We have been in Colorado for coming up on six months now. Hard to believe. Time is just slipping by as I imagine it is for most of us. I think that I’m going to get up every morning and watch Groundhog Day just to go full meta. I’m still working part time doing computer stuff which has been a good thing during the lockdown - to have something to do other than watch Netflix. Shery has her glass studio set up in one of the upstairs bedrooms and is focusing on improving her glass fuming skills.
Casey and finacée Dorothy already lived in Colorado when we moved, and Hunter and wife Toma moved here a few months ago. So, for the first time in a decade, we are all in the same time zone.
Blog posts and Photo Galleries
I have embedded a few photos into this letter, but most of the photos are in online photo galleries and blog posts. A few too many photos, and not curated in any way, but if you browse quickly, you should get a good sense of what we have been up to.
Blog post about a bike trip I took with Hunter and his friend Samyak. Lots of good photos of all of us: Grand Junction to Moab by Samyak
Some photo albums since we moved:
2-Week Continental Divide bike trip
Pouring concrete at Casey’s place
Road trip to Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef national parks
May - the move and the death of the 2004 RAV4
We drove from Falls Church to Boulder at the end of May. We put the Porsche on a car carrier and drove our old RAV4. We had to rent a small U-Haul trailer at the last minute to squeeze that last of our stuff into something. We used the “Pods” moving system for the bulk of our stuff but realized that we
wouldn’t be able to fit it all.
Somewhere between St Louis and Kansas City, the RAV4 gave up. Here are Sherry’s contemporaneous notes:
Oil blown all over the engine compartment. We're sitting in the mechanic's waiting area to get the verdict. UPDATE: The engine is DOA - no compression on any cylinder. Plan B - rent a U-Haul truck that will carry the U-Haul trailer contents, one way to Boulder. But we're striking out there, too. It is a Friday at the end of the month and everything is sold out. UPDATE #2 - We're back on the road! Our ONLY option was to rent a 16' behemoth, transfer everything from the RAV and the U-Haul, sell our sweet little RAV for junk ($250), and chalk this up to another great story. We drove for two more days in the truck into Boulder and fetched the Porsche from an anonymous parking lot.
After the untimely and dramatic death of our trusty '04 RAV4, we were forced to buy something else that would carry more than a six-pack. Nothing says Colordo like a Subaru Outback. Oh yeah. All Wheel drive, good ground clearance and all the sex appeal of a dishwasher and the driving characteristics of an overloaded barge. It's a special kind of love, this Subaru love. We actually bought it new - very unlike us. The used prices were really high, and the dealers were offering 60 months of zero percent financing. Sherry talked them down to $27,500 which was about the same price that the used ones were selling for. Go Sherry!
June - Moving in and getting settled
Day 1, while moving in, the carpet cleaning company flooded the basement. A pipe had burst at some point and nobody knew it. We also found out that a family of raccoons had been living under the solar panels for quite some time. The solar system wasn’t working and we don’t know if it is raccoon damage (they like to eat the cables) or a bad inverter. We drove out the raccoons, repaired the holes that they used for access and will worry about the solar system later. Too many other expenses and problems for now.
Our son, Casey and his fiancee, Dorothy, are building a small geodesic dome structure on their land. They are about 4 hours drive from us. I went out to help them build some concrete forms and generally assist in the preparation for the big concrete pour. They pumped concrete into the walls but concrete comes out in clumps and blobs. I was manning the concrete vibrator. The vibrator turns the concrete temporarily into a more liquid flowing state. It's kinda like magic to see it happen. The walls are made of parallel insulating foam boards with rebar and spacers between them. Concrete gets pumped into the middle.
July - getting settled, getting cats and exploring Boulder
We are pretty well moved in, with at least three rooms that almost feel like home. We seem to spend at least 20% of our day trying to remember where we put the spatula. It will be a long, slow process.
Went out for another walk in our new backyard. The trailhead is about 1.6 miles from the house. There are a few trails from this starting point and, as they say in the movies, you can do this the easy way, or you can do it the hard way. Today was the easy way. Sherry has been joining me lately. We go in the morning and we swing by a bakery along the way so we can sit and have a croissant when we get to a nice viewpoint.
I actually went swimming today in an outdoor pool. It was like a post-apocalyptic swim team: each person got one lane to themselves for an hour. At the end of the allotted time, or when too tired to go on, swimmers exited one gate while the next group filed into their assigned lane. I only lasted about 25 minutes, but it felt great.Reservations are made 2 days ahead of time online (they sold out within one minute). It seems that the indoor pools don't sell out as quickly. Setting my alarm for 7:55am to try for the outdoor pool, but expecting to settle for the indoor if I can't score a lane.
