With Lenny Kravitz! We volunteered for JAS June festival to get tickets to the September Labor Day Lenny Kravitz (me) and The Fray (my daughter). It turned out to be a busy weekend. There was a big farewell to Blue Mesa party on Saturday so we drove over for that and some water-skiing then back on Sunday when I showed some property then went to the concert! I love that we can do all that from here 🙂
One of the many things I love about living here is the odd and quirky events that happen from time to time. A local writer wrote a play about Greek tragedies and made it really funny. It was performed free next to the Roaring Fork River in Aspen right by the John Denver Sanctuary. We loved it!
Every couple of years there is a cool private festival called Marblestock held near the charming town of Marble which is about a 45 minute drive from Carbondale or about an hour from Basalt. Marble is known for the beautiful white marble that comes from the quarry. There is an annual marble symposium where one can learn to sculpt marble in the forest and by coincidence this was also being held this week. On the way to Marble we stopped in Carbondale to see the Sand Mandala being crafted by monks. So intricate; it seems like a shame to destroy it. We saw it the day before the monks swept up the sand to put some in bags for people and the rest into the river to symbolise impermanence of worldly things. I almost felt like the act of taking a photo conflicted with that goal but they said it was ok 🙂 While in Marble we went out to the Crystal Mill. This road seemed to have fallen into much more disrepair than I remembered! I decided to park and we walked the last three miles. If you want to go I would recommend going with one of the local 4WD tours!
Avalanche Creek is such a lovely hike when there is still snow at higher elevations. My daughter volunteered to hike a ways with me on my birthday – so pretty and peaceful, This trail is only about 10 miles up HWY 133 from Carbondale. There is a lake but I think it is about 11 miles from the trailhead so not doable for a day hike. We like to just hike as far as we feel like then turn around. On the way in you will pass an alabaster quarry where inside a sculptor is carving a huge eagle from the wall literally inside the base of Mt Sopris. I have not seen it though as it has never been open when I have been driving by but I like to know that it’s there…
Driving to Denver via Independence Pass I was surprised to see how much snow there still is in mid July… all that rain this last May will make for a pretty summer 🙂
Due to a really wet May I was hoping to find my favourite wildflower (pink long stemmed avens) in full bloom en route to the Lakes. Interestingly they were in a very early stage and not very pretty but it was intriguing to see them that early. The rest of the wildflowers were stunning! Thomas Lakes is so accessible from Basalt; the trailhead is about a 30 minute drive and although I like to have a high clearance vehicle many people do drive 2WD cars carefully up to the parking area.
This is awesome! Instead of paying tons of money to travel to train on snow the kids at Aspen Valley Ski Club get to have day camps on the X-Games snow at Buttermilk right by Aspen!!!! They all pile into a truck which drives them up the dirt road to the top of the snow, Then they get out, click in, and ride down to the mogul course and jumps, practicing their tricks into the air bag at the base – wow! As a mum to a competitive mogul skier this is so great for us 🙂
Friends of mine have talked about the San Juan for ages. This year we all applied for permits and no-one got one! But on a cancellation my friend got one so we were very excited to go. He cautioned that the water might be too low so we held our breath then due to all the rain in May we put in at peak 7000cfs! This was almost too fast and we missed the first petroglyph viewing take-out. This river has very few places to pull over when it is running that fast. We waited for our friends and treated that as a learning experience! We all put in at Sand Island (3 boats) and planned a five day trip to takeout at Mexican Hat. In the end we cut the trip a day short due to rain but we were so very lucky to see this before the tragic Gold King Mine disaster that happened not too long after our trip. I felt so sorry for the Navajo people that depend on this river for their water and their livelihoods.
We were in awe of the cliff dwellings, the petroglyphs, the scenery and the beautiful falcon we watched as she fed her very hungry babies. I will never forget seeing her dive straight down the cliff face with a prehistoric screech – wow! We listened to the sand waves all night and watched them randomly form from our camp – they were so big you could have almost surfed on them 🙂 This was a much longer drive from Basalt than we would normally take the raft; about 7 hours! But a great adventure.
We had to go to Gunnison in preparation for an upcoming rafting trip to collect a trip member’s equipment. Road trip – yay! As we drove from Carbondale towards Redstone Mt Sopris looked so stunning with snow capped peaks against the green farmland. I did not think Kebler Pass would be open but it was! This made the trip a lot shorter and prettier than going via Delta then Montrose. Having not driven Kebler at this time of year before (usually this is a fall leaf trip for me) I was entranced with how green everything is. We stopped in Crested Butte for lunch – I love that town! On the way back I took some pictures of Hays Creek Falls just near Redstone – beautiful!
A fun community event! In an attempt to set a ‘Guinness Book World Record for the Largest Painting Made Entirely of Footprints’ Basaltines turned out on May 30th at the Willits Rugby Field to see the 560 panels assembled into the finished product. I am not sure if the attempt was successful but much fun was had by all 🙂
Aspen Country 