Final countdown

In 24 hours I will be probably riding in the car of my trail angel who will be shuttling me to the trailhead for segment 3.  I will have a headache and feel light headed due to the change in altitude.  It always happens and it's nothing that drinking a boatload of water doesn't help. 

It will be nice to leave the humidity.  Today isn't bad.   It's actually pretty decent outside humidity wise.  But it hasn't been nice and this has made it hard for me to train.  If you know me, you know how it affects me. 
Looking forward to the mountains and the arid temps!

My new purchase is an Inreach.
I will now be able to communicate two ways.
That will be helpful.  

This represents months of work. 
The gummy bear and smores duct tape are so I can identify my box easily among the other hiker boxes.
I have heard there are quite a few hiker boxes.  I can only imagine.  I hope to take a pic of the multitudes.

Yesterday I helped set up for the Omaha Quilt Guild show.
You submit a quit, you have to help.  That's ok, they need help and it was fun.

My quilt is the one with the black ravens on it.
Waiting with anticipation to see how it does.
The judging is all done.  They just have to kick us out so they can award ribbons.
BTW, I love the floral one on the right.  I intend to use my CO wildflower photos and design something similar.

I was able to come back that evening to see how my quilt did.
Judges Choice?!!!  AAAUUGGHH!!  I was blown away.
And first place!  Wow!  I didn't expect all of this. 
What a wonderful way to start my big adventure.

Here is a rather blurry pic of the ribbons.
Pretty cool ribbons.  Someone must have an embroidery machine.

I have this pattern.  I have the fabric to make this quilt.
Mine will be all purple, black and golden brown.
I really want to get it going when I get back from my trip.
It's at the top of my list under getting the scrap quilt done for our bed.
The JC Penny quilt we have been using is literally falling apart.

Some friends of mine made this quilt. 
The mom did the embroidery, the daughter did the piecing and assembling and another friend did the quilting.
After it was put up several of the workers were admiring it and had really nice comments about it.
I'm so glad it won two ribbons as well!

This is another quilt that inspired me.
I'd like to get the pattern and do it the same way but change it up to reflect the pond in our back yard.

The images are colored with crayons, set with heat and then embroidered.
What a nice job!

I did take time to check out this longarm.
I plan to take a class at their shop this winter to try out their longarms.

I wish they had classes so you could do a quilt on this longarm.
It's a sit down version.
This Bernina chair would look nice under our Christmas tree.....

One of the small groups did projects using old embroidered items, doilies and handkerchiefs.
I thought this pillow which was done in linen turned out very cool.
Old fashioned but modern at the same time.
Hmmmm......I have a drawer full of doiles and embroidered stuff.

The flowers in our herb garden are blooming about a week early.
This is the peak season for them.  Always around the 4th of July.
Then it gets super hot, the gardens get full of spiders, the gnats and biting flies come out and Betty doesn't work in the yard anymore.  If it's not super windy and humid I will go out and ride but that's about it.

Our cactus have acclimated to the outdoors and are growing well.
(this is just some of them)

This one is cool.  It is two plants spliced together.
It has such a funky shape.

I will have to ask Alan if he can make something like this.
He doesn't do inlaid wood though. Darn it.
This holds something like 250 spools of Valdani floss!!!  Yikes!
I will never own that much.
I will need a much smaller cabinet.

This is kind of cool.  These are the "ping" points shown on the map for the CT trip we did in May.
It shows our route through the mountains.

I was able to zoom in to see the fire station.
It shows we were by the outside corner (where the water spigot was) and then inside.

This shows where we stopped for water on the second day. 
I had my pack sitting on the rocks so I could easily back into it and put it back on.

Today I took all of my stuff out and sprayed it with permetherin. 
Took a shower right away to get the over spray off.  It is poison.
This is to help keep bugs and TICKS off me and my gear.

I belong to a facebook group for people who are hiking the trail like me.
This weekend is when quite a few people are starting their hike.
I saw this pic and the guy who posted it said he and his 10 year old son start Saturday.
I love the little Yoda head hanging off the kids pack.
(This guy has some bucks if he is buying these brands for both of them!!)

