All is good...

Bruce is home from his second hospital stay in December, son Andy flew into Colorado from Sacramento to visit his Dad in the hospital. 
The cats love Andy's fiancee, Tara.  They both watched over her when she feel asleep on the couch watching the movie, Mr. & Mrs. Smith.
Sven and Gunnar missed Bruce tremendously, they too, are happy he's home.

The effects of sub zero temperature

Look closely.  This was my Dad's mercury thermometer that shows the high and the low of any day you happen to re-set it.  Concentrate of the left side, the bottom of the blue max bar indicator shows -4, the current picture taking event at about 30.
On the right side, I haven't re-set since the summer showing the max temperature at about 84.

The minus degree temperatures does some crazy stuff with the river.  The river freezes from the bottom up - called Anchor Ice.  The above short 2 second video shows the Frying Pan River actually flowing back up hill to avoid the growing ice from the bottom up, and if you watch closely, the ice has actually formed a mini waterfall on the upper right.               

Fire department doesn't have any fire to fight

Just by a stroke of luck I happened upon Basalt's finest fire fighters cruising around town in their fire engine all decorated with lights, Santa Claus on top and blaring Christmas music.  Our tax money?  I did enjoy it.

Bruce had a colostomy today so sorry to say.  So for the next few weeks he'll have his favorite pee bag plus a poop bag and drain from where the infection was.  Looks like we'll in Colorado for another 8+ weeks.  See you in a while Trinidad!!!

Finally a big dump!

Adopt Me!

Previously a sled runner dog, he is ready for adoption.  Took him for a walk to get him out of the no-kill kennel.  Very sweet, 11 years old.

Nice to be home

14 inches of colon gone!

Fireplace in the hospital room!

Bruce is doing just fine.  He just had his first food in four days.  Grape juice, beef broth and a Popsicle!
Only in Colorado do you get a fireplace in your room!  Wood floors and all the rooms are single.
He had a whole wing of the hospital to himself until they moved him.
We expect discharge on Tuesday.

Life in a small western Colorado town

A "sleigh-ride" on the annual Basalt tree lighting event.  Usually we have a real sled but this year the horses had to pull a wheeled vehicle.  Sorry the lighting is so bad because the sun is so low on the horizon.

Sven and Gunnar had a visitor

What do you think it was?
Maybe a space alien?

Blackberry post and other bear posts

Sorry, everyone.
It seems like blogger deletes videos after a short time. 

Looks like we'll be in Colorado for Christmas...

So I may as well do a little holiday decorating.  Bruce had diverticulitis 3 years ago and the doc said he may have future problems.  After being on antibiotics for 8 weeks, he still wasn't feeling like his old self; got some catscans and turns out the colon still has the diverticulitis and has attached to the bladder.
Surgery on 12/6 to remove a 6  inch stretch of perforated colon, hospital for 3-5 days and 4-6 weeks recovery before relaunching the Chicken in Trinidad.  He'll be fine.  As Bruce says, "This is piece of cake after getting your legs sawed in two".
If I had known we were going to be here, I would have decorated the big pine as in the past.  We'll just enjoy it.  

World Cup Downhill on man-made snow

Here's the real condition of Snowmass

The Viceroy, Snowmass Village from the gondola.  Sad picture, so sorry.
The summer road is still accessible to mountain 4 wheel drive vehicles.

Sledding on Thanksgiving

Parking and a gondola ride were free today, first day of the ski season so we went to check out the new restaurant at Elk Camp.  Lovely blue bird day, not a cloud in the sky and temps in the low 50's.  Ski School had made available a few children's plastic sleds so Patti and I decided to be kids again. Snow not very good...these pics were mostly on man-made snow-blower snow.

Hope to get an up close and personal picture soon

I'll keep watching and taking my camera with me.  They are really spectacular to see in the wild.
This is the time of year we see the illusive animals most often.  No promises; it's a matter of being at the right place at the right time.

Yep, we have snow!

Went looking for Big Horn Sheep

Big horn sheep have a sanctuary about 3-4 miles up our road in the White River National Park and I learned that they are starting to come down out of the mountains.  Didn't find any, just this group of mule deer by the side of the road.  They look like pets, eh?
We did happen across a beaver, 16"+ trout just hovering in the water and a herd of at least 30 elk but the elk were too far away and the sun too low on the horizon to get a good picture.

Somebody had fun...

We took a car ride up the Frying Pan river (16 miles) today and there were hundreds of pumpkins stashed everywhere...on a rock in the middle of the river, high up on the rocky cliffs, and hanging from trees.  Somebody put a lot of effort to stragicallly distribute all these pumpkins along a 16 mile piece of road.

They call it "littering" out here.

Happy Halloween

From the monkey and his banana.

Pink Flamingos at the Aspen round-about

A little spot of snow, upper left, on Tiehack.  That ski area of Buttermilk was named for the railroad workers who installed train tracks...ie A person who installed railroad "ties".
The flamingos are an annual event to raise money for the school system.

Update...As of 10/31 all the Flamingos were gone...Either someone stole them or they took them down because they were not there tonight for Halloween.  The Flamingo event is scheduled for 11/2.

First Snow Storm of the Season!

NOT BLACKBERRY BUT SOMEONE BIGGER, MUCH BIGGER!

