A Great Growing Season

This spring has brought some nice rain, and things are growing very well. The plants in front of our house are a lot of fun to look at, smell, and taste right now.

The red hot poker plants have gone crazy this year, with two of them putting out mutant heads- one is a trident, and another plant has a double head. The kids love to squeeze sweet nectar out of the heads of the open petals and lick it off from their hands. They tell me that the pollen doesn't taste too great, though- sort of bitter.

Our climbing rosebush has decided to rebel as well (at the root level, I'm assuming), as it is putting out some light pink roses that are decidedly NOT climbing roses!

We're experimenting with tomatoes in pots this year, as the back yard doesn't consistently receive enough sun in any one place to support productive plants, so the front porch is hosting a container garden, as it gets roasted throughout the afternoon until sunset, as the house faces west.

Sweet, juicy red hot poker blooms... mutants and all!

The rebellious climbing rose bush and friends.

Dusty Miller... so soft and fuzzy!

Mack Mesa Airport

David and Silas (and sometimes Amelie) have been going out, as able, to the Mack Mesa Airport northwest of Grand Junction for a project with the local EAA chapter that involves rebuilding a Dakota Hawk plane. This past Saturday there was supposed to be a Fat Tire competition involving short field take offs and landings on a grass strip. For those unfamiliar with the fat tire term, it's in reference to the fat "donut" tires some planes are equipped with for more bush style landings and take-offs. It was too windy, unfortunately (a common problem at that airport), but we did get to watch one pilot do several touch-and-go landings, along with some approaches where he just flew low over the runway. The best part is that a small airport equals a great view!

A "modified" Learjet serves at the airport's identification sign.

The windsock had some pretty good fill. This pilot had to do some pretty good "crabbing" (holding the plane at a slightly sideways angle to maintain a straight landing) to compensate for the wind.

More East Creek Hike from May 20th

East Creek Hike from May 20th... Unaweep Canyon Flora

These pictures will speak for themselves... high desert flora found in the Unaweep Canyon southwest of Grand Junction.

 

Feild Trip: Hiking Devil's Kitchen Trail & the Colorado National Monument

Have you ever wondered what Western Colorado looks like? We hiked through the Colorado National Monument on Monday, to a rock formation called Devil's Kitchen. It is a tall, sandstone outcropping with huge pillars and a large piece of sandstone shaped like a biscuit, sitting inside the red-hued vault. We had a guided hike with Ranger Leslie, who gave the kids the "From Utes to Boots" hike, where she discussed with the kids the way the Utes lived, the kinds of food they would have searched for, and how they were pushed out of the land in favor of white settlers who wanted to farm and graze cattle in the area. Today there is still free range grazing land for the cattle, but instead of being herded through the monument's lands up to the flat tops of the mesas, they are now trucked to the top for their summer grazing. It was so beautiful, and there was so much to see that there are a lot of pictures! Spring wildflowers were in full bloom, and there are so many visible rock layers, evidence of mud flow from either the worldwide flood and/or local catastrophic flooding that may have occurred with run-off after the post-flood ice age, uplifts and plenty of erosion. Oh, and if you've ever wondered about Colorado's name, which has to do with the color red, wonder no more! So, enjoy a taste of Western Colorado and its desert.

Serpent's Trail is a hiking trail that follows the original road built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1920's and 1930's. There are places where the road was built up with the natural sandstone, which was of course, was very available!

There is a lot of biological soil crust (or cyrptobiotic crust) in the Colorado National Monument, as well as other high desert locations. There are signs with an easy-to-remember saying, "Don't bust the crust!" This crust looks like the top of burn toast and is composed of many small plant organisms. It can be easily damaged and destroyed by feet trampling on it. The sample in the photo is very small compared to some patches we saw. The ranger poured water on the crust to show us how it puffs up and begins to turn green in a matter of minutes. 

 The plant on the lower left corner is a skunk bush that produces a skunk like smell when the berries and leaves are crushed or rubbed.

