Spoiled Colorado Hiker

So, I'm not hiking today because I've tweaked my neck and back in a painful way. That sort of tweak where you can't really look around because it makes you want to yelp. Now, I'm using my free time in an extremely productive way and posting on my somewhat blah blog.

Since Castle Peak, I've hiked in Rocky Mountain National Park and Climbed Mt.Shavano and Tabaguache Peak. I haven't remarked on these because, compared to Snowmass, these didn't seem that interesting. If I lived in Virginia, however, I would fall over myself to do any hike in Colorado. Heck, when we first moved to CO we would go to Roxborough State Park and just be blown away.

OUZEL LAKE hike in RMNP

This hike was really a slow 10 miler wherein our goal was to identify plants and mosey along (as opposed to 14ers where the summit time is somewhat critical due to the weather). The better pictures of the plants we saw are here:

You may be wondering why I'm not telling you the names of these plants. The answer is simple, my sieve-like brain has lost that information. Just enjoy the pictures and, perhaps, make up your own names.



For the first two or so miles this hike was jammed with people going to the falls - this destination hike draws casual vacation hikers who smell perfumey and look clean and fresh.

Oh! I do know this one. This is a fungus and it is called purple club coral.



The next weekend (this would be last weekend), we hiked Shav and Tab near Salida (this town has an excellent pizza place with outstanding beer: Amica's). We hiked Shav last year but were not successful in climbing Tab the same day. So, we went back this year and were successful.

On the way, Sandy got lunch at that Coney Island hotdog place - DO NOT STOP THERE unless you've got 20-40 minutes to spare waiting around for your order. We waited 40 minutes. The draw is that it's shaped like a hot dog.

We drove down and camped the night before in order to get up at the nightmarish hour of 4:30am to get started on the 11-12 mile hike. This is the sort of scenery on the way:


Camping in an aspen grove is lovely...

This is a photo of Shav taken from the summit of Tab.

Sandy on the summit of Tab
This is a macro of moss campion.
Saturday afternoon - on the way home.

But our day didn't end there! We went over to Lisa and Tony's for the strongest margaritas ever (very tasty though) - pics below. Please note: when I drink with a camera around, I start to mess with the settings. I'm not sure which setting I used but it's some color replacement setting, which explains why they seem to be glowing yellow in some spots.

Anyway, we had such a good time that we ended up camping in the backyard.