Smoky sun from our smoke yesterday evening.

We are winding down our vacation day by day. In two days time we’ll be back on the road headed east. Where does the time go? It seems as I get older time speeds up. When I was a child summer vacation from school lasted at least a year. Or so it seemed then.

I am preparing in my head to leave. I think this year I am ready. Some years we are not ready and choose to stay one extra day. This year we’ve been here longer than any other year. As much as we love the cabin and it feels like home, it’s not home. New Jersey is. At least for the next several years.

Can I break in here to add that I love my new iPad keyboard!

Okay, back. Sorry about that but as I’m typing away and not making as many mistakes as I usually do without the keyboard I am full of appreciation.

I haven’t blogged in a few days. I guess I am getting lazy. The dogs are getting lazy too. For the first week they were ready anytime we were to go for a hike/walk. Now they lay around like black blobs on the floor and give us a look that says “you guys go ahead, we’ll wait here.” Like kids given free rein of a candy shop, they soon tire of all the goodies. Sugar, or in this case, exercise overload!

I am the same way about blogging or trying to journal our stay. I started out with a bound journal, writing every day about what we did, what we saw and what meals we ate. I think that lasted about four days and I haven’t done anything since.

It’s like taking your camera on vacation with you and you never see the sights except through the view finder of your camera. Sure you have a lot of photos to document your trip but you also might have missed some high points because you were always trying so hard to capture them “on film.”

Same thing with my trying to journal. I was spending so much time writing things down I wasn’t living in the moment. So, I don’t feel bad about it.

We’ve been taking so many walks! I still don’t have my high altitude lungs. Usually I am not winded easily by the end of the first week (going from 600 feet above sea level to 8,650 is quite a change) but this time I find I still don’t have full lung capacity on some of our more strenuous walks. The dogs seem to have adjusted more easily, even old man Alex who is coming off spleen removal surgery just a few short months ago.
Last Thursday we made the drive down to Ft. Collins to meet up with some friends (some of which we’d seen since our move to NJ, and some that we hadn’t seen for years) at a restaurant we all used to hang out in. I have to admit it was bittersweet seeing them all again and the fact that even though we’ve been out of sight and most likely out of mind for most of them, so many people showed up! Rick and I were torn between two tables of people trying to talk to as many people as we could in the two short hours we were there. Sniff, sniff. I miss these people! If you are one of the people who came and you are reading this: Thank You. It meant so much to us. And, I have to say it made me question why we are living in New Jersey.

BUT ...

All that being said, we love living in New Jersey. It’s strange because I spent about 30 years in Colorado (give or take and minus those European years, but many of these friends shared one of our European experiences with us but that’s another blog entry altogether) and only six years in New Jersey.

More shots from last night’s smoky sky.

It’s tough being torn in different directions. So many things are great about New Jersey that I would never have expected until we moved there. The trees. Where we live. The culture. Being so close to New York City. Little winding roads for Mia. Even the climate!

So many other things I wanted to blog about while up here but those ideas, although formed in my mind, have not yet made it to the blog. Time for catching up on those things once I am back in New Jersey and reflecting on our time here rather than not living in the moment. Now.




But never fear, I still have several blog posts left in me before we leave! Lots of flower photos (which I am sure my sister will enjoy), some great footage Rick finally got of a ground squirrel leaping into the bird feeder, and who knows what else?

Sorry for the rambling post!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad at the cabin 8,650 feet above sea level

Okay, people have been asking if we are safe or if we were impacted by the High Park fire in Fort Collins. I can honestly say up until about 15 minutes ago we were not.

However, now, gag, cough, the smoke moved in while we were sitting outside. We came inside, closed all the windows and turned on the ceiling fan which we never use. We can still smell the smoke.

Outside our windows the air is smutty with wood smoke. If we did not have access to TV or internet I would be leaving now, thinking that fire was imminent. The sky is gray and murky. It even smells like smoke in the cabin right now.

I am assuming the sunset is going to be awesome, but at what cost?
We are far away from the actual fire, and this is the first time we’ve felt a real bite in the reality.

Hopefully, this change in the wind pattern will help the firefighters fight this out of control blaze. Maybe, just maybe, it will burn back on itself.




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad at the cabin 8,650 feet above sea level

Hi there! Mom said I could use the computer to tell (and show) you my big adventure the other day. Plus, that stupid dog Bella always gets to tell her stories (and she can’t even capitalize her words!) and I hardly ever do.

Anyway, you probably saw that slo-mo clip the other day that featured me. Well, Dad was on the front porch with the camera trying to film hummingbirds at the feeder and he had the door open. I can’t resist an open door, especially up here. Now, I am not an outdoor cat but since I am so good outside Mom takes me out once in a while and I get to eat grass and roll around while she stands there and watches me. I don’t run off. But Dad didn’t want to watch me, so he went and got me. He had me by the scruff of the neck because I was fighting him and as he went past the camera he lifted me up in front of it. I think it made a funny clip and I know many of you out there enjoyed it! I could never reach the feeder on my own.
The other day Dad was out trying to get footage of a chipmunk jumping from the aspen tree into the bird feeder and Mom let me outside. Here I am playing kitty in the tall grass.











Then I saw a butterfly on a flower! I decided to stalk it.



I got closer and closer ... it still wasn’t moving ...



until finally, I touched it with my nose!



