Recently, Fridays at the farm have been rather long. We arrive at the fields before the sun has risen and head home as it sets in the West. I cut my sandwich in pieces before leaving home as often I am eating while moving from station to station, and I simply don't have time to eat the whole thing at once. I don't mind the hard work, but it does tire a girl out by the end of the day.

Two Fridays ago, I wearily climbed the stairs up to our apartment, opened the door, and found this...


and this...



I'd like to point out that the first image is a pared down version of what I actually saw, but in my eagerness, I removed the ribbon and wrapping before I thought to take the photo. This was not assembled by some flower shop employee people. Kevin went to some impressive lengths here. He taped the seed packets to wooden sticks and made an arrangement by poking them into a Styrofoam cone. He then placed the whole lot in the metal vase and finished it off with a bit of wrapping and a ribbon. A bouquet of flower seeds. Perfection. It makes me smile just thinking about the thought that went into this. And if that wasn't enough, he also bought me bamboo stakes and twine so that we can mark off our garden in the backyard. I'm the luckiest gal on the planet.

Last weekend we headed out to Lyons, CO with new friends Traci and Chris for Folks Fest.


I'm a big fan of Lyons. I like the vibe there and the area is simply beautiful. The Planet Bluegrass HQ did not disappoint. The venue is intimate and the acoustics are amazing thanks to Mother Nature. One edge of the grounds is a beautiful crescent of red rock while the other is bordered by a thick area of trees and the St. Vrain River. The stage is unimposing allowing the audience to focus on the music and the artists, and its smaller size limits the crowd so you really feel like you're part of a special experience. Folks Fest also has a heavy dose of new artists, likely the future lineup of larger festivals.


Maine was well represented on Saturday thanks to Catie Curtis and Ray LaMontagne, and Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch were a highlight as well.


Our personal favorite performance of the day was Arthur Lee Land. The guy is a whiz and is made even better thanks to songwriting help from his wife Carol Lee. His sound is Afrograss, and he pieces together songs on stage overlaying loops of percussion, bass and guitar.

I had been looking forward to seeing Judy Collins as she had a lot of play time in our house growing up. She reminds me of Saturday nights in front of the fireplace, my dad playing his guitar and my brother and me singing along. Dad, have you been practicing? I think she was excited to be playing back on her home turf as there were equal parts reminiscing and singing. I would have recognized that hair anywhere.


The rain was intermittent throughout the afternoon, but started to come down fairly heavily as Ray LaMontagne was closing out the day. Walking back to the parking lot, we could hear his voice cutting through the rain. A perfect ending to a perfect day.

Two and counting

Provided with a second consecutive Saturday of no obligations, we decided to not waste a moment and headed back North to Rocky Mountain National Park. We were a bit more ambitious this time around opting to park the car as soon as possible and hike up to the clouds instead of driving. The trailhead at Bear Lake was teeming with touristas, and with us being 'locals,' we hightailed it up the trail and felt relief as the voices trailed off behind us. We basically found the hike by picking a random spot on the map, figuring that the odds of seeing wildlife and beautiful nature were in our favor regardless of where we went. This hike was marked as 'difficult,' so the odds were good that we would get to see these things without dealing with much traffic.


The first half of the hike up to Flattop Mountain was well maintained, meandering through the woods. There were many beautiful trees including some which seemed to have been struck by lightning.


The second half of the trail was very steep, rocky and exposed, but revealed some great vistas. As we climbed the trail it was obvious that we were gaining altitude quickly. The sun was hot and the air was thin. While pondering the inhospitable climate met some interesting furry critters that prefer this altitude, like this:


We saw quite a few of these pikas, including one that ran right up the trail next to us with a huge mouth-full of grass.


There were no shortage of marmots near the trail.


Once we summited Flattop, we could see our destination: Hallett Peak. From this point the trail basically turned into a pile of rocks and our only guide was the occasional cairn. The final mile up to the peak was straight up, and once you get over 12,000 feet, the going gets slow.

However, once we got to the top at 12,725 feet, the view was more breathtaking than the lack of oxygen.


We took some time to appreciate the achievement and soak in some sun (which is apparently pretty potent at that altitude as we would find out upon returning).


On our descent back to Flattop, we happened upon some magnificent elk, which capped off a day of some great wildlife encounters. All told, we gained almost 3,250 feet in our six-hour, 11.8 mile hike. Despite some sunburn, blisters and sore muscles we're very excited to keep exploring. Longs Peak, at 16 miles round trip with over 4,500 feet of gain, topping out at 14,259 feet sounds like a worthy goal. It might take a few more day hikes to prepare, but it seems like a feasible goal to hike our first 14er before the end of the year!

One month and counting. We've been out here in Boulder for a month now, and here's a brief recap - starting with the weather of course, because that's something we Mainers love to discuss . According to the Daily Camera, our local newspaper, we are three inches behind our annual, cumulative-to-date rainfall. The first, third and fourth weeks of the month were 3.5, 5 and 3 degrees above normal, respectively. The metro area "easily violated" EPA clean air standards, and we had record power usage on July 25th. Did I mention that there were also flash flood warnings? One bright spot was week two, the week we arrived (and I foolishly proclaimed aloud that the weather out here was just lovely). Apparently the second week of July is usually the hottest of the year, but temps were two degrees below normal. For the record, it really was perfect weather.