Here is another post by a gal who has the same pack as me!
A lot of gals have this pack and in this color.
I can identify mine by the bag I hang on the front, my water tube and the bandana I hang on the back.

Wow!  This is a gargantuan bag.  52 pounds!!  I wouldn't be able to lift it off the ground.
I would roll around like a turtle on it's back.

Here is another cute pic.  I will have to look for this couple and their dog.
I guess I can't bitch about the price to mail my boxes. 
I bet those huge boxes aren't cheap.  But they are re-supplying for 2 (3 with the dog).

The excitement everyone is sharing is tangible.
This is a nice photo. 
And she has a nice pack!
I looked at her pack but it doesn't have hip belt pockets.  I suppose you could add them.

In the meantime, I have been paying bills and finishing up things here.
I have also been trying to drink a lot of water.
Want to make sure I am hydrated BEFORE I go to the mountains.
Where there is a drought.

And I just saw this.
Hooray!
This is a load off my mind since all the resupply locations requested we use UPS.
One less thing to think about.
Now I am off to pull all my stuff off the porch and pack it up.
My flight leaves around noon.
Denver here I come!
I will post pics as I can.
Who knows, you do sometimes get reception at the top of mountains.

Back home and it's hot

I don't know if I am amused or annoyed when people in Colorado complain about the heat and wind.

When we did the week long bike tours through the mountains we always heard fellow riders who were from CO complain about the wind during the ride.  Alan and I would look at each other and say "Wind?  What wind?"  We are used to 20 mph winds or higher.  Wind where when you are riding you and your bike are at a slight angle.  Where it pushes you backwards as you ride up a hill.  That's wind.

Same with the heat.  Heat where you are sweating as you are drying off after your icy cold shower.  I have done that many a time on Ragbrai.  

Well I have been reading on the Facebook CO trail hiking pages about people complaining about the heat and wind.  I want to tell them that I just finished a training hike with my pack in 90+ degree heat with a dewpoint in the mid 70's.  And with 30 mph oven blaster wind.  I don't tell them but I want to.

I think my pack is going to rot away from sweat and salt before I can get to CO.

White vinegar in the washing machine does make your clothes smell good when you wash them.  After hiking in this heat you do need to deodorize them!  

Now that it is warmer, all the flowers are blooming.  I like this iris. 
Purple and yellow.  I think this is the most striking color combination.  

Yay  -  heat
(Here is my sad emoji face..... 😞)

Alan and I were headed to the movies (Avengers Infinity War) and I saw this tree at Lanoha Nursery.
It looks like a Dr. Seuss tree.
I want it in my yard.

Checking out the pond to see how the fish are doing.
Ryan's friends have been fishing a lot and catching quite a few bass and some bluegill.
Most of the bass have been about 12".
That's what this one is.  He looks to be fat and happy.
I put him back.  Grow baby, grow!

I took Mishka to the dog park.
I thought Huskies didn't really like water.
Well, she does.  This is her leading another dog out into the pond.
It is a really shallow pond where she discovered she can walk out quite a ways.

I imagine if I had to wear a super dense thick coat of husky fur I would spend most of my time at the dog park standing in water too.  Ryan noted that she is getting much stronger.  She likes to run when she leaves the water.
That definitely makes her stronger.

More fishing.  About 12".

Glad to see they look healthy.
Probably need to start removing some from the pond.
Will have to contact the pond guy to see what he recommends.
Also want to add some black crappie.  

The 2018 databook is waterproof.
CO has not received a lot of rain but if it does rain when I am out there, I don't want my main source of information to get ruined by the rain.  

The food factory is up and running.
I have a dilemma when I am backpacking.  I want to bring lightweight food but the prepackaged dehydrated food makes me sick.  Must be the chemicals in it.  Feels like spikey knives in my gut if I eat it.  It didn't used to bother me but it does now.  I found that out last year when I bought some to try before we went on our trip to WA.  It super sucks and makes it challenging to come up with a meal plan.  I also can't eat spicey food.  Or food that has too many carbs. 
I don't cook in my pot.  I only boil water.  Less animal problems that way. 
I also want to try to have foods that have healthy fats, veggies and a good omega 3/6 ratio.
That is hard!
I can buy some of this stuff and that is expensive.  So I am making a lot of this on my own.
I can say that I LOVE my heat sealer.
Here I am making breakfast pouches.
Eggs, peppers, spinach and sausage.
I didn't think I'd like powdered eggs but surprisingly these taste really good!

