World Series Events

     The Red Sox won the world series in 2004. This was an historic event and especially significant for long suffering Boston baseball fans. Meanwhile, within the southwest plains of Colorado other significant events were about to occur as well. Tonight was a full lunar eclipse, a spectacular sight anywhere but this night was going to be special. The excitement was building while driving to the Commanche National Grasslands south of La Junta, Colorado. The view port from there was going to be wonderful and all the camera gear was stashed in the truck.  The light haze of front range cities is visible to the north but is greatly diminished under the vast, clear portal that exists on these high plains.

   The gap gate off the county road was barely discernible within the fence line. No road was visible beyond it. Careful study of maps indicated that an access road into the national grasslands existed along the other fence perpendicular to the gate. The early summer winds had buried that fence and whatever road lay beside it under four feet of tumble weeds. There was no other access through the cactus and rock outcrops at this point. Taking a deep breath, and gearing down, the truck munched its way through the debris. There wasn't going to be a crowd out here!


     The night was absolutely clear and calm. The full moon appeared and rose quickly illuminating the grasslands increasingly in soft light. The camera was set on the tripod in anticipation of the eclipse which wouldn't occur for several hours. To pass the time the truck radio was on, picking up the game. The only station that came in was out of St. Louis whose team the Red Sox would beat that night to win the series.

     There was no wind. The radio crackled with the game as I settled into my chair. The only other sound was a slight scratching noise that seemed to come and go. Looking about I started as a Tarantula came up to the tripod, paused and continued on his way. I got up and looked around and  it became evident that the sound was made by Tarantulas and that there was more than one out here. They were marching in great numbers through the grass. They were spread far apart and came by the camp sparingly but they were constantly there none the less. It was the annual mating migration of the male tarantula in search of potential mates. Laughter filled my heart at the thought of this scene. Miles from nowhere, waiting for an imminent total eclipse while listening to the World Series I was not alone but accompanied by my new found desert friends.

Festival Echoes, "Gentle On My Mind"

Preparing for a festival as grand as the Telluride Bluegrass Festival takes time. For many Festivarians, the week to 10 day experience is their one vacation of the year. The excitement in the weeks before the Summer Solstice reaches a fever pitch the weekend before the music starts. In the early years, an entire festival was spent flopped in a tent in Town Park listening to the music from there, too sick from altitude, sun, and fun to be able to move.

  On one of the early week rides to Tom Boy

As the festival caught on, pitching a tent in an empty lot or sleeping in a car late in the week ceased being possible. Prior planning became necessary and arrival in the campground early in the week morphed to getting there the weekend before. Town passes on the Landcruiser faded to no longer trying to leave town at all. We started working at the ticket booths, renting bikes, and moving in for the week.

There are many of us now, who only meet in Telluride for the summer solstice. Friends from New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and places even further coming together for the hooten-anie of them all. And some never coming again as the years have tumbled down like water over the rocks and cliffs taking friends along the way. It is the same for the musicians who played for us here and have, in no small number, passed on.

Vasser Clements and "friends" (including Tim, Bella, Sam and Pat) 

One year, Hartford's floating music caught hold. Laughing children blew bubbles, sunburned lovers clung and shuffled in a dusty dance while the breeze began to stir. Aspens waved, leaves flickering in the wind, while great billowing clouds moved above the towering peaks soon to bring cold rain out of the impossibly blue sky. Wisps of flowers and cotton from trees floated in the air and the eternal nature of what this day held struck home.

Many years went by from that great moment in the sun dappled afternoon, in the happy crowd, in that beautiful place. Sunday afternoons have come and gone in other festivals listening to "In the Land of the Navajo", or Doc Watson calling out Bella, or the Telluride All-stars jaming when bittersweet realization twangs our hearts that the festival is coming to an end. Finally, the inevitable Monday late morning stop at Baked in Telluride and the drive out of a comparatively empty town.

It was the middle of summer several years ago while working in Rico that rolling into a relatively quiet Telluride I wandered down to Town Park. Strolling into the area in front of the stage and gazing up at the mountain side Hartford's banjo picking lofted into the air from that faraway afternoon with the bits of flowers and cotton from the trees that floated by.  Suddenly laughing at the thought of sound that wasn't there, yet sensing the deeply embedded experience both in this place and in our hearts, just as rich as the summer colors. Happily, and with a tear in the eye, I headed for home.