We got our kittens on Thursday! They are the sweetest, cuddliest, attention-hoggingest boy and girl. They both want to be held, and purr loudly. After much casting about, and one set of failed names (Buttercup and Westley), we've landed on Bean (the white boy) and Sabine (the brown girl). I'm smitten already!
I joined the climbing gym so I go there every so often and I ride my bike every single day but mostly for errands - nothing more than 5 miles. The weather here in Boulder is excellent. At night it dips down into the 70’s and the daytime temperatures are in the 80’s and 90’s but with no humidity. I spend at least twice as much time outdoors here in Boulder than I did in DC.
In what is possibly the most Colorado thing I have done so-far, I climbed the Second Flairon in Boulder with our son, Casey. He was in the lead, setting the route and placing the protective gear, and I was following and removing all of the protection that he placed in the rock. We were "simul-climbing", basically both of us climbing at the same time with a 100' of somewhat snug rope connecting us and pieces of protection in between. The flatiron is a 600+ vertical climb but it isn't very steep or technical. In the photo, I'm wearing all of the gear that I removed along the route. And, yes, it was hard to get out of bed this morning.
Unbeknownst to us, the entire exhaust system of the Porsche had been rotting out for a decade and it finally failed. Two catalytic converters, every bolt was rusted in place and needed to be drilled out, you get the picture.
August - Bikepacking along the Continental Divide Trail
Right now, I am getting packed up and ready for two weeks of "bikepacking" in Montana following the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. Three of us start on August 3rd in Butte and head south. It is only 2 weeks, and it is in some pretty remote unpaved areas, but still, I'm going bike riding! Normally, I tour on roads with more traditional touring gear like panniers and skinnier tires, but the GDMBR is mostly offroad, and one needs to be prepared to carry the bike over trees or push it up muddy hills, so weight and pushability are more important. So are fat tires. Is pushability a word?
The other two are a bit slower than I am, and we are only going about 40 miles per day so I expect to be spending some time in camp. I think that 40 miles under these circumstances is kind of like 65 miles on the road, or at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it. I'll bring a big fat book and a hammock.
Our younger son, Hunter, may be getting a job in Colorado Springs and moving out here! He is here now and we went down to look for housing.
We have been helping Casey, the older son, build out a new house on his property. But mostly just getting the house set up. We got two cats. It is hard to make new social contacts with the virus, but we are trying. We live in a cul-de-sac so we know most of the neighbors by now. Our older son and his fiancee, Dorothy, come by about once a month to hang out for a week and enjoy suburban life (and to do laundry).
This whole Covid thing is dragging on and on. It is hard to make social connections. We have met the neighbors, and their kids come over to play with the kittens, but that isn't quite enough. I'm also casual friends with the bums in the park - I bring them the Sunday paper, leftover U-Haul blankets and the occasional 6-pack. Bums in Boulder are pretty chill (Update: bums have moved on for the winter. Recycling the newspaper)
September and a Trip to Pasco
I flew to Pasco to see my parents in Mid-September. I was there for a few days, then Brad came, and he stayed a few days past me. Mostly just family time but we did help them with some of the heavy lifting and Brad took a small trailer’s worth of stuff back to St Louis. They seem to be weathering the Covid era as well as can be expected.
They are well, sheltering in place, and they have a neighbor who brings them the food that they ask for and then a few “bonus” surprise groceries. They are being forced to try new foods with varying results.
October - Hunter moves in and we go gravel bike riding
Hunter got the job! They moved into Colorado Springs which is about a 90-minute drive from our house. We see them pretty often, now. I would talk about the gravel ride, but Samyak’s blog post is much better than anything I could do. Sam is one of Hunter’s friends going back to middle school.
November - Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon parks and Thanksgiving
Sherry and I took a quick road trip to some of the Utah national parks. We were really stunned by Capitol Reef. We had never really heard of it. The park is overshadowed by Bryce Canyon and Zion, but it is nearly as amazing as they are. If you find yourself in Utah, don’t miss it.
Since we are all in Colorado now, Hunter, Casey, Dorothy and Toma (and the two Great Danes) all came to our house for Thanksgiving. The new house has a kitchen that more than two people can fit into, so we were each able to make our dishes without bumping into one another.
December - Bicycling in Florida and Christmas
The kids and dogs are here for Christmas. Toma had some Russian caviar, so she made some pretty and tasty treats for us. Dinner was Beef Wellington (first attempt).
I took a week to go bike touring from Sarasota to Key West with my long-time bike touring partner, Pat White. It was good to get out and ride for days on end in warm weather. I can’t say that I fully endorse touring in Florida (too many cars, not enough campgrounds) but that wasn’t the point of the trip. Getting out, seeing Pat and riding was the goal.
We hope this letter finds you well and that you are staying safe and healthy.
No comments:
Post a Comment