Moab Desert

I uploaded these photos after our June trip to Moab with the hopes that Mike would journal the stories. He has not so you are once again stuck with my ramblings.

A few days before Memorial weekend Mike and I headed up to Glenwood Springs where he worked and I played. The weather was rainy but bearable and I took some photos of the area.

We came up here last year in July and the picture below was black and charred due to a recent fire.

The fire was started by an underground coal seam that has been burring for 100+ years. There are coal seams all over the world that are currently burning underground an causing toxic fumes to escape. The fire spread quickly down the mountain and jumped the Colorado River (120ft) causing acres upon acres to burn.

A year later it is rejuvenating itself and the mountain again has life.

So after a few days in Glenwood where I bought a bunch of local history and Louis L'Amour books we headed to Utah. Our 3 hour drive was filled with rain. Just what we had hoped for as we were camping in our itty bitty 2 person tent.

We arrived about 9PM, checked into the camp ground and made our way to our site. There was a van parked in our lot and we kindly asked him to vacate so we could setup. The camp site was full and we did not want to have to move ourselves later if we were to get evicted for being in the wrong site. He had a van and all his stuff was inside so it was not a big deal. He grabbed his cooler and moved to the empty site next to us.

The rains had stopped long enough that we could stake out our site and decide where to pitch the tent. The site had a picnic table with a small shelter above it so we moved out the table and put our tent there. Mike always picks out the bests place for the tent. We had an extra tarp so we secured that to the shelter to help eliminate the rain entering.

We setup the air mattresses which were too big for the tent so we had to sleep at an angle. The tent was dry and warm and we sat in the chairs for a beer before bed. The skies opened once again and the area was soaked. Into bed we climbed and pretended to sleep through the pitter patter of the rain hitting the tarp.

Looks cozy huh!!! This is the next morning and you can see the clouds in the background. This tent has been used in Australia (in the rain), Egypt, and Canada (in the rain). When Mike and I tent together...rain. When we tent separate...no rain....Mmmmm want to go camping with us???

The place was all reddish sand and very comfortable.

Our site was across for the trash dump...yippee....no bears...I hope.

These clouds were with us the whole trip. Feel bad for the jeep with no roof.

So we ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for breakfast and wash them down with a can of diet coke...ahh vacation!

We head to Arches National Park for a day of hiking and site seeing. The walk was beautiful and we encountered a variety of flora.

John Wesley Wolfe, a veteran of the Civil War, built the homestead known as Wolfe Ranch around 1898. It is located on Salt Wash, at the beginning of the Delicate Arch Trail. Wolfe and his family lived there a decade or more, then moved back to Ohio. The cabin remains, an echo of what must have been a remarkable experience.






I love tumbleweed.







These cairns (Gaelic term) tell us what direction to follow on the trail. I liked this one because it was an arch. The weather was perfect for me to hike as it was cool and slightly rainy which kept other people away.


You can see here the millions of layers of erosion and deposition. The water carves into the rock and creates these beautiful formations. There are over 2000 catalogued arches and each month more are formed while others crumble.




This is Delicate Arch one of the most visited arches in the park. It was about a 3.5 mile hike with an elevation gain of about 480 feet through breath taking views. Can you see Mike under the arch? I think you all know me well enough to realize that I was not going to go near the foot wide path to get closer to the arch...hence a not so good photo of hubby but I am still here and did not topple off the mountain.




A well feed raven waits for its supper.

Another hike to see Double Arches
Cool dead tree, I am camouflaged.
Various terrain

It was a great day hiking and we are off to the camp site. As soon as we leave the park the torrential rains start again. The average rainfall for Moan in May is less than a half inch. The weekend we were there they got 2 inches. That does not sound like a lot but believe me it is.

We sat outside watching the storm for a while and Mike counted between the lightening and thunder to gage how close the storm was. It was a count of about 20 when he started 4 miles a way and within 15 minutes it was a mile. He kept telling me we should get in the car and I kept laughing at him. "My mother says we should be in the car." He jumps in the car and I hold out a bit longer.
There is no count between the lightening and the thunder now. Not sure if you can see this well but that is a huge puddle.

