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Upper flume

walking to dinner

The Hills came up for dinner on Saturday night to see my folks. we went to Relish's and had a great time.

  

walking with Alina

she likes the neighborhood streets as much as Helen and I do. the girls went for a short walk here. my dad was admiring the moutnains.

  

hike on Minnie and the Reiling Dredge

on Saturday we all went out for a short hike in a window of decent weather. my parents wanted to check out the Reiling dredge, and the VOC's new bridge across French Creek offered the perfect opportunity.

 
  

Alina and Granny

  

Alina and Papa

  

fall, for sure

today I woke up at 5:45, excited to get out for a quick mountain bike ride before work. I peered out the window and saw it was raining. oh well. now it's about 49 degrees out with a light drizzle. the top of Quandary peak got a dusting of snow last night, prob around 13,500' and higher. but tonight they say the snowline will drop down to 11,000'. Helen, Alina and I took my parents for a very short hike on the Lucky Mine trail and the trail over to the Reiling dredge. a cool drizzle ended up turning sunny as we saw some of the early fall color starting up.

hawk

as i was driving down Hwy 9 early this morning to drop off my truck at Summit Ford, I saw a huge hawk (brown & beige color) sitting atop a lodgepole pine. it was really cool and very austere looking.
my riding time has really dropped off the radar the last few weeks as we prepare to move out and start packing. oh well, I think I can really gear up for cross soon. it is exciting. they are calling for a chance of snow up high on Sunday...

sunset

again from Mineral Hill, about 10,700'. some dramatic color on Baldy and Guyot just before 8p on the 20th of August.

 
  

the reiling dredge and the new bridge...

i am about 1000' above the bridge, on Mineral Hill, as I am looking down on this amazing area.

 
  

alina and helen hiking on quandary

Alina's first fourteener...

today we summited Quandary. Alina did great, except for one exposed ridge where the steady 20+ mph wind irritated her already runny nose and eyes. she even breastfed at 14,265! video to come.

 
 
 
  

right side up

i got new shoes

  

alina's aunt & uncle

  

here's my L

  

sideways

my first attempt to upload some video...we forgot you couldn't rotate the video.

I wonder who accessorized me...

  

something good happened...

  

chinese finger puzzle

  

last local race

was last night at the ski area. took a nice spill and lost some skin, but no broken bones and the bike is fine. it is a shame to not just go out with a poor showing, but to have done that two weeks in a row. oh well. still held on to 3rd overall, thanks mostly to some strong races early in June. Gotta mend myself, get re-psyched and ramp up for cross. I can't wait for cross, esp. with a new bike!

8/15/06

the middle of August. and for most of us in the highcountry, this signifies the beginning of the end of summer. the sweet corn is past its peak, as are the flowers and some of the grass in town. luckily the moisture has been plentiful, so things are still pretty green. if you go up a 1000 feet or so, you can see some aspens with leaves turning already. kids are going back to school too. the good new there is that we will get a break from the in-house traffic, and we can focus on booking up the winter. it has really been an awesome summer. we've had so much fun with Alina. I really need to add some new photos on my site. I gotta figure out how to upload some videos of Alina walking. she has a touch of a cold now, but otherwise is doing great. ever since we listed our house for sale, I haven't really had as much time in the saddle as I would like, but that's life. gotta take care of the priorities. hopefully I can get back on track and start riding more, and also start to write more on this site, as I really enjoy it.

mid august

it is really flyin by now. we didn't do much this weekend, tried to start packing some stuff. otherwise we just hung out. getting pretty excited about being in a new house. hopefully our deal is solid here. alina has a touch of a fever and cold, but she's okay considering. luckily she has a couple days to recover before going to daycare on Wednesday. today we were going to over to Vail for a trailrunning race with Helen, but she decided not to after waking up quite a bit with Alina, and just not feeling so well in the morning. I got out for a nice ride in the am, and came back and did some house stuff with Helen and Alina. tragically, our friend and wedding photographer Brad Odekirk passed away last night in a fall. it is tough thinking about how suddenly he is gone.

summer...rain...fall

seems like summer left us for a bit, and fall came in with a punch. Saturday it rained pretty hard in the eve, just as I decided to pedal up Boreas Pass to recon the Penn Gulch course. After about 45min of riding in 48 degree rain up Boreas, I was at the top and pulled over to don my rain jacket. I then saw Westy in his truck, marking the course with Chuck. I gladly accepted a ride down to the tank, as the cold rain was very unmotivating, esp. knowing how much time it would take to get my bike running well again.
Alina is now walking, anywhere from 6-12 steps. It is really cool, and her balance is amazing, given how small her feet look. A whole new world of supervision is arising. Perhaps she'll get tired of the entertainment center glass doors, and her Schylling bike is cool, so she has other options.
Helen and I are really excited about the new house. Most all of our upgrades are coming together. Less than 8 weeks left in our current house, as we seem to have the green light with our Buyer under contract now.

other house photos

 
  

new house

under construction. can they really finish in about 10 weeks?

 
  

Peaks Trail TT

maybe I should have missed the race last week after all, had it not been cancelled. at least it sure felt like I should have missed it, as I didn't have any juice for this race. felt fine warming up on the ride down, and put out a good warm-up prior. I may have been a little too timid of a bonk in the first 20 minutes or so, so I prob went out too slow. Luke Mason passed me after the first 1/2mi or so. i soon had him in my sights, until he crashed, but it wasn't much after that and he was gone. after the race I seemed to feel like I hadn't put forth 100% effort, but I rarely leave anything in the tank. oh well. I didn't eat shit like Luke. Luckily he's okay, just a little gash in his gums from kissing his handlebar very suddenlt. And of course Kevin Kane the teenybopper was in front of me, this time just by 10 secs. Oh well, the young kids should be cruising past this dad. My bike worked well, which is nice.
Getting ready to take a leap with our house...pretty exciting stuff.

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Walker's produce stand

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