Man Weekend - Sunshine Wall, UT

Lafayette, CO - It's HOT. Hot, Hot, Hot I tell you. We still have not gotten around to putting up new shades in the family room where I'm now sitting at my computer. We had blinds there. However, up in our bedroom we couldn't sleep past 5:45 am, when the sunlight hit the bed with it's full force... causing what we figured was a full fledged fire hazard (at least we felt like we were going to burn up). So, we decided to move the blinds from the family room to the bedroom until we figured out what to do next. Now, it's late afternoon in the family room and I feel like my keyboard is about to melt. Anyway, we had the shade people here measuring yesterday, so shades are now about 2 to 3 weeks out (3 day blinds my ass).

No worries, we're moving up to the mountains this week. At a typical high of around 75 degrees, it just sounds a lot more agreeable. Besides, we need to get started on the renovations up there as well. We'll be doing luggage cart dent repairs, painting, and ski boot shredded carpet replacement so that we can put it on a rental program and recoup some cash. So... it should be all nice and spiffy when you all come to visit us for skiing next season!!!

In the meantime I have another photo post. These photos are from the weekend of April 19th. At the wrap up of the kids weekend, I was invited to join Glen and Andrew on their annual "Man Weekend". Women & kids were strictly forbidden. This was a weekend for the guys and their buddies to climb, drink, cuss, smoke, talk shit and eat meat without the burden of their better halves telling em' to cut it out. I was a little nervous as I have not been keeping up on my drinking, smoking, and cussing training, but I figured with all my construction experience, I should do alright.

Besides the climbing, I'm not going into detail about what went on during Man Weekend. I feel that would somehow break some cardinal rule or something. What happens at Man Weekend... you get the idea. Anyway... enjoy the photos.

Sunshine Wall, UT

There's more in the slide show if you're interested:

Man Weekend at Sunshine Wall, UT

Hanging with the Kids: Moab & Arches National Park

Lafayette, CO - Suwei and I just got back from our annual Russian River canoe trip this week. It's the one big event I plan every year, and well... a lot of things get put on hold until I make it past that crazy weekend. Anyway, we had quite a blast on the river again this year. I was so tired and hung over after two days of beer and sun, that I could barely stay awake on Monday and Tuesday.

To celebrate the awaking from my 2 day beer induced coma, I started a "to do" list in order to get a handle on all the things we need to get done this summer. The list quickly grew to over 50 items in the first draft. Some items were quickies such as "touch up paint in guest bath", "fix wall dings in stairs" or "return ropes to Jackie". Others were a little more difficult... like, "Replace back door", "Paint Kitchen", and "carpet condo." Still others were on another scale altogether... "get a job"... "make a baby." Everyday this week I've managed to cross off one or two items as I add 5 or 6 more. It's going to be a busy summer.

Anyway... one item not on the "to do" list but still on my mind is, "catch up on the blog". So, this evening I'm posting a few photos from the 1st weekend in April. Suwei and I joined Tanya, Glen & their son Keenan on a trip out to Moab for a bit of mountain biking, a bit of climbing and a lot of hanging with friends and kids in the desert. Out in Moab we met up with Glen & Tanya's friends Andrew, Kristen, Chad, and Lacey. Andrew & Kristen have a little girl name Lucy. Chad and Lacey are fairly new parents with a son, Aiden. With the kids being around 1, 2, & 4 or there abouts, Suwei and I were able to see just what we might be up against in a few years.

Keenan / Chad & Aiden / Lucy

On Saturday Suwei, Tanya, Lacey & I rode out to the Rim of the Porcupine Rim Trail, one of the more famous mountain biking trails in Moab. All of us were feeling at least a winter's worth of no biking and were more than ready to head into town for a beer after the short 6 mile ride. Suwei and I vowed to come back and ride the whole trail when we got in a bit better shape (which we did 3 weeks later).

Porcupine Rim

Sunday we headed out to Arches National Park where Suwei and I took a short hike while the others set up a climb on one of the towers. It was only a 5.8 but it kept us all busy for most of the morning.

