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This is a one-issue post: The Cistern trailer is ready to roll. Here are a few photos:

Cistern trailer, early days

Spare tire dominates the front end

Plywood deck is 3/4 inches thick

Profile shows off black frame and red fenders

Total investment is now approaching $300.00 with a bit more to come.

The ‘shakedown run’ will be tomorrow (Friday) when I take a day of vacation and head for The Lot. I hope to get started on mounting the tanks and plumbing and get a list of the other bits and pieces I will need to make the tailer work as intended; a platform for the cistern tank and honey wagon tank. More to come!

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

What Fields didn’t mention is the generator is still at the repair shop.  Without the generator, the honey wagon is a no-go (so to speak).

Happy Trails.

This is an at-home weekend so there’s not a lot of activity to report on. I’ve decided to post a few comments and photos that cover various topics that haven’t fit into past posts.

First, it continues to be a wetter than normal year for Colorado. The plants are loving it. New growth on the pine trees at Sanderling is spectacular, especially for this generally arid state:

New growth evident on pine trees

Pine cone production is way up

Flowers and other plants have also benefitted; we have seen more wildflowers (quantity) than we can remember. The colors are also very bright:

Bright wildflowers dot the countryside

Parrot’s Beak is a cheery white landscape accent

In our travels we have seen a newer poppy plant, more watermelon in color than red. These seem to be gaining in popularity and are often found near the red variety.

“Watermelon” poppies along a rock wall

The above photo was taken in Silver Plume when we were looking at houses. Another photo from the same trip  features a sign that seemed a little out of place for the town:

Silver Plume has a tea room?

In my last post I mentioned I had won some landscape blocks in an auction. Supposedly there were about 120 blocks. I counted them as I unloaded the trailer; I actually have 166 blocks! This puts the cost at about 20 cents each. About half of them are currently stacked up near our back porch, awaiting transport to The Lot. The rest are still in the back of the truck.

Landscape blocks are awaiting transport to The Lot

There is progress on the cistern trailer; I welded a broken bracket, finished painting the frame, added the first 2 (of 8) tie-down points, added the needed cross-frame supports, painted the spare tire and fixed its mount, and began painting the fenders. Still to be done: paint the decking and install it and finish painting the fenders and re-install them. I hope to finish these tasks in the next few days, but it’s raining gently at the moment so painting may be out for today. My goal is to have the trailer ready to roll by next weekend – the next trip to The Lot.

Cistern trailer under construction

In geriatric medical news, Pam’s bursitis is still bothering her hip but she has a bit more mobility, a good thing. She recently received a TENS machine she ordered and she’ll see if that helps reduce the discomfort.  My blood sugar level average has dropped a few more points and is currently about 102 – 104 for the 14 and 30 day averages, a good sign my diabetes is under control. (70 – 130 is considered normal.) Getting old is not much fun.

Thats it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

I have some odds-and-ends myself, so this week you’ll be getting “Pam’s Ten Cents Worth.”  First, a shout-out to Roz and Phil Hill in Shropshire, England; she occasionally checks in on this blog, and I check in on hers (umpteenthings.wordpress.com) for the latest “poultry raising” news.  She’s a hoot! Her hubby Phil is much like Fields, always working on some project with “reclaimed” materials (I’m not allowed to call it junk anymore). Hi Roz!

This week, I contacted a realtor in Vallecito Lake to ask some preliminary questions about the area – snow load, internet connectivity, that sort of thing.  The listings for this real estate company are consistently the properties we seem to be drawn to; it may be a good match.  Our downpayment funds aren’t going to be available until 2016, so we have time to ponder the possibilities.  Fields and I both think the Vallecito Lake area (17-20 miles from Durango, CO) could very well be our retirement location. (Mentally, I’m living there already some days.)