I am not a big fan of extreme temperatures - spring and fall do it for me. That said, the farm job seems to be improving my tolerance, or rendering me a bit less tolerant, depending on whether you focus on the hots or the colds. I showed up at work at 6am yesterday, and it was about 65 F. Most everyone was sporting fleece and jeans and there was even a wool hat in the mix. Now a month ago, 65 degrees wouldn't have bothered me so much, so I had a very light layer on over my tank top. Well darn it all if I didn't find myself cold (it was well into the 90s by mid-morning, so the goosebumps were short lived). On the flip side, I seem to be able to withstand working under the blazing 90 some-odd degree sun in long pants for hours on end. Yes Mom, I am wearing my sunscreen - I love you.

I think that overall, I have been struggling a bit with the fact that I will change and adapt to my new environment. Very odd, though perhaps not. I have always, foolishly and narrow-mindedly, stated that I could never be landlocked, that I could never live more than a short drive from the ocean, the beautiful, haunting, far as the eye can see ocean. Nothing like a bit of drastic change to bring the immature aspects of the human psyche to the surface.

When we arrived here in Boulder, I found myself feeling defensive of my New England roots, and I realized that I was focusing on what I viewed as the negatives - most swimming seems to take place in pools, the "historic" district is younger than most of the buildings I have called home in the recent past, that every block seemed to have its own mall, that most locals say the city just ain't what it used to be, that I can't buy fresh seafood straight from the dock. Ick. What an ignorant snob.

Now I am generally a glass half full type of gal, and feeling this way was a huge drag and something that preoccupied me on a daily basis. Thankfully, I hit a turning point this past weekend. As Kevin and I were heading out of town, off on our mountain adventure, I began to feel this enormous sense of relief and openness. As I stood at almost 12,000 feet of elevation, surrounded by traces of the elusive longhorn sheep and alpine tundra plants that grow a mere 1/4" each year thanks to a harsh and brief 40 day growing season, looking out at mountains that would dwarf most everything, life just seemed right. I don't have to become this place, I can call myself a New Englander for as long as I like, I can always love the ocean more than the mountains if that's how I feel, but for goodness sake, if or when I leave Boulder, I will have no regrets about my experience.

Tour de France over and farm job exhaustion becoming a bit less, well exhausting, Kevin and I decided to get out of town for the day and see what Rocky Mountain National Park had to offer.

Kevin had done a bit of research, and we decided that Specimen Mountain off of Milner Pass would be our destination for the day. With an elevation of 12,489 feet, this would involve climbing about 1,700 feet over the course of about a mile into the heart of bighorn sheep territory. Coffee and homemade muffins in hand, we hit the road.

We were about ten minutes into the park, when we realized that we were rather low on gas. My bad. We reckoned we could coast down and out of the park without gas, but weren't sure we could actually make it all the way to the trail head at Milner Pass, so back to Estes Park we went to fuel up. Good thing too because we saw our first bit of wildlife on the way down.


What you don't see here are her two babies that ran across the road to join her. Hooray for wildlife! Boo for my not-so-quick camera skills.

We stopped briefly at Rainbow Curve to get directions from this guy...


...but he fancied himself quite the dapper fellow and couldn't be bothered as there was posing to be done. So we pressed on, stopping at Forest Canyon to see what the locals were up to. Matthew, if you are reading this, please avert your eyes. I know how much it would pain you to be this close to a glorious, seven-point elk, well, actually he was starting to develop an eighth point.


Did I mention the breathtaking view?


Ahem, I mean, view?


And speaking of views... there were plenty.


After cresting the highest paved road in the country, 12,180' above sea level (more than two miles above Maine), we dropped down to just over 11,000' and parked on the continental divide at Milner Pass. From there, we set out on foot to locate "the crater" near Specimen Mountain and what proved to be the elusive Longhorn Sheep. We were treated to a beautiful, albeit steep, trail up to the crater where we found a marvelous view of the western Rockies.


We sat for an hour soaking in the view and hoping to catch a glimpse of the Longhorn. At one point, we spotted a moving flash of white among the rocks, giving us a ray of hope that we'd see at least one, but to no avail. This is a close as we got.


Just as we decided to start moving again, the weather took a turn. We felt a few sprinkles and heard rolling thunder off in the distance echoing ominously through the mountains. After numerous warnings of deadly lightning strikes, we thought it would be a good time to head back to the car.

Safe and sound, we pointed the car back down the mountain pass towards Estes Park. While this was only an eight-hour adventure, oddly it felt like a week-long vacation. It was an awe inspiring place and a welcome change from the city. We're looking forward to spending many weekends exploring what the mountains have to offer.

Kevin is like Norm Abram, but really good looking and witty. Sorry Norm. You're an excellent woodworker and way cooler than Bob "Benedict Arnold" Vila. Plus, you have your own drinking game. Not that I condone this behavior, but it would be funny to count the number of times you say the word "biscuit". I miss you, Dad.

On to business. Our Boulder kitchen is a bit, shall we say, on the small side, so Kevin the Magnificent decided that he'd build us a storage solution. Sadly Dad's fabulous wood shop is back in Maine, so he made due in the living room.


Nice pipes, Baby!

And the brilliant finished product.

I am a big fan of having little bits of home with you when you're far away. On our recent visit to Cherokee, Kevin's dad, Steve, gave us this crock. Being that Steve's popcorn making skills are known far and wide, it seemed fitting to use the crock to store our popcorn. Thanks Steve!