The annual Arches trip was held and we were able to go this year. It is a 4 hour drive and the weather is quite a lot warmer! There were 22 of us and all so happy to be in shorts and T-shirts. We got a permit for the Fiery Furnace which I had not been in before – really awesome – photo attached. A great trip and a big thankyou to Rebecca for pulling it all together!
Colorado is just the best place to live! After all that biking and hiking and rafting we went skiing again! At Arapahoe Basin which is open until June 5. The snow was really good and we ran into a friend I hadn’t seen since 2000! Skiied this Monday and Tuesday with my daughter and her godfather who was visiting for her 11th birthday. Lots of lovely steep moguls and some great tree skiing.
The upper Colorado is running at around 4500cfs. Tried to get there early enough to do Pumphouse through to Rancho but ended up doing the Radium to Ranch del Rio stretch instead – turned out to be the right choice. A boat ahead of us flipped in the Yarmony rapids so we stopped to help them. They ended up OK thank goodness. A beautiful day – I love that stretch of river. I have posted photos before so please look up earlier posts 🙂
Rafting again 🙂 I put my cataraft together last Saturday and got it into the river today! The Roaring Fork is not running very high – around 1600cfs so I only went from Carbondale to Westbank. A lovely 2.5 hour float with two bald eagles and just flocks of nesting blue herons. Here is a photo of the put-in and also one of the river with a snow-covered Mt Sopris in the background that doesn’t show up very well on my cellphone camera but looked spectacular in real life!
It is so beautiful here now with the snow still on the mountains and the leaves coming out with the grass turning green…. driving the other day I just had to stop and take a couple of pictures to share with you 🙂
What a great Mother’s Day. My beautiful daughter gave me some lovely presents that she had made for me – a bracelet, a poetry book about me, and a plant pot! Then I biked through the stunning Glenwood Canyon with two other mom’s followed by an unexpected hike up to Hanging Lake! The lake ‘hangs’ at the top of a steep canyon and above it the water spouts through a hole in the rock wall – very cool!
Yesterday I was invited to help ride horses with Avalanche Outfitters at Redstone Stables. What a beautiful ride! With snow still on the mountains and the bluest Colorado sky you can imagine we rode past spring run-off waterfalls cascading into Coal Creek up through pine and aspen forests to stunning alpine meadows with spectacular views. These meadows will soon be full of wildflowers. Right now we are riding through the run-off that will make these flowers flourish. As we came to the snow line the horses were past knee-deep in the snow and willing to keep going but we turned around as we have kids coming home from school… I wish I had photos to share but I had left my phone in the car – just trust that the views were more breathtaking than I can describe.
Stephi, my daughter, has hiked the Bowl many times – sometimes twice in one day! I have never gone to the tippy top more than once in a day but get up there as much as I can. So on the 17th April we FINALLY got to hike to the top and do our favourite line (Ozone) together for the first time!!!!! The top is at 12,342 feet and the elevation gain while hiking is 782 feet. Then there is 2,552 vertical feet of skiing – yippee. At the top there is an old double chair supported by some poles with lots of tattered prayer flags. Here is a picture of us in the chair… From here there is absolutely spectacular views including Pyramid Peak and the Maroon Bells – you’ll need to come and hike it to see the views!
And here is why we do it – what a run 🙂
Today we caught the chair at 8am… There was a low-lying cloud over Aspen – lit up by the dawn sun….. so beautiful!
This is the first year in the 10 years we have hosted XGames at Buttermilk that we have not gone to watch the night events. It is so big now. So we watched on TV. And I realised that the cameras are sooooooo close that it is hard to understand just how high and how far these athletes are flying. So here is a picture of a jump taken from ground level with people included for reference. The athlete must take off up the ramp and clear the flat part to land on the sloping downhill section. Check out how far that really is.
Aspen Country 