Bursitis update: Having completed the initial phase of treatment (meds and cold packs), I am now on to gentle exercise (an “Aging Backwards” DVD series), a herbal supplement (Turmeric), and the TENS machine (interacts with the muscles and nervous system to control pain).  Healing is a slow and ponderous thing at this point in life. (Dealing with pain may be why my stance resembles Grandma Ida, sister Becky.)

I ordered new guitar books – Gord’s Gold  and Best of James Taylor – and amazed myself that I could already play a few of the songs.  Musically, I’m pretty much stuck in the “Golden Age” of folk and early rock.  Why didn’t I start guitar playing in high school?  Guess I had too many guitar players at-the-ready then (flashback to Bro Lar and that amplifier in the garage).  Still playing and singing for myself, the sometimes discordant practice sessions don’t sit too well with Fields. (I’ll never be the level of his cousin Louise…)

Happy Trails.

(and…I can now play the Roy Rogers’ “Happy Trails” song too! I downloaded it from the internet.)

This past week seemed to have more thn it’s share of bad news.

We received word that our good friend Elinor Tourtillot passed away last Tuesday, July 7th. Her husband, Henry (aka Hank) called to let us know. Ellie was 95 and had been in poor health for several years. Hank and Ellie lived in Casa Grand, Arizona, and we had visited them a few times.

Both of our children have middle names to honor these two, Elinor for Felicity and Henry for Toby. We were neighbors when we bought our first Colorado home back in 1980 or so and we have kept in touch the last 35 years. Ellie was feisty and will be missed. We have a lot of good memories of Hank and Ellie and our mountain home.

A motorcycle-riding friend of mine had an accident and had to undergo surgery to repair his wrist and pelvis. He will be in the hospital for a while, though his vital signs look good. A girl turned her truck right in front of the riders (he was one of a pair) then fled the scene. She has since been picked up on a felony warrant, and it turns out she has a history of DUI and other moving violations. The other guy, also a friend, managed to hit the median and avoid the truck so was not injured.

And last, though not in the same league as above, my generator is now in the shop awaiting diagnosis on why it is not putting out any electrical power. I am disappointed; it looks like it won’t be the bargain I thought it would be. This has an impact on our visits to The Lot since I need the generator to operate the honey wagon pump; I may have to tow the RV to the dump station, something I had hoped to avoid.

Speaking of The Lot, I made a solo trip this past weekend, going up on Saturday morning and returning Sunday afternoon. It was a short but busy and memorable trip.

I saw a badger, the first one ever in Colorado. Pam looked on-line and badgers do, in fact, range in Colorado. I didn’t get any good photos as the badger headed out as soon as he saw my truck, but I am sure of what I saw. Here is the best of the poor photos I was able to get:

Badger in South Park

I managed to get two loads of wood over to the burn pit. Here is a photo of 2015’s first load of burn pit wood:

First load of burn pit wood, 2015

I’ve been adding hooks and shelves inside the storage shed and it is starting to look a bit more organized. Work is progressing on the cistern trailer, with fenders mounted, light brackets made and lights installed, safety chains added, and a general clean-up has it looking nearly ready to go. I hope to finish it this week.

Auctions are fun…sometimes. I bid on a lot of cement retaining wall blocks and ended up with the top bid so now I have about 120+ 16-pound blocks split between the back of the truck and our aluminum trailer. The blocks will be used to build some retaining walls in places where the drive on The Lot is tending to wash down a bit. Weighing in at just abut a ton, it will be an interesting trip to get the blocks over to the lot.

My landscaping blocks

I also won a 12-volt water pump which I plan to incorporate into the cistern project. There just isn’t a place where we can park the cistern and depend on gravity flow to work well, so Plan B is now in effect: pump the water from the cistern into the trailer. More work to do before this becomes a reality. I just need more time to work on stuff!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

This will be the summer of mountain land projects, most of them requiring Jer’s expertise.  There are improvements to the driveway in the discussion phase – an additional arc to add to the circle swing and more gravel on areas where there has been some erosion.

Somewhere along the way, there will be some wood removal as well.  But probably not until closer to Labor Day.

Happy Trails.