Bridal Veil Falls

Voices in the Wind

Often, the best way to the mountain top is where fierce energy has blown down a path to the bottom. Snow avalanches do this. Where they load and run, decade to decade, is a clear path to the top, avoiding the tree fall and other debris in the deep dark woods that densely cover the hills.

Today was one of those days. I got a late start after checking the gear and carefully arranging the pack. The hike, work at the mine, and walk back out would take me into the early hours of nightfall even on this June day. The climb always cleared the pipes and the mind and today was no different. A cool breeze pulsed up the hillside chilling the sweat drenched clothes. As I topped out, light headed at the ridge I suddenly started as I heard voices. Looking all about there was no-one to be seen. Snatches of a far away conversation brought to me in pieces in the abrupt and now mysterious winds coming up from the valley. I was now well primed for the ghosts from yesterday that haunt these old mine sites.

Following the ridge the old mining track became visible.

 It contoured around and through the next upper chute through large pines and then into the larger ravine with the mine. The trail angled up to a broad bench and the twisted remains of several sheds and cabins. The adit and dump were at the start of the bench and ore cart rails pointed out into empty sky. I trudged along the old road. Suddenly I spied a horse shoe that seemed unusual. Stooping I picked up the small and sturdy rusted shoe. I smiled as I thought of the burro that must have made so many trips along this path losing a shoe on one of them.

Picking my way slowly through the debris strewn about the bench top I stepped into the cabin. The roof had fallen in but still protected the back wall. A table and coffee pot sat on the floor and scattered newsprint that once papered the walls of this room remained on the back wall. 1907 headlines from Philadelphia could be read on the torn remains of the paper that must have kept the winds at bay in this cozy little room. Many mining cabins remain across the west but very rarely are they as remote as this one with some small treasures still intact.

Now the place is still but for the winds with their whispering voices. So much labor went into these little mines. The miners traveled difficult and great distances facing hardship and loneliness that we can scare imagine. This spot is still a hard days climb from Silverton which itself remains remote and time consuming to get too from the outside world. 

Chelsea

Chelsea saved my life. 

It was January in Boulder, Colorado and approaching 20 below zero. We lived in an old barn converted into a house sometime in the '30's or '40's. It was on a large plot of land two blocks in from Canyon Boulevard not far from the east end of the then new Boulder Mall. My roommates were in the trades and we had a lively bunch at the house each morning around 7 am discussing the coming days work and drinking coffee. I was rarely at my best at that hour as I was merely a student at the University and typically got home well after midnight from my geology study group. 

The house was cold. It had no real heat other than a wood burning stove in the middle of the main room. There was a backup gas heater in the same room but as that cost money, we had set it to only come on when the temperature in the house dropped below freezing. I slept in a down sleeping bag covered with wool blankets and wore a beanie and a full set of clothes when going to bed at night. The big battle of the house was to see who would get up first and start the fire. Whoever did this chore was rewarded with the only hot shower of the morning as after that it would be hours before the water in the heater was hot again. I rarely took a morning shower in those days.

While all of this may seem a bit glum, our rent was as cheap as the accommodations. We got to live in downtown Boulder and the three of us split the $150 dollar a month rent. The best part of living there were the summers when the old building somehow remained cool. We also had a deep porch, a large garden and close proximity to all that was going on locally.

The painting crew consisted of three and sometimes four guys. There were also two of us living in the house with the owner of the painting company. One of the painters had a cat named Chelsea. She was a mixed breed but definitely had a Siamese additude. Fred couldn't keep Chelsea at the apartment he was living in so we kept her at our house for the time being. She was great, keeping the abundant mice in check and basically fitting right in with our way of life. She was a tough cat and didn't like to much affection but rather just hung out like one of the guys.

On this particular brutally cold morning, Russ got up first to claim the hot shower. He started a fire and paid particular attention to making a robust one. He went back to bed at first to get the house warmed past the point of being able to see one's breath. I dozed back off after hearing his efforts at the stove. Suddenly I was startled awake as Russ yelled, 

"Jon, I think we have a problem!" 

I heard him go out the front door. A few moments later he came back in and opened my bedroom door and yelled at me again, this time that I should get up immediately. I jumped out of bed and saw Chelsea the cat running about the room, stopping suddenly, looking up at the ceiling and then running about the room again. 

Russ told me that Chelsea had been doing this for some time and he finally went outside to look at the house and that I had better come with him to do the same. We rushed out together and looked up at the smoke pouring out of both ends of the eves.

