Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Dirt Rolling Goodness

The end of May and it was time to roll out and spend some time disconnected from the world at large, if for just a few days. It's been a long, wet and cold spring and I wanted to be warm. I wanted there to be sun and blue skies and dry dirt so we headed to GJ/Fruita, something that is never done at the end of May because it's usually too damn hot. Well the first day was really nice but the second day it got hot and unbelievably windy, so windy in fact that we had to cut our ride short due to the fact that we were being blown off the trail quite literally and into the shrubbery. Walls of wind would roar up and over the edge of the canyon rims and slam into us, there was no making nice with this wind.

This one's for JJ

Lovely new trail outside of GJ..not another soul around. Somehow we thought this was going to be a 14 mile DH but it really wasn't. It was a up and down and littered with rocky ramps and ledges, fun!

This ride popped us out on top of this plateau, the views were AH-mazing!
Then that nite the wind arrived as I mentioned already. After our shortened ride the next morning which was actually quite fun, the DUST storm arrived. There was no safe place to hide outside, so we retreated to the truck. The air was hot and full of dust and dirt flying around with no end in sight, it was not fun so we fled to Salida. My soul home. Everytime we go there I feel like I'm coming home.

Yea Capricorns..and rainbows that shoot out of the head of billy goats! Capricorns can focus their mental energies into lovely fragments of colored light, we're special that way. We're always thinking rainbows and what's at the end of that rainbow. I could go on, but I'm gonna stop for everyone's sake.

Boats in Salida...

Alley's have the best stuff to photograph.

It was also Craig's birthday over the weekend, so he got to do a little fishin'. The Arkansas was high and it's always a tough time of year to fish it but he managed to get two on the line while I managed to do nothing but lay on the rocks in the sun reading.

and hang out with Ringo the Dingo

We rode in Salida too of course. Added their new trail Little Rainbow onto the end of our ride, it was fun, kinda wide, maybe it will narrow down with time, but fast and not technical. The wind was in Salida as well, not as bad but still pretty windy up higher and a serious chill to the air at times. They have a new trail above town too that we checked out. I like that Salida keeps building new trails, adding more to an already awesome trail network. There was some talk of retiring to Salida some day, a little casita with a little land, I like that.
On a side note..I hope to start adding some of the recipes and nutrition experiments I've been up to in the last year to this blog.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Waiting..

Riding through rain then snow then rain and fog. Feels like January 125th to me since it's been snowing at the house off and on for over week. No sun for three solid days, oh my...so I'm waiting, may start drinking caffeine if I don't get my regular energy producer back soon.

Sunday, April 24, 2011

Texture

Some more texture I liked while on a recent distant journey...

Links, connections...that's what the journey was about.

Now it's Easter weekend here in Colorado and it's been snowing at the house off and on, quite dreary but nice in it's own restorative way. Bought my little veggie starter plants today, looking forward and day dreaming about my summer garden while running in the snow. Sun and warmth will be here soon.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Cloud Kingdom


I flew recently. One of the things I love about flying is being able to look down onto the earth and see everything from a unique perspective. I also love clouds and being up in the clouds, it feels like a sacred landscape. On my flight home I traveled in the evening and chased the sun west. There were tremendous storms all around and below and it made for an incredible landscape of clouds with the setting sunlight.


These aren't my images of what I saw that day but I was completely touched and in awe of this wilderness of clouds. It appeared to me as a landscape of cloud canyons, mesas and mountains. With depth and relief, valleys and summits, it appeared endless and all encompassing, no earth below. This was/is a vast wilderness that was untouchable by me, by humans. I was able to visit and view it by flying in an airplane but otherwise it was completely empty of human activity and it was heartening to know that, to realize something so vast and complex was empty and still and off limits to human feet and hands. We can visit briefly but we cannot stay. I imagined myself being able to climb up and down all over these clouds that seemed so solid and substantial, this vast wild place, deeply quiet and untouched. A sacred kingdom of it's very own.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Strength

Fight Club

Awesome image, fierce, I get it..the movie is very good too. Fall down 6 times, get up 7..something like that.
I start 6 weeks of manual PT tomorrow for my back/hip, my glutes and my core need some recalibrating so they can support my hip and it's functions so everyone can play together nicely.
This weekend I'm off on a solo quest for soul strengthening, wish me luck.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

We got nuked!

Except for a few small snow drifts this area was open and ready to ride prior to it getting nuked on by snow on Sunday.

We still had fun even if we were a little cold..
It's pretty cool how something you ride often without much thought becomes fairly epic just because the weather changes things up on you.

Friday, April 1, 2011

A little more

Deep, open spaces

Friendly faces

This is not a poem, really..

more of a soliloquy perhaps..

open gates..please come in

the apple does not fall far from the tree..

this/that is all..