Climbing in Arches National Park

It was a damn good weekend, made even better by the fact that we stopped by Keystone on the way back and got two perfect days of powder in before heading home. After that I was definitely sold on living in Colorado.

Lucy Trying to Take Home the Desert

Anyway... there are more photos and comments from the trip in the slide show. Check it out:

Moab & Arches National Park, UT

Wedding Locale Hunting in Zion + Photos from Bryce Canyon & Capitol Reef National Parks

Lafayette, CO - Ok, for these photos we go back to the weekend of February 16th. Before the gas prices went really crazy, Suwei and I took a road trip out to Zion National Park to scope out potential sites for our wedding in September. This time, unlike our last trip to Zion in November, we managed to stay on task for most of the first day and a half.

In order to have a wedding inside the National Park boundaries, one must apply for a wedding permit with the National Park Service. In Zion there are only a few locales where the Park Service allows larger gatherings. Our fist chilly morning out, we were able to quickly narrow down the selection to two choices. The Temple of Sinawava at the end of the valley (where the Narrows Trail pops out) was our favorite, but they only allow up to 30 people. We didn't want to have to pick and choose which friends to invite, so we settled on our second favorite, the lawn in front of the lodge. Although it looked a bit barren in February, I remember that part of the park being quite spectacular in the fall. Settled.

Our next task was to find a place to hold the reception. Now, when we say reception, we don't really mean "reception" in the traditional sense. BBQ would probably be a more appropriate description for what we have in mind. White table clothes, fancy dinnerware, the ching chinging of crystal being replaced by dusty truck beds, camp chairs, a couple of Webers and possibly a keg or few (if we can work that out in Utah). Although we planned on reserving two group campsites inside the park for backup, ideally we were looking for a wilder setting outside the park where we could do as we like. The thought of toning it down after 10 pm didn't rub us the right way. So, we started scoping out every muddy track leading out of Springdale, Virgin and Hurricane. It being February, most of them were made practically impassible by plenty of mud and snow. We saw a lot of nice spots but, to this date, we still haven't fully committed to a site. However, Gooseberry Mesa is high on our list. We're going to put a little more effort into the wedding planning after the canoe trip next weekend.

View from Gooseberry Mesa

With the wedding stuff out of the way we made our way home slowly via Kolob Canyon, Bryce Canyon National Park and Capitol Reef National Park. This is where most of the decent photos were taken.

Bryce Canyon National Park

Capitol Reef National Park

Here is the link to the slide show:

Zion, Bryce, & Capitol Reef National Parks, UT

The Ouray Ice Climbing Festival, Ouray, CO

Downtown Ouray

Lafayette, CO - For today's post I'm putting up a bunch of photos from the Ouray Ice Climbing Festival held January 10th and 11th in Ouray, Colorado. We were meeting up with most of our Colorado friends who make this a yearly event. But to top things off, our friend Jen came out from California to join us and then, to make it really interesting, Tommy and Jessica a couple we met on the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal just happened to be in the neighborhood and decided to drop by.

Our Friends - Suwei, Jen, Jackie, Hank, Glen, Jessica, Drew, Tanya, Tommy, Andrew, and Drew.

For the sake of time, I'm keeping this post photo heavy and text light as I went into most everything worth going into in the slide show again. So check that out at the end of the post.

The Ouray Ice Climbing Fesitval

Suwei and Jen Call it a Day.

If you are interested in next year's Ouray Ice Festival (I'm sure we will be returning), check out their official site: http://www.ourayicefestival.com

Oh.. one more thing... if anyone is new to this blog and interested enough to come back for additional posts, there is a Google Groups box to the left of this post. If you enter your email address into that box, you will be added to the group and you will get an email each time I update this thing. Whether you're new to the blog or not, feel free to comment on any of the crap I post here. I would love to here from you folks.

Anyway.. here is the link for the slide show. Enjoy!

Ice Climbing Festival, Ouray, CO