All posts by johncohn

Thursday night – Last day in Colorado, Dads birthday

August 16, 2013 johncohn Leave a comment

Let me start by saying happy 83rd brithday to my Papa… Happy Birthday Hugh Karl Cohn.. We all love you very much !.. See you next week ! Mom sent this pic

We began our last full day here in Colorado with the intention of taking it easy.. as it happened, that didn't work out.. Diane began by making an excellent breakfast of home made chocolate sourdough bread and asparagus fritata . She brought the sourdough starter in our luggage.. how cool is that ?

When I woke up i found diane sitting by the window watching a cow nurse her calf abut 2 feet from our kitchen window.. makes it feel very homey.

We decided to take a 'short' hike…that didn't require much driving.. we went down 2 miles to the cascade falls trail we'd walked earlier and decided to try it again.. this time we kept going in search of the falls..

we made it to the first set of falls.. a double.. in about 3 hours.. all in all we were out there 6 hours ! There's an even prettier 50 foot falls about 3/4 miles further.. but we were already way past our time.. so we headed back. it was a really nice hike.. pretty flat.. some meadows.. lots of flies and mosquitoes.. the first we've really seen on our trip. Gabe and I jsumped in and put a samstone behind the falls.. I'll try to get picture of that from Gabes gopro at some point.

It was about 5:30 when we got home.. too late to go out again.. though we'd wanted to go hear rusty's band..

we all got busy packign tc because we have to leave very early tomorrow morning..

One major project remained. and that was to launch the glider that gabe and I had made out of a few bucks worth of styrofoam sheet from Home depot .. We cut it out using a pocket knife and put it together using tie wraps and duct tape.. We used a broken fiberglass rod for bracing.. The first few flights were disaster due to balance and wing position.. but a little fiddling and some extra weight.. in the form of 2 sam stones had it flying pretty straight if not that far..

Once we had that working, we added Gabe's gopro.. it wighted a ton.. but still flew pretty well !

The videos from the gopro are amazing.. gabe will post them when we get back to vermont.. .. very cool !

Max phoographhed the whole thing and also managed ot get some time lapse of the suns etting.. I'll post that when I see it too..

then we had a feast of all of our leftovers… and took soem pics of this very fine house..

now we're all beat.. We need to wake in a few hours to get going..

this has been a wonderful trip..

Wednesday night – animas

August 15, 2013 johncohn Leave a comment

Another day in paradise here.. we woe ealiesh, went for a short run.. then piled in th car and were out of the house by 9L30.. amazing for this group of 6..
First stop woas ‘Mild and Wild’ a river rafting company in Durango.. Ciane, Jac, Raya and I signed up to do 3 hours of the lower Animas river in a raft.. while Gabe and Max signed up to do the same stretch in inflatable kayaks.

I couldn’t bring a camera in.. but gabe had his gopro and got a few shots of us warming up..

we had a good 3 hours on the river. we got plenty wet..bt not as wet as max and gabe in the kayaks. Our gude Phil was realy nice and had tons of good local stories and geology info .. It was a great experience .

After boating, we dropped off the kids down town and went out to meet John and Bonnie.. our good friend Amy’s folks. Amy was with us on The Colony and grew up here in Durango

We had a good visit with the Wests. they are such nice peopl.. we swapped stories of kids, dogs, toys. travel etc.. it was great seeing where Amy grew up and meet her family..

It was also really good to be able to go through her baby pictures 🙂 .. what a cutey !

from there Diane and I went back into town and found the kids.. then we went up to see Rusty and Suzanna .. they currently live in an 1880’s caboose.. bbut they’ve outgrown it and are in the porcoess of movig into… gt this.. ad 1880’s tran station !.. It was great seeing the caboose. it was beutifull.. but pretty tight for two grownups and a large dog.. (Chumley) .

It was great to see that Rusty had a samstone there..

In playing with Chumley a sad thing happened.. my sam bracelet.. the one I’ve warn every day since a few days after sam died.. broke.. I was stunned for a second.. then I remembered. we can’t control anything.. that is the real lesson of Sam’ death.. I petted chumley and put the broken band in my pocket.. I will see about tieing it back together. ,..

From tehre we went to a great dinner with Rusty and Suzanna and the rest of us.. the food was great.. as was the silverware .

OK.. to tired to keep writing.. more tomorrow

what a wonderful vacation !

nite all nite sam !

-me

Tuesday night – right turn

August 14, 2013 johncohn 2 Comments

Woke today with what I think is altitude sickness .. headache so sharp and interesting that it was almost fun… moved a little slowly through the day but popped advil and drank water.. The pain is still there like a smoldering fuse.. but I can think over it.. let’s see what tomorrow holds

ice pick in the brain aside, today was another wonderful day in paradise.. we did something different today…. we turned right… Left out of the driveway takes us the 30 miles down to durango and civilization .. Today we took a right up the mountain and the 19mile roller coaster to silverton… another gorgeoues day.. here’s the view a mile from our house..