"What do you think we should do?" Russ asked. "Should we call the fire department?" 

"Yes, lets call them!" was my immediate response. 

The fire department got there in what seemed like just an instant. At this point it was 6 am and they were close and did not have much else to do apparently. 

After a hurried but thorough evaluation of the situation three fire people (one was a women) were up on the roof with a chain-saw with a hugh circular blade attached. They counted to three and cut a three foot diameter hole in the roof into which a hose of water was instantly directed. Amazingly they had the fire out in under 15 minutes. 

Russ had a number of suits in the upstairs bedroom that he threw out the upstairs door in the few minutes prior to the arrival of the fire department. The clothes were partly on the neighbors fence and along the sidewalk in front of the house. I suddenly realized while gazing at this mess that I didn't have shoes on nor anything but gym pants and a t-shirt. I was freezing! At just this moment a pedestrian walked up. There was a fire truck in the middle of the street with lights blazing. There were several hoses stretched across the sidewalk and fire fighters coming and going. I was standing on the sidewalk basically in my underwear. This lady looked at all the clothes strewn about and came up to me and asked, 

"Is this place for rent?"

All I could do was stare at her until I began laughing through chattering teeth until she walked away.

The neighbors came over and got Russ and me indoors where we realized that he had suffered severe smoke inhalation while salvaging his clothes and I was in the early stages of hypothermia.

Chelsea got all the food she wanted, and basically anything else we could think to give her for the remainder of her life for alerting us to the fire that morning. 

The Rancher

        Clouds built over the plains as they always do each day this time of year.  The wind blew soft and hot keeping the nats at bay.  Mud was deep around the building we were working on after the record setting 2 inch rain over the weekend.  The sun burned deep into the skin and I thought of that boy working on that ranch 29 years ago and only 30 miles away. I had thought of the Rancher now that I worked in La Junta again and looked up his name in the phone book.

            I didn’t recognize him at first when I pulled up to the address in Fowler where the phone book said he lived.  There was an old man in a jump suit sitting in a porch swing connected to an oxygen tank who was staring at me as I looked again at the house number.  I got out, strode around the truck and said,

            “Hello, does Ken live here?” 

            “He used to” replied the man who I knew instantly was him. 

            I told him my name at which his face softened and he repeated it softly while gazing steadily at me.  I came closer and asked him what he knew for sure.  He told me he was riddled with cancer and was dying.

            We sat and talked for a long spell.  He told me how his brother had died of West Nile just the year before.  He said it was really strange but it reminded him of something he had seen in the mid 1930’s.  He, his brother and his dad drove a Model T up to the lakes not far from La Junta.  They were looking for some horses.

            Back then, folks just let their horses go as they couldn’t keep them and had no use for them being so poor.  Lots of horses gathered round the lake those years.  They had lost some horses they cared about and they drove to the lake in that Model T looking for them. What was strange, Ken said, was that this particular year, most of the horses were lying on their backs and pawing the air as they died of some ailment.  His voice choked up as he said that his poor brother, out of his mind, lay in his hospital bed, clawing at the air just like those horses so many years ago as West Nile killed him.

           

            Lest I forget the character of the man sitting next to me, a mere shell of the towering terror he was to me as a lad, a truck drove by with the driver resting his arm on the window.  As he went by Ken hollered “Hey!” and the driver jumped causing us to laugh out- loud.  Ken looked at me and exclaimed,

            “Did you see him jump!” and laughed and laughed.  By this I knew I had found the man who laughed till he fell down the time I brought the horses in. 

            I had spent the day rounding them up, mostly mares and foals but also several wild stallions.  I trotted them from their grazing to the ranch area and had them funneled down to the gate into the arena when they whirled and ran at the last minute.  Old Andy, the horse that became my closest friend that year, wheeled with them and I caught the saddle horn as I flew off the horse.  I managed to hold on as we galloped off to the refrains of that hard mans laughter.  It was hours later and getting dark that I brought those horses in once more, this time at a dead run, sweating, and straight through that narrow god damned gate!

           

            We talked till dark, sipping coffee reminiscing about that summer that we had batche’d it together just me and him on that big spread. 

