We're baaaaack!

Hi to the faithful readers, who made it through the trip report without nodding off...

We are home again, holding down the fort while Marci vacations on Maui. She's been gone a week, and has another week to go. This is it, we are here now for the summer. Another tentative trip is being planned for september, when they let us out of the county again. We want to take the boat to Lake Powell for a week of sun and water with some friends. Who the friends are is still not entirely known, but we want quite a croud so a houseboat becomes affordable.

It is cloudy and cool here, but that hasn't stopped us from doing things. We just let it rain, and hope we find shelter before it pours. Try to be back under a roof by noon, when the clouds move in.

We packed up our hot dogs and marshmallows the other night and took them to Green Mountain Reservoir, where we sat and enjoyed the full "blue moon" until the wind came up. The lake is extremely low right now, in the middle of peak run-off, which has us puzzled. All we could come up with was they let out a lot of water to make room for peak run-off. The Blue River is running well over it's banks right now, and the Dillon Reservoir is full. It was actually full all winter, because for the first time in years, Denver did not need to draw water out of it. Denver got such phenomenal moisture this year, they could draw all they needed from their own reservoirs.

The lower trails are drying off. We have taken the bikes out three times this year, once before Hawaii, twice since we've been back. Summit County has a less than stellar reputation amongst the mountain-biking crowd, simply because the trails are not advertised. The few trails that make the maps and guidebooks are jeep trails, or only short spurs of singletrack. The most advertised singletrack is on Keystone mountain, accessed by paying a fee to haul your bike to the top on the chairlift. Even the locals who write the guidebooks admit to only printing the most well-known trails, keeping the out- of-town traffic off "their" trails. As one of them informed a mutual friend, "if I put 'em in the book, they'll get ridden!"

It is true, no area needs heavy bike traffic. Tire tracks encourage erosion, and two-way traffic encourages off-trail riding. But it is tourist revenue that Summit County loses to Utah in the summer, because Utah is willing to share it's trails with non-locals. (Well, maybe not willing, or thrilled, but they do seem to keep fewer secrets than Summit Countians)

Not that Summit County has the world's best trails or anything. But they do have better one's than you'll read about in the pitifully thin, recycled-paper booklet the Summit Daily prints out every summer. Many of these trails can be found in the area known as the back ranch. Lay a ruler on a map from Breckenridge to Keystone, and it will cover many of them. The Aquaduct, the Blair Witch, the West Ridge , Soda Ridge, and the Colorado Trail, to name a few of the named ones. Then there are the unnamed ones, like "The one that takes off from the yurt", "The one that comes out by the powerline", and "The really muddy one that starts by the trailer park". It usually takes us about three hours to find a loop, we often end up in Tiger Run, a part of Breckenridge, before we find something that connects. Many of our friends have tried to help us, but it is just too confusing. trails are not labeled, or mapped, so we are left with the convoluted mess of, "ya know where the planks are across the stream?"
"yeah, is that where i fell that day?"
"No, you over by the dredge. this is a different stream. Ya know where theres that really steep hill, right where several trails converge?"
Uh... I think so... it that by the Colorado Trail?"
No, this is a good mile from there. let's see... ya know where that big horseshoe gulch is? and there's several big rocks?"
"I know where there's big rocks, but I don't think they're the same ones you are talking about!"
"Never mind...Ok, so ya know where that old cabin foundation is?"
"Which one?"....and on, and on, and after a while, nobody is any more enlightened than anyone else about the locations of trailheads, and way-back loops, and old mines. Finally, our trail-guide throws up his or her hands, and says, "Let's just go out together some day, I'll show you around!"

So in the meantime, B and I have been taking random trails, missing loops, no idea where we are, just a vague idea, and we occasionally happen across places we've been before and find our way home from there. Our behinds are not toughening as quickly as we'd like. Each ride becomes slightly less painful, after we sit on our bike saddles long enough for the bruises from the last ride to get numb.

My calves will not be beautiful as long as I ride bike, just as my shins will never be smooth and unmarred again since I started braving rails. Remember those rainbow shins? Still ugly purple scars across them. The bruises never did heal, right over the point of impact. It causes much consternation, a sudden intake of air, usually released along with a not-so-nice expression of displeasure when they get bumped, as happens a lot with me. And now, the sprocket-gouges from Moab still purple dots over my achilles tendon, my calves are once again sporting a line of deep holes, surrounded by ugly bruises. I know, mud and blood just happen, but it is so hard to deal with on laundry day. All of our new white socks are stained. And I had to wear panty-hose with my dress and heals when B took me out to celebrate our anniversary, to cover up all the wear and tear.

By the way, in case ya didnt know, B and I celebrated #5 on the second of June. And Congrats to cousin Norman, who shares the same day with Char! He thinks he is gonna come up here and ski with us, he tells me. Now, of course I believe him, it's just that enough other statements of that nature made by others of you my readers, never came to pass. Ya know you're all welcome, if ya dont all converge on us at the same time! (just kidding, cuz. Norman...)

Amber, Scarlett, Brooke and I hiked up to the S. Willow Creek falls this morning. It's not a long hike, just long enough to make one feel pleasantly drained of ambition when one gets back. The Merrels are treating ninety percent of my feet very well. But they have chosen to crease right over the line where my little toe, misshapen, fat, several times broken, turns into my little toenail. I know that they have a track record of about eight miles before they rub actual blisters, but it still feels nice to slide them off and cool the burn at the end of a much shorter hike. Sure enough, it sprinkled on us on the way back, but it held off on the downpour and hail and high wind until we got back to the house.

In the meantime, poor B took his lawnmower to one of our properties, mostly weeds and rocks, with a little lawn thrown in to appease a rather hard-to-please neighbor who, we have joked facitously, will be pleased only when he looks out his window and sees nothing less than the green of rolling hills, interupted only by the distant winding of the River of Life. And the backside of the gate to the gated community he lives in, the gates distinctly pearlish in nature. Naturally, our dandelions and false chamomile daisies add to his already marred surroundings, and, despite the fact that we already have seventy-some units to look after, we must do our best to create beauty and traquility around him, or the boss gets called, and the emails get harsh and frequent... Ok, so in his defense, we deal as much with noxious weeds as does the rest of Summit County. B spends all summer spraying and mowing so we can still qualify as good neighbors. Our mantra is, "They deal with enough", meaning our guests subject them to enough abuse, that when the neighbors of our properties ask us to jump, we do not ask how high, we just jump as high as we can and pray it's enough. Ha. I'm betting most of my readers do not deal with seventy next door neighbors, and a dozen different homeowner's associations.

But today, poor B experienced the truth of another mantra the boss is fond of, "No good deed goes unpunished." Mower met rock, and rock turned the metal under the deck into a twisted, broken mess. Apparently, the mower is a total loss. It's not even officially summer yet, and we already have to replace it. Not a riding mower, mind, just a push mower, but still, it was an investment we made only last summer, to be used on our own yard as well as that guy's yard.

Oh, well. That's the way it goes. Maybe it's karma for getting so annoyed at the neighbor in the first place.

Ok, have a good day, all of you. I'm off, to go find some sustanance that is not in the form of granola. A bit of a feat, but doable if one gets creative...