Pam and I had taken July 2nd off as vacation days, and since both of our organizations gave us July 3rd as a paid holiday, we had a long weekend to do “stuff.”

Our arrival at our Sanderling mountain lot Thursday afternoon had one hitch — found out the Honda needs a new radiator cap. More bad news: a mouse somehow found its way into the RV trailer, leaving a few turds. I don’t know how it got in. We never did see or trap it, and it’s possible it left after finding nothing of interest. I set a couple of traps set in case the animal makes a return visit.

Pam is still quite bothered by an inflamed bursitis in her right hip and this limits her mobility. We had not planned to work on any major projects but she did get several smaller tasks done, including transplanting some shrubs and a small tree into the circle in the middle of the driveway loop.

Rain made its appearance in the early evening, a shower that lasted for more than an hour. We are happy to get the moisture up there, but it brings out mosquitos, something we have not had to deal with in previous visits. I guess you have to take the bad with the good.

Friday was a road trip day to view at some for sale houses Pam had seen on line in high country towns along I-70. We visited Idaho Springs, Silver Plume, Empire, and Central City. These towns are all within about 30 miles of each other; most of the driving was to get from The Lot back out to the interstate near Frisco, driving time is about 90 minutes for that leg of the trip.

The houses were a mixed bag. All these towns are old mining communities and the houses are on small lots and close together. One place, in Silver Plume, was Pam’s preferred “grandma house,” with frontage on Clear Creek, but had a heavy dose of mosquitos outside and dropped ceilings and dark paneling inside. Not to mention the constant drone of interstate noise…

Silver Plume house

Blondie checks out the yard.

This road noise from the interstate, which is just across the creek to the left of the house, is a huge drawback.  (Did I mention the clouds of mosquitoes?  Haven’t seem them that dense since living in the Midwest.)

A nicer structure, also in Silver Plume, was this house on Madison Street:

Madison Street home

It is a cute place, a bit further from the interstate and no creek frontage, but no garage and no place to put one. This seems to be a common problem with most of the properties we looked at, not surprising given the nature of the towns, but a negative for me.

However, later in the day in Central City we looked at a place that originally had a carriage house:

House on Spring Street

Carriage House on Spring Street

The carriage house would take care of our storage needs for sure!  The owners of the two structures, the Central City Opera House Association, are trying to sell the two separately which would put this arrangement out of our price point.

Pam liked the porch entrance of this Central City house:

1800s Central City house upper level

Lower level of the 1800s house

This house typifies Pam’s “grandma house” standard – bay window, ornate porch, eave treatment with shingles and/or lace-like filigree.  This particular house is a duplex; we ended up talking to the older gent who lives in the bottom half of the property. He gave us much information on Central City’s current services offered to residents (such as they are).

We looked at a number of properties and I will not get into a description of all of them. Suffice to saw we made a day out of poking around in all of the communities mentioned above. The weather was high country beautiful and, as is usual in summer, we had another shower on the way back to Sanderling.  We also saw some beautiful flowers and scenery. One place, an old mining claim, had a brilliant mix of red, blue, and white columbine blooming along side the driveway.

Columbine in three colors blooming in Empire

The blue columbine is Colorado’s state flower so I am partial to the species in general. The day was a successful outing as a scenic day out, not so successful in thinking about finding a house in one of the mining towns.  Generally, the streets are narrow and/or in poor repair, the residential homes are extremely close together, and the prices have shot up dramatically since our last visit to these areas some decades ago.  Services are limited, and that includes a decent mountain medical clinic and hospital.  In some places, like Central City, historic district overlays make it nearly impossible to even so much as take down a “historic” outhouse if one remains on your home site.

That evening, back at Sanderling, we had a nice sunset with clouds over South Park.  Rain continued later that evening and into the night hours.