I also like to add olive oil to my dinner pouches.
You can buy little olive oil packets.
Or...you can make your own.

Same goes for almond butter packets.

I stopped by the Brass Armadillo to browse and came across this.
I had this when I was young.
It was stolen.  I had a little "homestead" set up in the yard for Barbie and stupid me, I left this outside.

Alan wants to put a wading pool in the dog run.
He asked me to see if Costco had any.
All they had was this....
He said No.

My airport bag arrived from Zpacks and it is too small.
I can juuuuuuust squeeze my pack into it which is not good.
So I ordered a half yard of 1.43 dynema and added about 9" along the side.
I had to also add the velcro at the top, move the one clasp and loop to the new edge and re position the center pull tabs.

I had a little extra dynema so I added about 4" along the top of the bag.
This is perfect and allows me to have more material to roll down.
This fabric is very light and super tough.
A handle is sewn on the side.  I will put my pack and all my gear inside the bag when I take it to the airport.
This will protect my pack so the straps and zipper pulls don't get ripped off.
Then when I get to CO I will put this on the inside of my pack to use as a liner.
It is waterproof and will protect my things from getting wet.

Yes.  I am aware of this which is currently going on in SW Colorado.
Fortunately the Buffalo Mountain fire was quickly extinguished.
I read they were all over that like white on rice.

Definitely not what I want to see when backpacking.
Alan, Ginny and I did a bike tour in Montana/Canada and there were forest fires all around.
I remember putting my gear bag on the truck one morning and seeing fire like this all along the mountains.
The flames were licking up above the trees as the smoke was blown away from us.
We were on alert at one campsite and told we could be evacuated at any moment.  Fortunately we weren't.
One section we rode through was closed in the morning and due to prevailing winds was opened when we arrived so they allowed us to ride through.  It was kind of exciting to see all the smoke jumpers and the helicopters carrying the giant buckets of water to dump on the fire.  What was not cool was all the smoke we had to ride through.
Everyone ended up with a nasty cough. 

Pictures from one of my hikes around the lake.
No elevation, just miles on the feet.
This seed head reminds me of my Aunt Barb.
She brought one to our house when she went on a walk and thought it was really cool.
Like a giant dandelion puff.

♫"The signs of summer"....♫
(Think Simon and Garfunkel...Sound of Silence)
When school got out one of the first things we always did was climb up into a huge mulberry tree and eat mulberrys for hours.  It was about 2 - 3 blocks from home but felt further.  It was right next to the horse boarding place where Tyler fell off a horse and broke his arm.  He wasn't supposed to be riding the horse.  It was not his.  It was just one of the horses in a pasture.  The kids would all go to this pasture and ride the horses.  It was far away enough from the buildings that nobody could see them.  It was also quite a long hike through the woods over logs, the swamp, a stream and barbed wire fences.
Not a good thing when you are going home with a broken arm.
Ahhh... summer memories.

Thistles are a noxious weed but they are pretty at this stage.

I came upon a rape in progress.
At least that is what it looked like.
Fortunately she got away when I arrived.

I did not know we had tiny red mushrooms/fungi in Nebraska!

Looks like it will be a while before there is any fishing next to the bridge.

Making dinner pouches.
This is very tedious.  I have to first cut out the pouches from the roll.
Then seal one lower corner.
Then seal the other lower corner.
This creates a "bowl" shape on the bottom which makes it easier to get your food out vs the 90 degree corners.
Then add your ingredients.
Then seal the top.
Repeat 64 times.
I made extras so I don't have to do this again soon.

Yeah, this is still going on.
Hoping the rain they are forecasting arrives soon.

The San Juan National Forest is now closed.
This will affect the last segments for me unless it rains.

Making up resupply boxes.
Not sure how long it will take but I do know I am slow and don't want to overdo it and hurt myself.
And I enjoy going into town and meeting people.
I'd like to visit a lot of towns.
And spend a lot of time in CO.
It's better than spending the summer in NE!
Looking at the long range forecast for Creede, CO I see a lot of low temps in the 30's.
Being cold sounds really good right now.