I should have listened to him when he got in the car. As I run around the car to get in I accidentally locked the car door and could not reach the key. So I was nice and dry until I attempted safety. Finally I get in and I am soaking wet. Mike hands me a beer. The heat I am generating steams the inside of the car.

55 minutes later the rain is gone and the sun is shining. We go for a walk to see the damage the storm caused. This is the site above ours.

Our neighbors tent was filled with water. One tent was floating away as we walked around. Other people where hanging their sleeping bags and pillows to dry. Our tent was completely dry! Mike decided after this storm to make little ruts around the tent to divert future rain waters, which we needed.
Gorgeous rainbow.

We ate a very quick supper, cleaned up, and ducked into the tent before the rains came all over again.

The next day we decided to go south and hoped to avoid the rain. We headed for Canyonlands National Park, Island in the Sky. It was a wee bit of a drive and we had not gotten gas so we had to stop on the border of the park. We saw a small mom and pop store and paid $5.00 a gallon to get us in and around the park. Ouch! It was well worth it though.

We did the White Rim Trail which lead us to the confluence (flowing together) of the Green River and the Colorado River. The Colorado River is about 1450 miles long and runs from Colorado to Grand Canyon to California. The Green River is about 730 miles long and runs from Wyoming partly into Colorado and then into Utah.

It was a 13.5 mile round trip hike that had a lot of ups and downs. We got lost the first mile so it was a 15 mile trip for us. Last time Mike lets me lead. We had bought walking sticks for this trip and I am really glad we did. They are very helpful and highly recommend them. It was an elevation gain of about 1,600 feet and took us about 8 hours with a 30 minute stop at the confluence.

The sun was shining the whole time and was one of our best hikes. No blisters!! I did run out of water and had to steal Mike's. I drank him dry too but we only had a mile left to go.

We returned to the car and had a little picnic. We then went back to the campsite to find we had missed all the rain. We headed out to supper and crashed around 9PM. The campground did not permit campfires so there was not much else to do but sleep when you go back to your site.

Great weekend despite the rain. We had an early breakfast and then drove the 6.5 hours home.

House, can there really be more, Updates

Mudded and ready for paint.

But first we need to texture the wall so it looks like the rest of the house from the 70s. I bought a spray can that works well on small areas and Mike rolled mud on the bigger areas. More sanding and another coat of sealer goes on before the paint. Which means more dust and more clean up!!

We also decided to remove the white paneling that was on the sliding door wall and replace with sheet rock.

Fortunately it already had sheet rock and we just need to patch! Yeah!!!

While Mike worked on that I continue to rip down more walls. Again this is the laundry room are and we are removing the yellow closet today. I took down the cabinets above washer and dryer and discovered this lovely red and putrid green wallpaper of pheasants.

This is the closet...no more.

During the week I painted the dining room Cucumber and love the color. Cannot wait for final touches of hardwood, floor boards and crown molding!

The living room also was painted a warm brown cannot remember the name of the color though.

Yippee 2 rooms done minus floor and molding!

Great Sand Sunes National Park

Friday night we headed to Great Sand Dunes National Park in Alamosa, CO. It was a 2 hour drive to our B&B and then another hour drive on Saturday to the park. It was a beautiful day and the scenic view was worth the drive.

These are the tallest dunes in North America, the largest rises 750 feet and covers 30sq. miles.

You cross a little stream that reaches your ankles, then start your ascent. We took off our shoes and splashed merrily across the trickling water. We noticed a slew of kids playing while their parents sat in their lounge chairs and conversed. This trickle of water was a big deal. Land locked Coloradans are desperate for water! How sad. The stream will dry up in a few weeks and you will never know that it was even here. Once the snows come again this winter and melt next spring the stream will again appear for a few weeks much to the enjoyment of moms, dads, and kids.

The wind was strong and the sun hot. The sand will reach temps of 140! Ouch!! Mike and I enjoy the views and watched people try to scramble up the dunes but only to slide back down. One step forward two back. Bring self bailing shoes.

The diversity of the terrain was pretty cool: alpine tundra, forests, massive dunes, grasslands, and wetlands all in one convenient location.

A great place to hike and camp if you want to.

Images as we drove by and I hung out the sun roof.