Diane drove the tricky 19 miles up over the pass… the road got pretty crazy over 10,000 feet.. sheer drops on one side and mountain on the other.. slow but beautiful going.

we pulled in to Silverton to find it was a bit of an amusement park.. it had made itself into a nice caricature of the mining town it once was. .. buildings with painted fascades all holding trendy jewlery stores and bars.. We were very happy to find our way tot he really excellent silverton museum. It was a real treacure.. a great mix of history of the place..

most of the stuff related to mining in one for or another..

but there were soem other cool things thrown in like these antique science teaching devices like this wimshurst generator

and these ladies who used to run the towns telephones from this console.

and these scenes from the jail.. icluding the jailer’s family’s apartment

We then wandered around Silverton looing at the stores.. and checking out the people.. a little honytonk.. but sweet..

We then remounted an headed 23 miles further notrh to Ourey.. what an amazing drive.. it was white knuckles the whole way (diane drive).. sheer drops that made the the drive to silverton look like Kansas.. it was spectacular and terrifying .

Ourey suited us much better than Silverton.. it was a real (albeit touristed ) town.. with the most spectacular setting you could imagine for a town..

A nice guy in one of the shops showed us how to get to cascade falls.. just near town.. Max and gabe climbed way up and piut a samstone in the plume of the falls.. just as they dd, the wond picked up the water and splashed them playfully.. .. sam ????

I even went in.

then cam the long twisty drive home.. also scary, also beutiful. we were glad to see our driveway.. only 30 miles.. but about 2 hours of driving !

Our freindly cows were waiting for us in our driveway when we returned..

we just finished a nice dinner.. I’m heading to the hot tub.. then sleep..

more tomorrow.. hopefully free of altitude sickness. wish me luck !

nite all nite sam

-me

Monday night – castle rock

August 13, 2013 johncohn 1 Comment

Great mix of things today.. we began with a really nice 3 hour hike up Castle Rock.. it’s only a few miles south of here The clouds were starting to gatehr for rain.. but we decided to try to beat the weather..w hich we almost didi .

.. (btw.. I want to apologize.. I’m having some trouble with my iphone camera.. some of these pictures are even worse than usual)

the trail started through aspens..

We found tons of mushrooms.. including what we think was aminita

eventually we came across a really cool old cabin on elbert creek

Inside were emeergency provisions for anyone who hppened to get caught there in bad weather.. nice !

We found a cool old frame and put a samstone in it ..

We left the cabin and headed up into a beautiful meadow full of wild flowers..

The trail here aren’t marked all that well.. we came to a fork.. and as yogi berra said.. we took it.. we headed up hill in the hopes of finding the top ..

The whole place made us feel like ‘The Sound of Music’..cabin, mountain , flowers.. check !

we just needed singing ..

raya ended up with flowers in her braid

we kept climbing..

and eventiually came to the top.. the views were amaing.. it was a sheer drop on three sides..

we ate a quick lunch becasue the clouds were coming in fast.. and we didn’t want to be up there in lightning.. the lightening here is pretty scary.. yesterday we saw it nearly hit thee horses in a field..

Uh-oh.. thunder.. we packed quickly.. then began our one true mission. to lunch a samstone from the top.. we had 10 feet of surgical rubber tubing and a sling that max and gabe had made,

loading the samstone

ready

set

GO !!!.. it was out of sight !

a few more pics then it started to rain .

we started to run.. not because of the rain.. but because we wanted to be off there if it started to lightening..

i was rainign pretty hard .. s we slipped through the mud.. it was a hoot !

then it turned to hail.. and it HURT !.. it was still fun though .

we made it back to the cabin.. the hail on the roof was an amazing sound.

The hail really piled up

ut was then when we niticed Sam spelled backwards in nails.. cool !

The hail and rain stopped.. then we made our way down the trail to the car.. three hours exactly.. not bad..

from there we headed down the road and stopped at a local honey place.. the highlight there was samples of tasty honey wine (mead) and a view of a see through bee hive..

meet the queen.. here she is laying eggs

we then stopped across the street at a very nice organic meet, cheese and egg place.. it turns out their son is currently in Jericho VT.. He’s in the biathlon program for the Vt National Guard..very small world as ever..

here are some of their pet goats.. cute !

we then headed home.. it was raining hard.. for a while which was actally nice.. then we slowly made our way back outside. the boys set up a throwing tomahawk target.. abe had brought it in his luggage .. wonder what that looked like in x-ray ?