To the mountains

What would you do?  Spring has sprung, trees are blossoming, some even have touches of green foliage, the grass is getting a taste of irrigation water, eyes are painfully itchy, the wind is blowing, so...time to escape to winter!  Crazy, but just a few days, and I'll be ready to brave more of the above.
A painfully bright drive over two 10,000 ft passes, to the quiet community of Silverton and I'm ready to listen to the deluge of melting snow following the path of icicles.  It's loud on the metal roof.

The road is clear.

The skiers are happy to have another few runs.

And I'm delighted to be here with longer days. Last November I watched the sun rise and set at the highest peaks of the mountains.  Now it comes up and goes down in valleys with five more hours of light.

New socks finished!

Guest Visit

I have friends!  At least, I would like to believe I have friends.  And many of those friends are friends who I don't see for years and years.  It's one of those hazards that goes with "wanderlust".  I really don't mean to leave friends behind, although some have taken it as a personal offense that I pack up and move...  Others are happy where they are and understand our motivation to move away, try something new.  (Almost everyone I know remembers I knit... that moves with me!)
In December I heard from my friend, who I first met in the early 70's, and didn't see for many years.  For real, we hadn't met up between 1986 and 2006!  But somehow, we share a past, and that makes us friends.  (My daughter rolls her eyes when I insist I have friends who I haven't seen in 20 or more years. I can't help that I live in the remote Southwest, and others live in England, France, Norway, New Zealand... It isn't so convenient, but fun to catch up!)
So, Dibble wrote her usual holiday greeting and mentioned that she was going to California to visit her sister, and I jumped on it!  Soon we had tickets and arrangements, and that's what I was doing this past week.
We went to the Chuska mountains:

To the hot springs in Durango:

 To Aztec Ruins:

And many places between.
Attention knitters!
We must make a trip to Kirtland...  100% wool in beautiful skeins, sold for weaving, at the Foutz Trading Post.  $18 per pound.  Lots of colors!!

Doggies that make me smile

Went out for a quick trip to the mountains.  Perfect weather:  Some clouds, some dark, but no rain;  just wonderful air.  Friend, MLE, invited me along with her choice of a pooch (she has six or so to choose from) to ride up to the mountains (an hour) and relax with a packed lunch along the river.
But first we had to load "Boomer" into the car.

That's one happy and well-behaved dog.  He definitely knows he was the "chosen" one!
Moments before went like this:
MLE:  Jul, come hold this dog while I get Boomer into the car.
Me:  OK.  I got him.
MLE:  (to the other 16 dogs) STAY!
Me:  (2 seconds later)Ahhh!!  M!! They all got out!
At this point, I'm standing inside the fence with my dog (I did as I was told) and the other 16 were ALL in the car.  Ten minutes later, I took the above picture.  Each dog was individually escorted back to the yard.  LOL
I chose to introduce MLE to geocaching.  That's the price she had to pay for inviting me...
We took a delightful detour off the main road, through some little side canyons, and as I remarked how remarkable the quality of the road was, ahead, we spied the end of pavement.  The next 7 miles were what we expected of such a road, and we located a cache up a hillside with a lot of luck.

Re-built schoolhouse from 1905 - MLE rang the school bell but no children came.

Then we headed for the real mountains (Colorado):

And located another cache on our way home.

The Mountain Man

My hub came home from the mountains.  He was in Silverton, Colorado last week to toot his horn.  Yes, there was a lot of horn tootin' at 9,300+ feet altitude. 

They look happy breathing thin air!
And he brought home this:

6 lbs, 6 oz or 2912 grams

I couldn't weigh it without splitting it in two.  But alas, 

not so pretty inside!  We chucked it.  Don't worry: You can still enjoy a meal at our house!!