The beginning is a little slow and I'll probably edit it when I have more time, but for now, your patience will be rewarded.

NO YOKE!

The story behind this is that the Republican headquarters has been getting "egged" every night by vandals so they decided to turn the situation around and have fun with it!

Turns out the egg throwing was caused by 5 eighth graders, 2 which were siblings.  Their Mom put 2 + 2 together when they were found giggling over the newspaper article and were promptly marched down to the Sheriffs station to confess.  Yeah Mom! 

FRC's!!

Free Range Cows....


We made a Costco run to Vail  a while  ago via Cottonwood Pass and ran into this herd along and on the road.  Cottonwood Pass can be done in a car if it has relatively high clearance.  Not scary at all except at a couple one lane hair pin turns with nowhere to go but down for about a 1/3 mile.  Way down!  This is actually a graded and maintained the dirt road.  Then you get on a real dirt road which we don't have a picture of..




No Free Range Chickens to be found!

A visit to the wildlife rehabilitation center

One of three Bobcats in permanent residence.  As former "pets" they cannot be released back to the wild.

A 6 month old baby bear whose Momma was killed in a car accident.  The center will him keep him awake all winter as he doesn't have enough fat to survive hibernation.  He will be released next year.

A silver fox and his red fox pen buddy.  Both were pets; the silver fox is thought to have been a pet brought to Colorado from Alaska and then the owner learned wild animals were not allowed, as he had a collar on when found roaming the streets.  There were also mountain lions, fawns, eagles, owls, coyote and wolves either as permanent residents or due to be released upon completion of their rehabilitation.  The animals being rehabilitated "came" to the center with injuries, were found as babies alone and scared, or abandoned.

Blackberry visits our front door!

Fishing in a private trout pond

Ate them for dinner...Yum!

They were so big we could have frozen one for the winter!

Nice Rainbows!

NO WAY BRUCE IS GOING UP THERE!

One of our smoke detectors started bleating tonight.  We got out our 20 foot extending ladder to get to it but the foot of the ladder had to rest on a step and there was no way Bruce was going up there with his new knees.  You can see the white base of the detector to the right of the ladder after Bruce knocked it down in under 30 minutes of hard labor.
Good thing he's been working out!

4 Wheeling Aspen Mountains' summer road

At approximately 10,000 feet the fall colors are a little past prime.  The ski runs were named back in the cocaine hay day of the 60's.  Aspen was crazy enough in the late 70's and apparently more so in the 60's.


Blackberry visits us almost every late afternoon.  When we have a video of him doing something cute or silly, or just plain entertaining, we'll post it.

Another Blackberry video

Bottom line is that he finished off the apples the next day, after tumbling down apple tree branches that were not strong enough. . Wish I had that camera to record the circus,   

"Blackberry" pays a visit

The sound in the background is the stream next to the apple tree Blackberry climbed, as well as Fox news.

Annual Balloon Glow at Snowmass

Maroon Bells, Aspen Colorado

 Fall colors are emerging at 11,000 feet.

Due to the drought, Maroon Lake is low on water.  The poor beaver who lives here has to take a hike to get into the lake!

Nice Bear Butt

It's BOO BOO getting ready to cross Frying Pan Road!  We can identify him by his black body and tan head.  He just crossed the river if you're wondering why his butt is shiny; it's wet.

Bruce's Fish!

Finally a nice Rainbow Trout and he didn't get his feet wet!

After dark visit!

 Looks like Mr. Bear crossed the river, climbed up on patio, shook the water off and up into the woods he went!

DUCKING ON THE RIVER

Bruce and fellow paddler stuck on a rock.  The river guide had to rescue them.  It's called "Ducking" because everyone follows the guide in a row; like a row of ducklings going behind the mother duck.  Sharon got flipped and went swimming but we don't have a picture of that.

Power Outage

Here's my Lift Master!.

As promised - Strange & Weird!

We ran across this display on the eastern side of the Continental Divide.  The dirt side road was marked private and do not enter but we couldn't resist getting a picture.  What's the story behind this effort??

Two Continental Divide Passes in one day!

At 12,095 feet elevation.  Sorry about the porta potti....Pro Challenge Cycling coming to town tomorrow and there will be lots of people at the summit to cheer them on.
We chose Hagerman Pass to return at 11.095 feet.  It's a 4 wheeler off road pass and quite slow and a real bouncer and jiggler.  Notice that there still snow in the background.  This pass was used by miners and others looking for a better life back in the 1880's traveling by horseback, wagon or foot.
The Continental Divide separates water from going east to the Atlantic, or west to the Pacific Ocean.

Totally STRESSED OUT! Featuring Gunnar.

Boating at Ruedi Reservoir

Coming in for take out at the boat ramp.  That's Patti waiting with the trailer in the water to hook us up to the Tahoe.
It was a lovely day to just hang out, listen to music and munch down on Patti's gormet creations, watch the sailing regatta and enjoy.

The Bureau of Reclamation built the Ruedi Dam and Reservoir in 1968.  Ruedi is part of the Fryingpan- Arkansas Project which diverts water from the head waters of the Fryingpan and the Roaring Fork Rivers to the Front Range (Denver).  The dam is 285 feet high and 1,042 feet long and impounds 102,000 acre feet of water with a surface area of 997 acres.