July 13th, 2009 by Sha

Last Friday we took off for a couple days of camping before I headed back to Grand Junction for two more weeks of work. Pete bought a new tent for us while I was away working and had found a really pretty camping area near Big Meadow up on Wolf Creek Pass. It’s called Park Creek and is in the Rio Grande National Forest. The camp site sits along the headwaters of the Rio Grande River, which was running just behind our tent.  The weather was perfect, and the scenery was absolutely gorgeous. We spent a day relaxing at the camp site then we headed out for a scenic drive up to an old mining town called Summitville, which was just eighteen miles farther up the mountain from the camp site. It’s a ghost town, but a few of the old buildings are still standing. Summitville is at about 12,000 feet elevation, which makes for some incredible scenery. There are beautiful alpine flowers, deep green meadows, and awesome mountain vistas. The temperature was 84 degrees when we left the Park Creek camp ground and dropped to 46 degrees at Summitville, it was unbelievable. Just one more reason why the state’s tourism motto is “Colorado Wild”!

July 4th, 2009 by Sha

The photo of the bison sculpture is from the trip and was taken in front of Wells Fargo Bank on Main Street in downtown Grand Junction, CO. The group I was with, a bunch of gearheads, was geeking out on this because it is made entirely of old bumpers. How cool! We walked around and marveled at it for at least ten minutes, it is very impressive – and large. By the time I returned on July 1st the trip had lasted 19 days, a bit longer than expected. Pete picked me up from the airport and we went directly to East By Southwest for sushi. We got to try something new, Pacific Blue Marlin, and wow was that ever terrific! Very similar to Walu, a light colored flesh with a mild flavor and very “meaty” in texture. It was presented sashimi style (my favorite) with a balsamic fig sauce and peppery micro greens, delicious! Before picking me up at the airport Pete had stopped at Wal-Mart for some new shirts and also picked up a huge lodge-style tent so we can go camping. He set the tent up yesterday, all 11’ x 20’ feet of it and boy is it great! We’re planning on going camping for a couple days next week in nearby South Fork along the Rio Grande river. It’s really pretty over there, and it’s only a little more than an hour away. I have a lot of data entry to do before we go, but there has to be time for fun with all the work I’ve done over the past three weeks. I haven’t worked this many hours in years. Oh well, feast or famine as they say. One thing is for certain though, it is so nice to be home and to be with my honey and all our kitty kids. I missed them all so much!