An assortment of food ready to assemble.

We finally received some rain.
Half an inch!
All the previous rain storms have missed us.

The dog is napping on this rainy day.
That is a secure feeling dog who can sleep on her back like this.
I think she really enjoys the ceiling fan blowing on her belly.

That same evening we received a lot more rain and unfortunately hail.

Big hail.

Roof damaging hail.
Fortunately we already have our roof claim in progress which is for the bad batch of shingles that were put on 2 years ago due to the previous bad hail storm.

The dog is enjoying natures ice cubes.

The neighbor's creek is back.

And it gets to be pretty big.

We are sitting on the deck as the dog runs around enjoying the cool rain.
There is also lightning.
We didn't want to get hit by lightning.
The dog, well she didn't care.

The tube in the neighbors yard which is the source of all the water.
It comes from the big catch pond across the street.

Looks like the storm was worse just to the south of us.
The news said they did get quite a few tornadoes.
I think the total for this storm was 6.
Most of them just south of us.

This is the hail about an hour after it fell on the ground.

Our yard had some water drainage from the catch pond that drains onto our property.
Not nearly as much as the neighbors.
Fortunately not a lot of mud with this storm.
They did recently dig out the catch ponds.

So after the rain and hailstorm the Accuweather app told us more was coming.
I like how they give us a time frame.

We are surrounded by hail storms!!

We did get more rain and wind and fortunately only pea sized hail.

The neighbors stream now has two channels.

Almost 3" total for the day.
That will help drive up the humidity.
Ugh.
Good thing is...less than 2 weeks to CO.

After the storm we had these really cool clouds. 
My mom used to say these clouds look like a sheep herd.

Tilt the phone a little to change the lighting and they look like this.

Taking the dog out to inspect the house and yard.
Looks like we may have managed to come out of this one unscathed.
The water drainage wasn't too bad. 
We have always had heavy drainage through here after a big rain.

A spire cloud.
Usually means another storm is brewing....

Fortunately this didn't turn into another storm for us.
It just made really cool clouds to look at.

I did a hike and saw these kayakers.
Looks like they are floating through Willy Wonka's chocolate river.

The eagle babies are getting huge!
They don't have white heads yet but appear to be outgrowing the nest.
This is why the nests are made so big.
It won't be long and they will be taking off to make their own nests.

Who would have thought we would see signs like this 30 years ago?
Drones are cool but people are irresponsible with them.

You get purple fingers when you eat mulberries.
They are almost all done for the season.
They were good while they lasted.

Can you see this?
I have poked it several times and it is stuck pretty securely.
Just always hoping it doesn't fall on me when I walk under it.

An example of what I put in my resupply boxes.
Food for each day.  I number them to make it easy.  Helps make sure I alternate my dinners and not eat the same dinner two times in a row.  Then starting from left to right I have Tylenol and Advil.  I don't resupply those every time but I did in this box.  Fizzy tablets for electrolytes in my water.  It also helps the water have a little kick.  It gets boring just drinking water all the time.  Mouthwash to use after I shower.  I do floss every night and I usually rinse with mouthwash too but will only do it in town during this trip.  The baby shampoo bottle has bug spray refill in it.  Under that is a refill of foot tape.   Lotion for my eczema and to massage my feet.  Then I included soap for when I shower in town.  My skin gets super dry so I wanted to use my kinder, gentler soap.  A new hand sanitizer.  I plan to sanitize the heck out of my hands.  Don't want to get sick on the trail from hand borne illnesses.  Eyedrops refill.  It is dry in the mountains!  I need these to help see in the morning.  My eyes get really dry.  Shampoo and conditioner.  I went to the local Holiday Express to buy a bunch of them and the guy just gave them to me.  He was so excited to hear I was hiking the trail.  He said it is on his bucket list.  Then last but not least I included Tide to wash my clothes and toilet paper.  Don't want to run out of toilet paper!!

This is where the dog has spent most of her time during these hot, hot days.
Enjoying the cool bathroom floor and the cold air coming out of the vent.

Yeah!!
Rain in Colorado from hurricane Bud.
I hope it soaks them and helps out the firemen.
They need all the help they can get.