Sunset, July 3rd

Saturday morning was a work half-day around the lot, cutting trees and getting piles of wood staged. (One pile for disposal at the burn pit, the other to be salvaged and cut into firewood.) I mapped out and cleared a trail for the ATV and trailer to navigate on a future trip when we will be able to load up the burn pit wood and get rid of it. The work was enough to bring out a sweat but, as we have seen in the past, worth the effort.

We had planned to come home Saturday afternoon to avoid the heavy Sunday traffic, so after a meal of bratwurst, (cooked over an open fire) potatoes, and fruit we cleaned up, shut the trailer down, and headed home. Per usual, it was difficult to leave the high country, but another round of showers was headed our way so off we went.  Just past where the Sanderling road connects with a state road, we made a quick detour and drove through an upscale housing development – Silverheels Ranch – which is very close to Fairplay, for a look-see.

Today (Sunday) we will work on all of our “normal” weekend chores and relax a bit before the work week begins again.

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

The search continues.  I could live in a smaller house, Fields needs quite a bit of outside storage.  The small populations in the mountain communities don’t support many services.  Living close to the interstate puts services within driving reach, but the noise of the traffic is a constant background irritant.  Old houses, while charming, all pretty much need immediate maintenance.  What is with “renovations” of dropped ceilings and dark paneling circa 1970?  Those “upgrades” destroyed many an old house we have viewed.  For us, it would be a strip down job back to the wall studs and “begin again” to make the house reflect the period it was built.  Do we have a major renovation still in us at this point in life?  Unknown.

Happy Trails.

Last week was hot…triple-degree days that are not unknown but don’t often come this early in the year. We decided to escape the heat for a bit by visiting our Sanderling lot.

After packing the dogs and other gear we started on our way and arrived by early afternoon. Pam’s right hip has been causing her some pain (inflamed bursitis) so we didn’t plan to do much, but that didn’t stop us from doing some clean-up of over 30 dead small aspen and work on salvaging some of the pine branches that had snapped out of trees during a recent wind storm. The aspen are piled up to be cut into firewood and a pile of ‘burn pit’ wood has begun to take shape. A few other tasks were accomplished such as using the power pruner to clean up a few more trees and refilling the hummingbird feeders.

We did get a few smatters of rain, just enough to make sitting under the awning a good way to relax. That was nice; we are so used to working while we are there that we sometimes have to remember to take time to just enjoy being in the high country.

We met the couple that bought the lot next to us; their names are Blair and Spence. A younger couple, in their early 30s perhaps, and they plan to develop their lot through a plan similar to ours. A driveway will go in this fall and they have an RV that will be parked on their land (over a ridge and not within eye sight of us). It was nice to finally meet them — we will watch their progress with some interest.

Back in De Beque, work continues on the cistern trailer. I’ve been doing some clean-up work and painting the frame, a task that will take me more than a few evenings. (I am using RustOleum paint from a can and brushes, not spray paint.) Now that the honey wagon tank and gear has arrived I need to finish the trailer so we can try out our plans for water supply and septic disposal. In the interim, I did pump water by hand in the high county and put water (around 22 gallons) into The Box’s fresh water tank, a job I hope the cistern will make easier in the future. The holding tanks will need to be emptied soon as well.

Cistern trailer under construction

Jerry putting water in The Box

Another new toy was purchased, a chain saw chain sharpening kit. For the past several years I have been sharpening my chains by hand, a slow and somewhat imprecise procedure. Given the volume of wood to be cut I figured a better approach to sharpening would be in order. I found an Italian-built unit, less expensive than most I had seen, and ordered it. Last night I sharpened the chains on both saws after practicing on an old chain I had near my workbench. Now I am curious to see how well the saws cut.

Chain saw sharpening tool (Mfg photo)

We will be going up to the lot this weekend, but plan to take some time off to look at a few potential retirement houses that Pam has identified through on-line searches. This means that actual work time while we are at The Lot will be fairly minimal. Still, I will have some time to try out my chain saw sharpening  job. I have high hopes but we will see what happens in real life.

