Bartell Field Camp

I just got back from Colorado, where I was fortunate enough to go help out with OU's field camp. Geologists have to take a summer field course in order to graduate, and OU just built themselves an awesome new camp. In fact, we call it "field spa" because it is so nice. Other Universities have crappier camps in the area (sorry unnamed State school), and back in the Pleistocene when I was at field camp we stayed at the Holy Cross Abbey in town. But since then Ulathorn Hall at the abbey has been condemned due to toxic black mold, and OU has a wonderful new place to stay. Hopefully I'll be attending the grand opening next weekend at the field camp, but until then here are some awesome pictures of the camp and surrounding field areas. We also went up to Summit County for the weekend before camp started, and got snowed on...a lot!!

Here are the pictures from field camp, which is in Fremont County, just outside of Canon City, Colorado. One of my favorite places on Earth.

On the first Saturday, we took a trip to Salida to look at some regional geology. Some of these pics are of my favorite mountain range, the Sangre de Cristos, as well as some pics of the Collegiate Peaks (the mountains, that's what I'm talking about!)

Touch-a-Truck

Even though the dude wasn't feeling too well, we had been planning on attending Pioneer Library System's fundraiser called "Touch-a-Truck". I thought it might be kinda lame and have maybe a few emergency vehicles or something. We pulled up to the Cleveland Co. Fairgrounds and it was covered with any truck imaginable!!! It was the coolest event ever. John Milo's favorites were simply a flatbed trailer and a big empty semi that he ran up and down for about half and hour. Can't wait to go back next year!!

The last few months...

Sorry for the delay in posting!! Just some random shots since last January of the family.

Ruidoso, New Mexico and Ski Apache

At Middle Earth's fall festival (that's our daycare...and yes, it's wonderfully nerdy!), the director auctioned off four days at her family cabin in Ruidoso, New Mexico (our daycare is a non-profit org, so they need to raise money). I immediately bid on it, because I thought "I love Ruidoso...it's right there on the border of Colorado and New Mexico, it's beautiful!" and we won! I was so excited! I figured I'd take my parents so they could watch John Milo while we skied, it would be great. Then my Dad said "Uh...you don't even know where you're going". Turns out Ruidoso is down by Alamogordo and white sands....oops! I've been there too a few times, and it is just as beautiful as Raton, which was where I thought we were going. HA! But it was a great trip,and John Milo loved the cabin a lot, he and Nana and Poppy even saw three dear come down the steps in front of the cabin. After that, every time he looked out the window he asked "deer?".
The cabin was located about one block from midtown, which was full of kitschy shops and lots of art. JM loved walking around down town and outside the cabin. Smokey Bear is from Capitan, a town about 30 minutes from Ruidoso, so downtown there were tons of wooden carved bears everywhere. *Every time* we saw one JM would look at us and point and growl. It was hilarious!
And on the way there, we stopped by the Big Texan Steakhouse. John Milo ate an entire nacho tray filled to the top with mac and cheese. Yum!

John and I went skiing at Ski Apache, which was fun, but also unfortunate as they had only received about 28" of snow. Much different than Lisa, who went skiing at Wolf Creek, and I'm pretty sure that they got 28" in one day while she was there. Ski Apache has the only gondola in New Mexico...and it was old and tiny! We knew we were in trouble when at the top it was only a little snow, and mostly rock. You could see White Sands (elev. 4100) from where the gondola drops you off at the peak, which is about 11,400'. They had snow making on one of the runs, and unlike my snow-making experiences in Iowa (mostly ice), this was really fun powder to ski on. Not a lot of terrain was open, but what was was really fun.

Ruidoso was a neat town, and I can't wait to bid on the cabin again next year. We stopped by Roswell (Bill's hometown) on the way home too. Very odd is how I would describe it, but I was also disappointed by the distinct lack of alien memorabilia.