Vacation - offroading

We planned this trip to be able to offroad, and offroad we did!

I am very glad my brother decided to join us, as it is more fun (and safer) to offroad with another person (and another car), and we were happy to let him take the lead on many of the trails.

Kevin and I did Yankee Boy Basin on our own (my brother had not arrived), and then did 2 days of offroading together.   (my brother did YBB by himself after we left, and oops - we thought we told him we stopped before the top, but he went up to the top thinking we'd already done it with no problem.

We brought radios so we could communicate between the cars and I was working as navigator for both vehicles.

Our days of offroading with my brother:

1) Last Dollar Road  (to Telluride) and Imogene Pass back from Telluride to Ouray

2) Engineer Pass and part of the Alpine Loop (we'd wanted to do the whole thing, but thought better of it after seeing how long - time and concentration wise - the first day together took.)   

All the views were great, but i would NOT do the start of Engineer Pass again -- the first 5 miles were so torn up from ATVs it was just rocky and bumpy (and I thought several times we'd not be able to make it through...but slow and steady we did).

We saw some amazing sites, and even got to have lunch overlooking a ghost town (Animas Forks).

The offroading community can be a lot of fun, we would talk to people about what roads they'd taken or mods they'd made, and even asked a woman we'd seen on the trail (we saw her again  in town) if they ever found her brother (they did, but not the day we saw them).    We also had some 'cautionary tales' -- a kid staying at our motel broke his axle on a trail, he had a good attitude about it, but knowing how far from home we were we were sure not to take that trail (we never would, its for "experts" and mentions only take it if you are expecting damage - Poughkeepsie Gulch if you are interested).

My photos don't do any of scenery justice, and I did make sure to stop and just take in the view (and the drier air).

We also visited Box Canyon falls, and even found a used book sale in town -- we found some great finds, I even found a 4WD book we put to immediate use.

Vacation 2021

We had a great summer vacation -- part of me wishes I could do the "what I did on my summer vacation" presentation now (that I hated as a kid!).

We went back to Colorado to enjoy the mountains and do a good amount of off-roading, and while it was warmer than we wanted it to be, we had a great trip.

I had intended to take notes about what we did each day, but only managed to do it our first full day in Ouray.  

I will try to fill in what we did (and where we ate - as that is what I look at to share with others).  I will break it into several posts.

The first couple of days of the trip were mostly just *lots of driving* - we decided to break it into more days this time - we left late morning after we'd boarded the dogs, and had 2 nights on the road (Wichita Falls, Albuquerque) rather than trying to have only one night on the road.

After arriving in Ouray, Colorado, we needed a break from driving, so for our first full day we took in some of the sites in town.

We hiked up to see Cascade Falls....the elevation is no joke. We did learn our lesson from last time - we parked in the parking lot and then hiked up to the falls (years ago, we tried to walk there from our hotel  - our sea level lungs were not having it). It is a great waterfall, and a short hike. A family who had hiked up there was having a picnic, and their dog ate the dad's sandwich while he was handing out the others....poor puppy, and poor dad who had no lunch.  We also visited the Ouray County Historical Museum -- if you go, take my advice and start in the basement (the mining exhibits are really interesting and unique to the area), I went to the basement last (first floor, then second, then basement) and wish I'd started at the bottom to have more time in that area. I thought it was an old house, turns out it was built as a hospital (and ran as one until the law said it had to have an elevator to continue).

We had really good Italian food that night, at a place called Bon Ton, we were lucky to have read that reservations were recommended.  We saw many people turned away since they were booked that night.  I am not sure how much of that is that they are always booked vs staffing challenges coming out of COVID (we saw several examples of that throughout our trip).  

I love that the town is small enough that we could walk up to Main street from our hotel to eat/shop/just see the town.  We did that nearly every evening.

This blog has already come in handy as I was able to search back and find when our last trip to Ouray was and the name of the first off-road trail we took (in a rental car), so we could find and do it again - Last Dollar Road.

COVID one year later

I keep finding myself wondering how have we been living in COVID reality for a year AND how has it only been one year?   It seems so much longer in many ways.

This week March 12 makes it one year since COVID became very real (and close to home) for me in ways that the Houston Rodeo closure, NBA games stopping, and all the national headlines can't match....

It was Thursday of Spring Break for my university, and all staff had Friday off.

We had a last minute 4pm meeting to discuss what it would mean to extend spring break a week and shift all classes online, they needed input from all perspectives. It was a surreal meeting to be having, and I remember that a few top level folks were out or off-campus that day and had to try to call/video call in (if you had told me that was how all my meetings were to be conducted for the next year...I don't know if I'd have believed it). 

The meeting went late, and I met my hubby (on his spring break) for dinner, and just remember trying to make sense of it all. After dinner I went to try to buy some extra food before everything closed. I went to a Target right next door and was not expecting to already have hurricane-prep level bare shelves.

One year later, I am really fortunate to be able to say that my family is still safe and well, and definitely missing time together.    Video calls help, but they are not the same.    

I also know how fortunate I am to be able to have kept my job, and found some good things about working from home -- though I do hope to one day make my dining room a dining room again....

We are not at the end of it, but knowing that we have hit 100 million vaccine shots given gives me hope.

Table

   

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Over Labor Day weekend, we got Kevin a table for his office - it will give him more desk space and he can use it for studying/playing chess since he's gotten back into chess again...I don't understand it, but he loves it.

We were really pleased to find a used table that will work really well - it is even adjustable height! - on facebook marketplace, and it just fit in our big SUV.

He had been using a card table, that I can now use for jigsaw puzzles (I had used our formal dining table but it is now my work desk).  I am more excited about being able to puzzle again than I probably should be

We are trying to make the best of being at home so much due to COVID.  

It was really not the Labor Day weekend we had envisioned, but we are trying to do what is safe.

Back to School...2020 edition

The first week of the semester is always busy for both of us, since we both work in higher education.  We knew this year would be different with COVID (we are both still working remotely full-time - Kevin's classes are all online this term), and then 2020 added an extra layer of craziness by having us need to watch not one but TWO storms in the gulf (and right at the 3 year anniversary of Hurricane Harvey).

Marco ended up fizzling out, but Laura became the storm to watch and we nervously waited and watched.  Houston was lucky that it went east of us (as a CATEGORY 4), but it made for a nerve-wracking week, and my thoughts are with those who were impacted in Texas and Louisiana, including some members of my family.   Everyone is safe, but dealing with damage (and a delayed baby arrival!)  I also hate that part of me is relieved when a storm goes to another area, and not us.

We had a few days off because of the impending storm.  With my 'office' literally steps away (I took over our dining room), I actually did quite a bit of work (our busiest time of year is fast approaching) but enjoyed the fact I could work on a projected uninterrupted (no meetings to log into and email responses could wait) and work when I want, take time away from screens when I wanted.

I have been dealing with hurricanes my whole life, and don't think I ever get used to them, and some of my hurricane prep is a bit random.  I do what I can - car is gassed up, have some cash on hand, plenty of food and meds for us (and the dogs), flashlights, batteries, catch up on laundry just in case we lose power, etc.    I also do somewhat silly things that make me feel more prepared - for example, I was trying to use up some random freezer/fridge things in case we lost power, and this week I baked cookies so if the power went out we had cookies and not raw dough (desserts are needed!)   They were delicious :)