I did have one disappointment; my generator does not put out any power! I’ll have to bring it home and start checking out circuitry to see if I can find where the problem is and get the repairs done. Bummer. We need the generator to power the septic pump, part of the honey wagon system. I may need to take up my older and smaller generator and see if it puts out enough power to run the pump; the generator had been used primarily to run a batter charger to recharge the RV’s batteries, not a task that takes a lot of power. The pump motor may require more than the small generator can put out. Always something…

Flowers blooming around the house include daisies, lillies, and hollyhocks.

lillies in bloom

Hollyhocks and daiseys in front flower bed

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

Hot.  Busy. Limping slowly around. Reading books.

Father’s Day Weekend saw me take my first ATV trip of the year on a return visit to Lead King Basin. I had last been to Lead King in 2012.

The late spring snows Colorado received have made for a late spring in the high country. In June of 2012 the snow was melted off the trail, including side roads, and many flowers were blooming. This time around it was different story, with snow still on the trail in places and few flowers blooming.

The upside is that the waterfalls and streams are going full-tilt, and for me, waterfalls and the sound of water flowing over the rocks holds a special attraction, so it was still a great trip.

I have put together a 3:42 video for my ATV Videos page. In addition I have assembled a gallery of photos on my Galleries home page; the direct link is Lead King 2015. For this post I will show just a few of the photos that are in the gallery and add some commentary.

The trail starts at the edge of Marble, Colorado, and passes this lake:

Beaver Lake just outside of Marble

The lake is popular with fishermen, kayakers, and non-motorized boaters. It is a pretty spot.

The entry into Lead King Basin proper is very picturesque featuring white-capped mountains and a waterfall:

Entering Lead King Basin

The melting snows had two effects — the side trails blocked by snow and snow + water on the main trail in many places:

Water overflowing the trail

Snow blocking Sheep Mountain side road

Mother Nature will eventually overtake all of these trails; the Schofield Pass side road was blocked by a rockfall. The Forest Service will re-open the popular Jeep and ATV road later this year.

Schofield Pass road blocked by rockfall

The main attraction in the area is the Dead Horse (AKA Crystal) Mill just outside the old mining town of Crystal City. Here’s a photo of that structure:

Crystal Mill on the Crystal River

The mill generated electrical power for the area mines and has undergone some renovation (primarily a new roof) in attempts at preservation. It is one of the most photographed structures in Colorado, even though it takes a high-clearance vehicle, preferably a 4-wheel drive, to get to it.

I finished my trip with a visit to the old Colorado-Yule marble quarry. This quarry furnished marble for many state and federal buildings and is the source for the marble used in the Tomb of the Unknowns, formerly the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The quarry is now closed and you can’t get near it, a change from my last visit when you could view the quarry and (later) take tours while work was in progress.

Sign approaching quarry

Marble cut and stacked, awaiting orders.

What a great trip; I enjoyed my visit back to the area.

In around-the-house news, I have been working on the cistern trailer – fenders and lights are on order and some painting has been done. The hollyhocks and one lilly are blooming, giving our yard some bright colors. More lilies are budding and we hope to have quite a show in the next few weeks. Other than that, it’s been a pretty routine week.

Craig and Dianne have a weather-tight shell and are beginning the inside work for their new house on “their” lake in northern Wisconsin. Pretty exciting times for them and we are following their saga with great interest.

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

Temperatures will be in the 100 degree range all this coming week.  Summer has arrived.

In my last post I mentioned we had purchased a cistern and would begin looking for a trailer to dedicate to hauling water. Well, a trailer (of sorts) has been purchased.

The problem I found when looking for a trailer was payload; water weighs 8.3 pounds per gallon, and with a cistern of 275 gallon capacity I needed to find a trailer capable of handling around 2,500 pounds. (Total includes the weight of the trailer itself, water, and the cistern.) Not easy to find a suitable small trailer, as I found out, as most small trailers are rated only up to around 1,000 pounds.

