Earache

Hey Zzzak

About 8 months - every winter.

Fuck knows what the rental company will end up giving me, It'll be somewhere between the minibus thing or a cargo van with boxes to sit on. Find out tomorrow when I pick it up.

My wife's sisters and brother are coming here for the week -6 of'em! It's gonna be hard to avoid them for a week, but I'll give it my best. Had to rent a large, 9 person van to pick them up at the airport and haul them around for a week. KInda looking forward to driving that so I can see what all the excitement about vans is. Drive report to follow.

"Old" RayBans now

Wait until next month - then we'll have snow in August. Then it'll start snowing at night in September and we'll be shoveling the stuff before ya know it.

Quick cruise past the Lake and we're back home. End to another good day out.

Well, we made it back down unscathed either by skill or dumb luck...

Lots of flowers blooming up here. I really should figure out what kind they are someday...

Marmot...

This guy had a cool camp site setup to watch stars with telescopes at night. Bet he got awesome night pics....

We did get turned around at a switchback and headed back down, encountering uphill traffic on the way...

The good news is that the adventure isn't over. Due to the narrow trail, Desmo gets to back down the hill in reverse. Good times.

Almost to the top and - denied! Snow blocks the summit and access to the back side. Well poop.

The views back down the hill were nice...

The summit was in sight. Looking forward to going down the back side of the mountain...

Once we passed the tree line at 11,500 feet, the views were pretty good despite the smoky air...

The trail wasn't exactly smooth, but not too bad really...

What's the worst that could happen?

After not killing ourselves on bikes for a few days, we decided to see if we could do it in a Jeep instead. Headed up Jones Pass with Desmo at the wheel...

Best 9 weeks of your life.

Desmo and I were talking about that; it takes a lot of effort and work to live up here, but I think it's totally worth it. Lots of people move up here and last about a year before quitting and moving back to the cities

I'll try to find some more fucked up ones today.

Some old, semi-abandoned buildings for @XTreme , my last pics of the day....

"Cowboy Bistro" - nuthin' gayer than that.