A Day In The Life - 06/23/2011: Pike's and Segways

 This has been another day of so much to do that I am glad that we are young and healthy. Today we headed south to Colorado Springs and the Garden of the Gods. We passed the Air Force Academy and watched planes towing gliders into the sky.
We had signed up for the Segway tours. We had done this once before in San Juan, Puerto Rico and it was so much fun that we decided to do it again.

 They always have an orientation period but because most of us had ridden them before (one person even brought his own Segway) it was a fairly short orientation.

This tour was the long one at 2 hours and it sure beat walking, being in a car or on horseback. This was so much fun.

 The rock formations were fascinating as we came over this rise.

 While we were waiting to start this guy just sort of befriended us and was telling us about the park and the things to look for and soon we knew about his family and his favorite movies. He phoned his wife to get the name of the movie so that we could watch it. That was lots of fun. Then he took our picture in front of the figures of the kissing camels by the garden gates.

 Then we headed over to see Pike's Peak, but decided to eat lunch in Manatou Springs at Adam's Mountain Cafe. It is a tree hugger restaraunt with lots of vegan and veggie dishes and not a steak or burger to be found. But the food, again, was excellent.

 We did indeed make it to the top of Pike's Peak. And it was snowing lightly up there. The air is about 50% of the oxygen that is available at the base.

 This is NOT the train that took us to the top. It was just a cool thing for taking pictures on. So I did.

 This was the cool train station.

 This train does not apply the drive power to the wheels but runs it through the cods in the center. A normal train can get traction through the wheels on the rails for a maximum of an 8% grade. A cog train like this one can travel grades up to 26%. The steepest grade that we traveled to Pike's Peak was 25%.

 At the top of the peak was this plaque. It is about a woman, Kathrine Lee Bates, who, after traveling to the top of Pike's Peak and seeing the plains of Kansas to the east with their wheat fields and the mountains to the west, wrote the words to the song, "My Country 'Tis Of Thee".

 This is the view to the west of the mountains. Pike's Peak is one of 54 peaks in Colorado that are over 14,000 feet high but what makes this one special is that it stands alone. The others are in mountain ranges. And it is on the eastern edge of the Rockies so that you can see the plains of Kansas from the top.

This is the view of the plains of Kansas to the east out in the distance with Colorado Springs near the base of the mountains.
The lady providing the information over the loud speakers as we rode the train up mentioned that we did not need to worry about the train failing and crashing because there were two springs at the bottom - Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs (gasp!)

A Day In The Life - 06/22/2011: Denver Silver Mining

 All I can say is that it is a good thing that we are still young and energetic because we did so much stuff today we should be dead . . . at least dead tired.
We started out by driving northwest of Denver about 40 miles to Silver Plume, one of the old silver mining camps. At one time there was a narrow gauge railroad that traveled 50 miles back to Denver to deliver the silver ore from the mine. (I know, we traveled 40 to get there but the train took fifty - actually, 54 miles to haul the ore. That's progress.

Today a section that travels about seven miles to Georgetown Lake (which is only about 2-3 miles by the freeway) has been preserved. And it doubles back on itself and actually travels underneath itself at one point in order to change elevation in steep areas.

At this point it crosses over the gorge, circles down and actually travels underneath where the train is here.

In the middle of the train ride we stopped to take the tour of the Lebanon silver mine. It was very interesting as well as a lot of fun. I kind of like this touristy stuff.

Our tour guide, Faye, recommended if we had time to head about 7 miles further west to the Loveland Pass which is at the continental divide. It is quite different from when we pass the continental divide along I-40 in New MExico and very cold. Glad I brought a jacket.

Then it was off to Beau Jo's Pizza in Idaho Spings on our way back to Denver. It was another recommended place to eat and it was outstanding pizza.

Back in Denver we went to the Denver library which was a really cool place with several floors, and a robotic book return system as well as some fun architecture.

Across the street from the library is the museum and several fun art pieces, like this indescribably piece that could be Mother and Child . . . or Master and Slave . . . or Big and Little-er.

And above the restaurant on the third corne, on the top of the building is this huge sculpture of an Indian sneaking up on a cowboy in his wagon. There are arrows flying through his hat and bullets piercing the feather that is sticking up in the air. This one made me laugh. Can I get one for the house?

Gaye was intrigued with this one where the pieces of paper in the dust pan are about half the size of an adult. It was cool.

After so much fun we found this ice cream store off in a neighborhood called LIKS. It used to be named Lickety Splits. They had some trivia question every day that if you could answer it you got a free scoop of ice cream - like, "How many bats does the National Baseball League purchase every year?" The answer was 4800. We sat outside in the shade of a tree or an umbrella to (quickly) Lik our streaming cones before we got to wear the contents. It was yummy!

A Day In The Life - 06/21/2011: The Adventure Continues

 Gaye decided to take us to Denver for my birthday so we hopped on a plane early in the morning. OK, we arrived at the airport early in the morning and arrived in Denver about noon. But the view of the mountains coming into Denver was spectacular.

 First of we went to the Botanical gardens in downtown Denver. It was really cool. Like this squirrel who really likes M&Ms. In fact, after a couple he decided that he wanted more and started stalking me. I finally had to wrestle him down and throw him in the lake.

 You can probably see the squirrel in the middle of the lake . . . but it sure is a pretty lake.

 Then it is off to the Tattered Cover bookstore, of course. Can't pass up a town that has a good bookstore, you know.

 And there was this cool Starbucks sign.

 Then it was off to Silver Plume to ride the narrow gauge mining train. But it was a lot more like a tourist train which was still a lot of fun as it wound around through the forest crossing raging streams and . . .