A Craigslist ad featured a trailer with a 5,000 pound capacity rating for $100.00. It was on the Front Range (Denver side of the mountains), though, so cost of getting it home would be another $50.00 or so in gas money. Little more than a frame on wheels, the trailer did have a valid Colorado title and a spare tire. I decided to buy it and bring it home. Here is what it currently looks like:

Cistern trailer, early days

I will need to add permanent lights, fenders, and re-do the deck at an estimated cost of around another $100.00 – $150.00. I may even get ambitious and do some painting of the frame and wheels. Once done I will pull it up to The Lot, put the cistern aboard, tie the cistern down with ratchet straps, and see about getting our first load of water. The saga continues…

Catching up with a few other odds and ends…

We ordered our honey wagon kit, which consists of a tank, pump, and hoses. Items should arrive in the next week or so; shipment is coming out of Pennsylvania via motor freight. I’ll have to pick the shipment up in Grand Junction, the nearest terminal the trucking company has. More on this as we move ahead in the coming weeks.

I had mentioned my “new toy”, a power pruner, and for those who are not familiar with this tool, here are a couple photos:

Power pruner

Pruner head

The pruner is an extended chain saw. It does not cut very fast but it does extend your reach and requires less work than cutting limbs with a hand pruner.

On my way to The Lot this past weekend I saw a new sight: Llamas on the open range in South Park, about 5 miles from The Lot.

Open range Llamas

In the 3 years we have been driving through this area I had never seen Llamas anywhere near our lot.The young ones were particularly cute. I wonder if they will become a permanent sight or if they just escaped from a farm for a few days and will be captured and removed from the open space. It would be nice to see them from time to time.

I had stopped by The Lot on my way back from getting the trailer mentioned above. By that time is was early evening, around 4:30 PM. Plan was to get some work done, stay the night, then head home Sunday morning, but alas, continuous rains pretty much killed any activity for Saturday. I like getting the moisture but it makes for a pretty dull day. Still, I donned my rain coat and walked around the lot for a while. The “wet forest” smell was strong and not unpleasant.

On Monday, the 15th, we had a visit from a good friend of more than 30 years. Bernie (Bernadette) Davis was Pam’s first boss when we moved to Colorado in 1977 and we have kept in touch through the intervening years. Bernie was on a business road trip and was able to stay overnight. Pam prepared an excellent meal and we had a good visit. Here is a photo of Bernie:

Our friend Bernie Davis

Around the house, the iris are done blooming but the hollyhocks and lilies are just getting started. We have received more rain so everything is still very green. Wildflowers in the area, and also in South Park, are putting a lot of color in the landscapes. They are nice to see!

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

At long last…
This weekend we took The Box (the RV trailer) back up to Sanderling, our 9,000+ feet mountain lot in central Colorado. Here is how the weekend went.

I had taken Friday off as a day of vacation (as did Pam). We had The Box ready to roll shortly after 9:00 AM and off we drove. The trip went smoothy enough – not a lot of road construction slow-downs – and we arrived at Sanderling by around 1:00 PM. After leveling The Box and unpacking a bit, this is what our parking spot looked like:

The Box at Sanderling, June 5th.

Note the overcast skies. There were rain showers on and off both Friday and Saturday. Sunday was nicer but it started to get windy about the time we had to leave for home.  Evenings were brisk; although temperatures were above freezing at night, it was still necessary to run the furnace.

As expected, it was a busy weekend. Friday was mostly set-up and walking around the lot. We were surprised; a major wind storm must have passed through and there were a lot of snapped-off branches and some aspen leaning at sharp angles. I had to cut the top off one of the”circle” aspen just to get The Box positioned at the top of the driveway.  Must have been a very powerful microburst, by the looks of the downed aspen it occurred while the trees were budded.  We lost large branches of many mature evergreens in this event.

Saturday I headed to Lafayette, a town north of Denver. As part of our new master plan, I had decided to get a 275 gallon cistern to use to supply water to the trailer. This is a work-in-progress and will involve getting a trailer to haul the cistern into Fairplay to get filled. Here are a few photos of us unloading the cistern into temporary storage – our on-lot shed:

Cistern is a food-grade IBC tote.

