Salt Lake City

Here we are in Salt Lake City, spending the nite with Colleen Smith and Wayne Bingham.  They are strawbale builders & authors & photographers.  Check out their website at SmithBinghamPhoto.com    for way better pictures than mine.

Today's beer report:  turns out they DO brew beer in utah.  Had a Pale Ale from Desert Edge Brewery of SLC.  Very Good.  Speaking of recommendations,  Kip's in Pagosa Springs, CO makes a very good elk burger.  Wagon Wheel Pizza in Monticello, UT makes a Very Very good Mexican Pizza.  And Butte Cafe in SLC makes a fine portabello sandwich.  

Mesa Verde cliff dwellings, Colorado snowy view from car, view southwest from Trudy's at dawn.  

Monticello, Utah

Motellin it for the second nite in a row.  

Beer Report!  Two on tap at Kip's in Pagosa Springs:  Pinstripe Red Ale, SKA Brewing, Durango.  Lucky U IPA, from Breckinridge.  Both good.  Pevious to that, i bought two sixpacks in Taos brewed by the Santa Fe Brewing Co.  Pale Ale and Nut Brown Ale.  I liked the Nut Brown better.

Today i learned to use a dinner knife to break into a motel room!  Management TOLD me to do it!  Turns out we weren't supposed to lock the knob from the inside side as we closed the door.  They could have warned us....    

As we left town this morning (no, the cops were Not after us) we took a side trip into the National Forest for some fine Cross-country skiing.  My poles worked fine this time, but we both agreed that our 20+ year-old equipment need upgrading.

In the afternoon we side-tripped to Mesa Verde and were rewarded with a private tour of the Spruce Tree Cliff Dwelling.  It was very cool.

Now that we are in Utah, microbrews may be hard to find, but our motel room has 3 copies of the book of Mormon.  i have started reading it!  While drinking beer, of course.  

Pagosa Springs, Colorado

It is the 28th of January, and i have never ever seen my legs and feet so so very very PINK.  We are in Pagosa Springs, CO, which is a hot springs town and we cooked ourselves in a rooftop hot tub.  Our tub-mate happened to be a local straw-baler.  We had a very interesting conversation.  She said they had had a slow year but that things are picking up.  She said she was using crushed recycled glass instead of sand in their plaster mix.

I don't believe i have mentioned our visit to the "earthship visitor center."  That's the tire house people, they have their headquarters north of Taos; it is called "the Greater World Community," i think.  It was pretty darn cool and inspiring but we don't like the name. We will try to incorporate some of their ideas.   

Snowboarding Santa Fe

Jeez, i forgot to report the best day, until i read Kathi's comment of a few days ago.  Speaking of comments, i just changed the settings so that anyone can comment, i think.  I didn't know they couldn't, and i don't know if it matters.  

Monday i drove up to Ski Santa Fe.  I got in about 4 hours of snowboarding, talked to lots of people on the lift, did about 5 runs with a boarder about my age.  Great guy, took me through some moderate bumps, that was fun to do a few times but kind of hard work.  The snow was good.  Everyone told me my timing was right, they had been short of snow until last week.  I wished i had been there right after the storms but i didn't want to complain.  I stayed on the groomers pretty much, and they stayed smooth and predictable thru the day.  I  wiped out twice, but not badly.  I was on the blue runs mostly, started looking for greens at the end, so as to prolong my day safely.  I had to make sure to get my $60 worth.  The locals told me the deal was to buy the January pass for under $200 i think, and come a whole bunch, and then be entitled to $40 lift tickets for the rest of the season.  Probably did 20 runs of 1000 vertical feet each, but as Kathi knows, i may err on the plus side.

Talked strawbale with a guy from Albuquerque,  and i told him about our friend Eric's former house in Rio Rancho, and he actually could tell from my description that he had seen it.  Small World!

Taos

We are now just outside Taos, at Trudy Abrams, formerly of Yellow Springs.  The directions to her house were just as circuitous as the ones to Shel's.  She has a great new house, of which she told us all the problems and disappointments, but overall i think she is happy with it, as she should be.  I had been thinking we would split today, but Trudy has convinced us that Taos requires a closer look.  I should not be in such a hurry.  Who knows, Trudy may be right; perhaps Taos is Yellow Springs West.

  I have said that i want to find a small town with a liberal, worldly population that has a definable downtown and a feeling of community.  A public radio station and a local newspaper would help a lot.  A good supply of water, clean air and being able to see a lot of stars (in the sky) are important, too.  Last, but not least, there needs to be a quality ski resort!  The Taos ski resort just started allowing snowboards last year, so Taos can now be considered.  I will keep you informed.  

The Road to Taos

On our way from Santa Fe to Taos, we visited Shel, the ceramicist who led the workshop to tile the bench at Xenia and Corry.  We pulled off the side of the two-lane, had to use our ski poles to maneuver our way down the switch-back path to the rickety suspension bridge across the river, followed a very circuitous semi-path past fences, a very curious hog and an irrigation ditch, and found ourselves at the most delightful little house, with a whimsical wall around it.  Shel showed us around the house, his studio and his 4? room cave carved into the sandstone hillside.  With multiple skylights.  It was all pretty damn amazing and my pictures don't do it justice.  There was so much and i failed to get pictures of a lot of it, such as his current work; slumped glass.  I am inspired, but to do what?