Tepee Rings and Oil Stains

The Powder River Basin is one of America's sacrificial lands for our energy needs. Oil derricks, oil and gas pipelines, industrial roads that seem to go nowhere, and the largest open-pit coal mine in the United States. This vast region occupies an area approximately 120 by 200 miles or 24,000 square miles of open prairie, desert, high mountains, isolated buttes and deep rivers. This was home to the Ab-Sa-Ra-Ka or the Crow Indians and remains remote and unknown to much of America. Camping on Casper Mountain near the North Platte the view north remains crisp of the Big Horn Mountains near Montana hundreds of miles away.

Chugwater Country, Western Powder River Basin

The largest coal deposit in the world is mined here. Oil and gas has been produced from this basin for decades and it has become an important resource for Coal Bed Methane and Natural Gas. A century prior to the energy development this was prime real estate for ranching and became the location of one of the most notorious  industrial American wars of the 1800's. The battle grounds for the Johnson County Cattle Wars are here and the legendary Apache-trained assassin Tom Horn served the shadowy purposed of the cattleman in these hills. One of the great hide-outs for the Hole in the Wall Gang remains difficult to access even today.

Geologist, Powder River Basin

We were here with three vans full of clients, geologists from the oil companies who paid for our services in interpreting the rocks that lay deep within the basin. We developed models to define where oil would be found, often two miles deep below the ground surface. We pulled our vans off of the dirt road and got out to survey the surface geology. As our discussion wanned I wandered off to the head of an escarpment with what looked like a promising view. Suddenly I stopped and gazed in earnest at the ground near the edge of the cliff. Rings of stone were laid upon the ground. The largest was at the apex of the cliff faces and had the most commanding view. This would have been where the chief lived. Smaller rings were laid out in two rows each along the two cliff faces. Rings of stone used to hold down the tepees that once lined this hill. They had been left just as they had been in the seasons before. Left for the returning Crow hunting party that never came again.

Bob the Bowling Bear

We awoke early that morning as was our custom even though we had been up most of the night, stargazing and watching the meteor shower. Our tongues had been loosened by the incredible night sky glowing with brilliant starlight and we told stories far into the night. Early meant dawn and all the struggles that go with sore muscles, lack of sleep and the hard ground. The coffee solved most of that as we plunged into our gear and sorted what we would need in our packs for the day.

Stunner Campground from the Ridge

We were headed up a steep drainage, above Stunner Campground, to where the old mine was marked on the map. As was often the case, the mines were no longer associated with any visible road or trail, at least not from the campground. The terrain was typical of the Eastern San Juans, rugged and unforgiving. The drainage marked a slash in the ground that was visible high above treeline as yellow dirt where the erosion fanned out into the rocky ledges above. We humped on the packs and got going as the sun flickered on the ridges above. It would be hot again, at least for a time during the middle of the day.

Tree falls and rocks kept us busy for a time as we ground our way up the steep climb. No time for words as every breath was needed for the thin air. The water splashed along mossy banks tinted with the red and yellow that told us we were on the right track. The abandoned mine tunnel allowed air and water into the mineralized vein weathering iron and other metals that now precipitated on the streams banks and rocks with the telltale patina. The adit had collapsed but timber frames stuck out at weird angles to mark the place that had once been opened as a tunnel into the rock. Water flowed from the spot, orange and yellow coated the vegetation with brightly colored muck.

We set down our packs and begun our work. GPS instrumentation was setup to more precisely map the mine and we carefully began sampling the water and testing its pH, and conductivity. Water from these types of mines typically had low pH and high conductivity attesting to the ionic metal flowing with it. Intent upon our work I suddenly sensed something and looked up. A rock the size of a bowling ball was hurtling through the air straight for us! I yelled "Rock!" and nothing more was needed. We both knew what that meant at the bottom of this ravine with high cliffs above.

Being the trained professionals that we were we both ran into each other and went flying into the creek. This may have saved us as the rock smashed into several flying pieces, striking the ground where we had just been working. Panting along the side of the stream we looked up at the huge bear standing along the ledge some 60 yards or so above us. He was snuffing the air and moving his head about in that characteristic way that bears do as they try to see what they only to well are smelling. "Damned geologists!" He seemed to say as he turned and disappeared from view.

Later that afternoon, after we cleaned up the mess and finished our work, I hiked up the drainage and over to where he had been. His prints were large and he had been above us for a time it appeared by the many tracks. The stones weren't that many here, nor that close to the edge. It looked to me as though he had been purposefully bowling for geologists and had almost gotten two!