Lonely little house

Patriotic oil tank

The Sangre de Cristo (Spanish for Blood of Christ) Mountains are one of the longest mountain chains on Earth. They stretch from Colorado to New Mexico. There are ten peaks over 14,000' high and more than two dozen over 13,000'. The name, is said to come from the red color of the range at some sunrises and sunsets, especially when the mountains are covered with snow.

The Scenic Highway of Legends

Native Americans believe this to be the devil's tail. That the devil surfaced to see if he could conquer the world but God cut of his tail and it remains still as a reminder that the devil will not prevail.

Another myth is that the giants used these as shields during a battle. The gods grew tired of their noise and destruction and caused the land to dry up and die forcing the giants away.

One giant was left to watch over the area and make sure the enemy did not return. After years of waiting the gods took favor on him and turned him to stone. Gee, thanks, I guess.

Goats prevail today!

No matter what you believe it is an amazing view.

We stopped in Cuchara to see the old historic town. A few stores and a restaurant. This small town is a summer haven for Texans.

The Timbers Hotel and Restaurant opened the weekend we were their so we went in and had a beer and chatted up the bartender who travels the world doing seasonal work.

The resident herd of deer were on the road to meet us on our return from Cuchara.

We stayed at the Inn at the Spanish Peaks, in LaVeta. A cozy B&B run by Tracy and Bill. Tracy greeted us around 9:45pm as we had driven down from Centennial and it takes about 3 hours. The room was designed in a "Costa Rica" flare, and now, more than ever, we are dying to get to CR to see Greg and Gail's cabins that they are building. The breakfast was fabulous and more food than one can eat. They gave us great local info and stimulating conversation as well.

As we entered there were about 10 humming birds in the nearby tree feeding in the lovely nectar our hosts and left for them. They were hard to capture in a still picture.

Sunday we headed home via a scenic route and stopped in to see some ghost towns.

St. Elmo Ghost Town

Built in 1878 in a heavily forested area, originally named Forest City. The USPS complained of too many such named towns. Griffith Evans, one of the founders, was reading a book at the time titled St. Elmo, and hence the name was changed. Some historians claim the population was over 2,000 during it's hey day, but 1,000 is more accurate.

In 1881 it became a station on the Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad line where the tracks continued through the historic Alpine Tunnel. The settlement was considered a main source of supplies arriving by train for the area settlers and eventually included several merchandise stores, three hotels, five restaurants, two sawmills and a weekly newspaper called the Mountaineer. The miners worked at several silver, gold, copper and iron mines throughout the area. The Murphy Mine shipped as much as 50-75 tons of ore per day to the smelters at Alpine. Altogether, there were over 150 patented mine claims in the immediate area.

In 1881 Anton Stark, a cattleman brought a herd to the railroad and was so taken with the town that he and his family quickly took up residence. Anton became a section boss for one of the local mines and his wife, Anna, ran a general store and the Home Comfort Hotel, which later became home to the post office and telegraph office.

The survival of the town was largely due to the Stark family and their descendants, who remained the sole year-round residents for many years.

The failure of numerous mines, and the closure of the Alpine Tunnel in 1910 started the decline of St. Elmo. The railroad continued to run until 1922 and it has been said that the rest of St. Elmo's population rode the last train out of town, never to return. In 1926, the railroad tracks were torn up. But the Stark family stayed, believing that St. Elmo would thrive again, buying up property at tax sales.

For many years, the Starks tried to influence developers in re-opening the mines, but when they were unsuccessful they turned to tourism, leasing the empty cabins to vacationers and continuing to run the general store. After Anton Stark's death, Anna realized that the tourism trade was not providing for the family and sent Annabelle (daughter) to work in the telegraph office in Salida, 20 miles south of St. Elmo.

According to local legend, Annabelle Stark, still keeps a ghostly watch over the town.

It was a long solitary road into St. Elmo's and we contemplated turning back several times as there seemed to be nothing here. I am glad that we did not. We had stopped earlier at a supposed ghost town that looked like an artist colony instead. It was still very active and had a population of 5,000.

If these walls could only talk. I am sure the tales they would tell would have us howlin'.

Loved the old sled.

Every house must have an outhouse. The house are so close you think they could have shared them.

The rest of the trip was driving home through the mountains on twisty, turning roads that had Mike panicking as I drove them a wee bit too fast for his liking.