Pam helping me unload the cistern

Once a smaller utility trailer is acquired we will have the tank filled (Fairplay sells bulk water), place the water tank upslope of The Box, and use gravity to fill the in-trailer water tank. Stay tuned – more on this project in future posts.

Pam brought flax and poppy plants along to plant in the circle:

Pam planting her flax starts in the circle

I tried out a new toy, a powered pruning saw that I had purchased at an auction and gotten running.

Jerry using new toy to cut dead branches. (Photo by Pam.)

These saws can be purchased new for around $460.00; I have about $40.00 tied up in this one. It is a Maruyama ( pronounced “morey-ama”) multi-cutter and the product line includes several attachments. I have the chainsaw-pruner head, which will come in handy for helping to clean up The Lot.

Here is another shot at work with the pruner, also including a pile of broken limbs from the windstorm:

Jerry working the pruner behind a pile of snapped-off tree limbs (Photo by Pam)

Another errand this weekend was securing our annual burn pit pass. The burn pit is the local method for disposing of downed and dead wood and encouraging forest fire prevention in the mountain subdivisions around South Park.  Future weekends will include driving piles of slash and junk wood from the Sanderling lot to the pit for disposal.

Not all work and errands this weekend, though– we spent some time just enjoying being back in the mountains again. Pam suggested the following shot, taken this Sunday (June 7) morning:

Pam and Jerry enjoy the view from The Lot

All -in – all it was a good weekend: The Box set up on the lot, a few tasks completed, and a few other projects advanced. It’s good to be back in the high country.

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

I am always amazed at how much work it takes to organize and stock The Box.  We forgot to bring a few non-crucial items this time, on the whole we are stocking a bit lighter than in the past.  Here’s hoping the local mouse population doesn’t find The Box this year!

The mountain dog pen fencing is now fixed well enough for the dogs to be penned occasionally.  Last year a deer (? – we think) ran into the fence at speed and really made a mess of one side.  Fence repairs are adequate for the moment; that area of the property may be used for a car port in the future as it’s fairly flat and accessed off the driveway.  The dog pen will likely end up elsewhere and have to be taken down and put up again anyway.

Happy Trails.

Since I did two posts last week, Saturday and Monday, I’ve covered most of the events of the past week. This is going to be a short post!

Weather has improved; mostly sunny skies, no rain, and temps approaching 90 degrees today and for the next few days. (What happened to our 70s and 80s?) We plan to finally get The Box (RV trailer) up to our Sanderling lot next weekend. I am waiting on a replacement window glass; I was trying to straighten a window frame that didn’t quite seat and I cracked the glass. The local glass shop is replacing it but had to wait for tinted glass to arrive; they had only clear glass on hand.

Waiting for replacement glass

Around the house, I tested the swamp cooler yesterday (anticipating the warmer weather coming this week). The water supply line had developed a leak that had to be repaired but everything looks good to go now. Today I will be replacing some window screening so we can open a few more windows to let in the cooler morning air. Pam has put together a list of stuff to stock The Box for our summer weekends at The Lot and she’ll be going grocery shopping later today.

Pam says “No more flower photos!” but I couldn’t resist adding this photo of one of our columbine plants — all are blooming profusely. Yellows, pale and deep blues, purples, and this deep red are all doing very well this spring.

Columbine are doing very well this spring

Most of these colors would never exist in the wild, or only in very small numbers, but several varieties do well in domestic flower beds.  Pam designated one raised bed, in our back yard, as the “columbine bed” when we first put it in years ago. As the plants mature they are self-propagating and doing better and better.

In family news, Craig and Dianne’s house is moving along. Latest photos show the walls are framed up and rafters are going in. Craig will begin roofing in a few days.

End rafters are in place on the Paroubek house (Photo from C. Paroubek.)