And then it flew away up into the sky.

After that I saw a chipmunk and chased it. Mom thought I had caught it and I think I almost did. I ran really fast through all that tall grass, as fast as I could. Mom didn’t even know I could move that fast! The chipmunk survived and Mom picked me up and told me that it was quite enough excitement for one kitty.

And, that’s my big adventure!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad at the cabin 8,650 feet above sea level

Sometimes up here I feel like we could get close encounters of the third kind too.

But these particular encounters where just as thrilling for us. Tuesday night we were just about to sit down at the table to eat dinner when Rick looked out the window that overlooks our newly formed open area (we had our beetle-killed pine trees cleared out) and shouted out DEER! Sure enough, there was a little buck deer just standing there munching away.




Look at those huge ears and those cute furry nubs of antlers coming!

Then yesterday we were about to sit down by the window to eat again, this time for lunch, and Rick looked out and shouted MOOSE! We ran for our cameras but by the time we got back to the window the moose had moved in to the trees, happily munching on our baby aspens. Here is what we saw:




The back end of a moose! In the next photo is you look closely you can see the moose’s head looking in our direction. Both photos taken from inside the cabin with a 300mm zoom lens. Pretty hard to get anything with all the trees in the way.



We watched it slowly wandering around eating, hoping that it would come out in to the open again but it didn’t. We debated on whether or not to go outside and see it we could get a clear shot of it or wait and see if it decided to come our direction again.

We looked at each other and knew we were going moose stalking. So, with a margarita under our belts that we had with our lunch and still in our house slippers, we set off, cameras in hand.

We could not see it anywhere, so we both walked “indian style” through the woods in the direction we had last seen it headed. It worked pretty well and soon I spotted him on the road. Again, all the trees made focusing a challenge.

Here he is with his head turned around looking straight at the camera. You can see one eye and one antler.








See him peeping at me? It only took him a few seconds to decide he didn’t like us or those things that were pointing at him, and he took off at a gallop. Sorry these aren’t in focus but I was doing the best I could to track him.






Big moose but probably a young one. We were thrilled with our lunch guest!

Then last night Rick decided to go fishing again. It was a lovely still night and no wind (unlike the daytime weather!) so it was perfect. He was thrilled to catch five fish in total, all baby brook trout. (Rick fly fishes and it’s all catch and release unless he hooks one big enough to feed us both.) I’m including a pic just for fun.


Just because we were out and about anyway we decided to drive down to Bennet’s Pond which is a spot where we have seen moose before.

I was looking in the other direction when we rounded the corner by the pond and Rick shouted at me excitedly to “quick get your camera ready, there’s a moose!” And here he is:





A different moose than the one we saw earlier in the day. This one had an injured leg and was moving with a pretty good limp. Plus, if you look at the photos above of the other moose his face was a much lighter brown. We watched him for a while but didn’t want to stress him to feel like he had to run, then we left him alone to graze.

Very exciting!!



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad at the cabin 8,650 feet above sea level

I am still trying to catch up on blogging and now I’m a bit behind.

On Sunday we packed a picnic lunch and decided to take a drive to the Snowy Range since we haven’t been up there is several years. It’s a pleasant drive, especially the “back” way.

We took 80C over Sand Creek Pass from the cabin over Sand Creek Pass and down to Woods Landing.



The Rawah Mountains as seen from the top of Sand Creek Pass.

The roads are all dirt and right now they are in pretty good shape. I don’t think we passed one car. At Woods Landing we cut cross-country on another dirt road to connect up with Snowy Range road and in to the tiny town of Centennial, Wyoming which was founded in 1876. There are lots of bars in Centennial and I think I know why!

From Centennial the road is a gradual climb up, up, up. The Snowy Range Road was originally a wagon road built in the 1870’s. It was paved in the 1930’s and finally widened and improved again in 1988, receiving the designation as the nation’s second Scenic Byway.

We passed many campgrounds that were closed due to fallen trees from the bizarre winds they’ve experienced this past winter and spring.

At the top at 10,000 feet above sea level a sub-alpine tundra exists. The mountains are raw and right in your face.







You can see the view if you look at the above two photos, squint your eyes and place the second photo next to the first photo and line up the one peak. Or you can see Rick’s panoramic shot on his blog site.

At this scenic view point I found my one of my favorite alpine flowers. I was afraid we were too early to see them since there was still a lot of snow in huge drifts that were just starting to melt.

Here are the flowers: Sky Pilots.

And Rick snapped this photo of my taking the above two photos. See what I go through to get flower shots? They are tiny and grow very close to the ground.



These were growing right along side the Sky Pilots. They are either Dwarf Clover or Alpine Clover. Too hard to call.



Also tons of marsh marigolds just as the snow starts to recede. They really like things wet. They come in two different colors.







At the top we got the dogs out for a walk and a romp in the snow. What scenery!







Bella of course headed straight for the water. It must have been freezing but it didn’t seem to faze her. If she hadn’t been on a leash she would have waded out further but she was having trouble keeping her footing due to a rocky bottom!






The Glacier Lily, or Snow Lily is also very abundant just as the snow recedes.


It really is beautiful country. Here is Rick taking slow motion footage of the waterfall. You can see that footage here on his site.

All in all, a lovely way to spend most of a day!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad at the cabin 8,650 feet above sea level