 . . . crossing a really tall bridge before circling around and traveling beneath the same bridge.

 And right in the middle of the train ride there is a tour of the silver mine, which was very interesting.

 At the recommendation of the mine tour guide we then drove a few more miles to the top of the continental divide at Loveland pass. It is a lot different than the continental divide in New Mexico.

 On our way back to Denver we stopped for lunch at BeauJo's Mountain Pies. It was great pizza.

 The Denver Library complex holds not only the library in a really funky building but also the art museum in another bizarre structure with really cool statues and art pieces.

 Like this one of a cowboy having a shootout with an Indian. There are arrows flying through the cowboy;s hat and bullets going everywhere - even through the feather. And there is sits as big as life on top of a building where you only see it well from the top of another building. But here it is anyway.

 And there was this huge piece of art work in front of the museum.

Finally we ended our day with a trip to LIKs Ice Cream parlor. It used to be Lickty Split Ice Cream but it got shortened. And it was really great ice cream where you sit out side in the shade of a tree or an umbrella as you lick the quickly melting dribbles from the scoop a-top a cone before you end up wearing it. At least that is the idea.

A Day In The Life - 06/20/2011: The Annual Event

I am guessing that nearly every day is an annual event except leap year. But June the 20th comes every year, pretty much. And somebody insists on turning it into an event.
So this year I decided to out fox them and take the entire week off from work. And it almost worked.
Gaye took me to have a Bahama Bucks. Yum.

It started out with sleeping in and enjoying the morning. I spent some time in the garden. It is doing very well. I like this straw bale stuff.
Then Gaye and I went by her new school where she will be teaching fourth grade. She was really excited.

Jennie was so kind to bake me a batch of birthday brownies that are topped like BBQ grilling. These were really cool.

A Day In The Life - 06/18/2011: June Birthday Party

 The annual Family June Birthday party was in full swing once again this year. Unfortunately I couldn't post all of the pictures but I tried to add a few that were good.
Gracie and Hero are always pals at these family events and with good food and good friends, what could be better.

 There were about 70 people this year and this was near the beginning with Les and Bob most likely enjoying swapping harrowing tales of back aches and muscle pains.

 The kids learn quickly (sometimes) to not run too fast on the gravel, although we had a couple of mishaps with Hero and Jase, the youngest. Even Kaden Varga was in the middle of whatever was going on . . . eventually.

 Emma was missing Ariel but found other kids her age as well as spending time being followed and mimicked by the younger ones.

 The Vaterlaus clan gathers in their usual spot under the porch to spent time together and catch up on the events since the last birthday.

 Jase is playing with his dad and giving him kisses. Noah is hanging out with more food - some of the best part of the gathering. Eat and run then eat some more and play more with long missed friends and family. How could life be better than that?

Finally! I caught Noah without his "camera face" out in the yard with, what else - food in his hand! He is growing tall and is as full of energy as any 4-year-old.

What a great family we are a part of! It is always so much fun to get together. As always, I miss being able to spend more time with Dena and Gaylen, our hosts of this party. But it is a great time to see so many people that you don't have opportunity to see on a regular basis.

A Day In The Life - 06/15/2011: Books I Have Loved

Books. Books. What I've read recently.

 Finished the first five "coroner" books by Collin Cotrell. They are mysteries that don't move too fast, have a little bit of peasant-type body humor but I love the way he writes. He just has his characters making comments that are so off-the-wall funny to me that I keep reading. The first one is titled "The Coroner's Lunch". I have one more, #6, to read.

Next, I recently finished re-reading all three Eragon books in anticipation of the fourth and final book being released in November. I am glad I did. There was a lot of details that I had forgotten, especially near the end when I was reading until 4 o'clock in the morning and then discovered that this was NOT a trilogy and let out a wail that woke Gaye up. But, now, after several years, he is probably trying from being killed by his readers and finishing the series.

I also finished a book by Keith Thomson titled "Once a Spy" It took me a while to get into the action of this book but it turned out to be very good. I talked about having seen the author at the Poisoned Pen in one of my earlier blogs. So now I've started his second in this series, appropriately named "Twice A Spy". (He promises that the third one will not be "Thrice A Spy".) It is a good training manual for when I get Alzheimers . . . worse.
In the e- category, I re-read all of the Harry Potter books to be ready for the release of the last movie next month. Although I did not like the ending of the last one hopefully they can mend that with the merging of the next one. We will see soon enough.
I am still working on The Count of Monte Christo but it has become very boring. Maybe I'll skip ahead since I already know the ending.
I have also started another Agatha Christi book titled "Murder Is Announced" which is quite intriguing.

Well, I'm off to flip a few pages . . . .

A Day In The Life - 06/13/2011: The Little Talent Show

It finally happened. Our ward, the Hartford Young Single Adult ward, Had it's very own "Very Little Talent" show. It was very entertaining. There was "big" talent, the ones that were on the program. And then there was "little" talent, like a magic trick by Nick Rasmussen and catching M&Ms in his mouth by Jesse Haws and his lovely assistant, Laci Smithson. And there was the funny face contest which really showed off little talent. And Kristine and Shalae hopping around while playing the harmonica. And David (yes, our own David Clark) did his own walking on stilts. Yes, "little" talent.
But the "big" talents were Nancy Heath singing, Jason Garcia doing a hip-hop number with his friend, Hali Merrill playing a song that she had written on the guitar, Rachelle Heap singing "Under the Sea", Jana Weinberg playing the piano and singing,Sarah Witbeck playing the violin (fiddle) and Andrea Pratt (who won) doing a standup comedy.
It was all so much fun. Glad we went. Oh, yes - and our two very funny MCs in the picture - David and Glen Farnsworth - both related closer than Noah.