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

“Nasty poopies!” I’m sure our neighbors appreciate my (very vocal) attempts to keep the dogs from snacking on cat poop in the yard.  KitKat has decided, now the weather is nicer, that the entire lawn is her cat box. Apparently some of the feral cats have followed her lead.  Lovely.  Cleaning up animal poop (and barf) appears to be my life’s work…

Happy Trails.

Sunday (May 24) we braved the weather and took a trip to SW Colorado, the Durango – Bayfield – Lake Vallecito area, to look at some potential retirement properties. We viewed several properties, eliminated some, fell in love with one that is dramatically over our budget, and experienced a lot of different weather conditions. This post will cover both the weather and the properties, almost two different stories.

To get from our place to Durango we had to cross Red Mountain Pass, one of the higher Colorado roads that gets to near 11,000 feet elevation. We knew we would probably run into bad weather — if not at Red Mountain Pass, then at Coal Bank and Molas Passes (both located between Silverton and Durango).  It’s still winter in the high country, aided by all the recent (and ongoing) precipitation.

Approaching Red Mountain Pass, 5-24-15

View from Molas Pass, 5-24-15

Hwy 550 north of Silverton looks like it is still mid-winter on  May 24th

We experienced rain, snow, fog, hail, and sun breaks during the trip. Most of the time, though, we were able to drive to (and later view) the properties during sun breaks, or at least in  drizzling rain.

The properties were a mixed bag. The few that were affordable needed renovation or repair, much like this cabin:

Cabin in our price range near Lake Vallecito

Storage building comes with cabin

No garage, although there is space to build one. The cabin’s calking needed to be replaced, ramps were not in good shape, and steps needed to be replaced. This would mean a lot of work before the place was “move-in” ready.

Another place looks to have a bit more potential, although also needing work.

Most square footage for the money but a funky layout.

No walkway to the front door

Featuring an attached 2-car garage and a large basement, this place looks like it is a foreclosure and the interior appeared to be stripped of carpeting.  Potential, just takes more money to redo the inside.  Exterior landscaping would need to control moisture/runoff from the dirt roadway that approaches the property too.

Top of the line, and way out of our price range, was this stream-side cabin with a detached garage:

Stream-side cabin had it together.

Detached garage is part of stream house package

Stream from upscale cabin (Realtor photo)

The stream frontage was great, featuring a nice background sound of water over the rocks. This property had our desirable “big three” – view, water, trees – plus plenty of garage space, a flat lot, in a very tidy (and upscale) community near Vallecito Lake and not too far from Durango (location, location, location), and finally, enough space for all our stuff. Not perfect; stairs inside to upstairs bedrooms could be a problem as we age, but this was the place we liked the best. The clincher – only about $600,000.00 over our budget… 🙁

A daunting 485 miles and 13 hours after we began, we returned home. We experienced lots of weather, scoped out several properties and residential areas, and drove through part of the state we had not really visited for many years. While a bit discouraged that all the properties in our price range either need lots of work or are lacking in some way (no garages, mostly), going forward we now have a better idea of the “lay of the land” in the communities we visited.  We will review real estate listings accordingly.

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth:

The two mountain passes providing road access to the southwest corner of Colorado/Durango area are not for the faint of heart. The Red Mountain Pass/Highway 550 approach we drove on this trip features a remarkable scarcity of guard rails, narrow shelf roads, and sheer drops hundreds of feet down.  (I couldn’t help but think of my brother Craig while on this route, as he and I share a discomfort with these types of “scenic drives.”)

A summer view of Hwy 550 coming out of Ouray on way to Red Mountain Pass. Note lack of guard rails.

Approaching from the east, however, is Highway 160 – the famous Wolf Creek Pass road (from song and legend).  The serpentine switchbacks on Highway 160 have more guard rails, but are equally as stressful to drive.  The two routes are not for the casual driver, nor are they well-suited for regular commutes in all weather conditions.

Three levels of roadway on Wolf Creek Pass. (Web photo.)

Happy Trails.