cooking techniques - hardwood for the slow burning coals used for biscuits and cobblers vs. pine for the intense heat under the oil frying the chicken fried steak. Next to the Chuckwagon section was the little old town including lots of leather and fur sales, paintings, clothes, hats, iron work art, and some fake establishments like a jail, undertaker, and bank. Then there was the American Indian section with a few teepees, dancing, and shops with beadwork, various other jewelry, more leather and fur, and some musical instruments. We got Wee a tiny beaded cowboy and bought our famous drummer neighbor an Indian drum. < img src = "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjePEOC4OQnDvGGX5_BkLdbnQOtBY8eyI-mCu1zHcBxNduijYC1MwHRjPWQDsIT4CJ5ABjqN_U3yVzNWben_EJtETLAGkwErPwWga6epx2ehDt1-tNmg-S0dzkfWelhOXhHU_aHTfDrLz-B/s576/IMG_2315.jpg" /> The rodeo event started with Navy paratroopers landing in the middle of the arena and then went on to regular rodeo events.



It was a little unique in that it had a few events run more than once and some funny little events in between. My favorite intermission event was when they had foals on one end of the track and mares on the other and it was a race to see which baby could get to its mommy the fastest - the babies all reminded me of Skye when he was tiny. In all Cheyenne Frontier Days was still not as huge as the big events in the big cities, but it was as real as it gets. We even stopped in downtown Cheyenne to shop a little more at the Wrangler store and for Alex and Wee to have a steak at one of the few restaurants in town.