The kids learned about how pine nuts are a great source of fat and calories- these were a must-have for the Ute Indians during the winter months. She also showed a picture of the pine jay, which helps get the nuts out of the pine cones from this tree. The soft, flaky bark could be peeled off in strips for baskets, or for baby diapers! Wad up a soft pile of bark, set it in piece of animal skin, and apply to baby! Diapers changes are a breeze- just toss your "insert" out into the bushes!

Yucca

 

Red Canyon, looking northeast toward the Grand Valley and Grand Junction

Haircut!

When you're 15 months old and haven't had a full haircut before, it's worth recording!

Frontier History Museum & Glenwood Caverns

We recently enjoyed a school field trip to the Frontier Historical Society Museum in Glenwood Springs. This unique museum has a very unique and diverse collections of original items from western Colorado's early days, including items from Doc Holliday's last months in the fair city. He has been romanticized by western movies, and frankly, if you look him up, he was an empty soul in desperate need of God's salvation- an alcoholic barely getting along from day to day. The therapeutic waters of Glenwood actually did his tuberculin lungs in because of the heavy amounts of sulfur. His famous shoot-out at the OK Corral? Well, you'll discover it was just another average day in the Wild West if you read about the history of Denver and the Front Range of Colorado. Apparently people from far and wide (Europeans in particular) come to this museum inquiring specifically about this strange dentist-gambler.

The museum has the bedroom set that was in the room of the Clarion where Horace and Baby Doe Tabor lived during some of their time in Leadville (probably before the silver crash). A special saddle used by President Teddy Roosevelt is on display in this museum, along with the fossilized imprint of a palm leaf and a fossilized dinosaur knee cap- and the largest chunk of iron pirate any of us have ever seen! "The Great K and A Train Robbery" plays continuously in an upstairs room, as this silent-film starring Western movie hero, Tom Mix, was filmed in the Glenwood Canyon.

There was a lot more interesting stuff to see and hear about as well- but those are some of the highlights. We were limited on time, as the second part of our field trip took us to the top of Iron Mountain to visit the Glenwood Caverns. These caverns are still alive and growing (i.e. dripping water through limestone- which results in carbonic acid), and our camera and one or two of the kids enjoyed a "cave kiss." These caverns have the deepest/tallest main room of any cave in Colorado, and our guide told us that sonar has revealed an even larger room below the room we were in. They are currently digging to find it. In the meantime, we enjoyed cave bacon (eyes only- no taste testing!), straws, stalactites, stalagmites, columns, and phosphorescent minerals. It was beautiful!

Our guide left out the millions and billions of years, and gave credit to the Creator, who made the beautiful creation. He included a lot of facts about the minerals, but didn't give information about how caves like the Glenwood Caverns would have formed. Cavern experts will typically tell you that the caves take a LOOONG time to form (drip... drip... drip...), however, given the conditions that are likely to have existed after the flood in Noah's days, caves and their formations could actually have formed very quickly. Here are a couple of good articles about cave formation as related to the worldwide flood. The one from Answers in Genesis is a little shorter and simpler to read, and the Institute for Creation Research article is more thorough. The AIG article discusses the prevalence and role of sulfuric acid in rapid cave formation. Interesting to note is the high amount of sulfur associated with the Glenwood hot springs (which are just one of over 30 hot springs- tamed and untamed, in the Colorado mountains).

https://answersingenesis.org/geology/caves/cave-formations/

http://www.icr.org/article/origin-limestone-caves/

On to the pictures!!!

Just another beautiful spring day in Glenwood Springs.

Frontier Historical Society Museum...
some of our pantry items haven't changed!

A cool crowd in the bedroom... with Horace and Baby Doe Tabor's
furniture. The crazy quilt was made by a Leadville seamstress who
included a panel with a drawing of Baby Doe.

Where's the interstate???

Up to the top of Iron Mountain! View is looking west at I-70.
Storm King Mountain is on the right, and the effects of the
2002 Coal Seam Fire can be seen on the left.

The King's Gallery

There are also rides that cost an arm and a leg. Thankfully, we were given
school group pricing!

The ride down the mountain.