Cider Mash 5k

About a month ago Dave learned of a 5k that was happening at the local apple orchard. Gary had been looking for a race and Dave jumped on board. They were joined by Marc and Dave began training. He picked out some new kicks at the running store which is no small feat as to find high performance trainers for his small feet.

Dave found the best Coach and motivator in Mayhem. The three year old golden spins circles whenever Dave touches his running shoes and the light up collar with the green light that keeps the pair safe on their nocturnal training runs. They started slowly and ran a few times that first week and built up stamina.

This wasn't your standard 5k road race... this Cider Mash was a cross country tour of the orchard including some deccent hills and terrain. Thankfully there were no apples for ankle rolling. The three started out together along with 300 of their closest friends as they ran along the road and turned into the apple trees.

There were no dogs allowed at the race so Coach stayed home with Chaos eating treats and napping anxiously awaiting to hear how Dave's run went.

Dave and Marc stuck together and Gary wasn't far behind as the runners came back into view.

Ok... so they weren't in the font of the pack but that's not the point. Dave didn't get into this to bring home medals or anything. It's more about finding an outlet for Mayhem's energy and a great way to stay in shape for when he's able to get back on the rock again.

Colby kept watch for his Dad's orange hat bobing through the trees as he hung out with his Dzia Dzia, plus he sported his 'loaf hat that he earned from his first turns at Sugarloaf last winter.

 As a post race bonus there were gluten filled apple cider donuts...

but mostly Dave was just happy to have a good day in the chilly sunshine with his brother and Gary.

East Coast Travels with the Turtle

We hit New England just in time for the biggest heat wave of the summer. Of course with us travel is always entertaining and since we had booked tickets a month out and not 24 hours out it was destined to change at least once.

From July 11 East Coast

Two days before our trip our 6am flight was canceled which shifted our wonderful 3pm arrival time into Boston back to 6pm. A bummer and it put us into rush hour traffic but we could deal with that... but then our new flight was delayed... then canceled. We were sent back out through security of the small Montrose Airport to the desk. I left Dave with our bags and hobbeled back towards the desk.  I was gimpy from an ankle injury I ended up towards the end of the line. Like my fellow passengers, I jumped on the phone with United Airlines customer service in India...and was given new flights that had us leaving Montrose at 8pm and getting to Boston 3 flights later at 8am on Friday morning. I called Dave back out through security and when we got to the desk agent (40 minutes later) she managed to get us on the noontime flight and into Boston at midnight.
We killed some time in Denver and the turtle enjoyed a Fat Tire before getting started on Moyer's Red Sweater.

From July 11 East Coast

Turns out the turtle is quite the knitter and started the project while in DIA.

From July 11 East Coast

And while on the plane he made good progress...

From July 11 East Coast

But took a break when it was time to get the bag after the late arrival into Boston.

From July 11 East Coast

mountainfilm in telluride

this is the first mountainfilm that we've been able to share with a visitor and Sara dived into it head first. The festival still has another day to go but so far we've seen 26 flicks (anywhere from 4 to 80 minutes long each) on topics ranging from the climbing photography of Jimmy Chin to truck farms (seriously, only a guy from MA would think of a farm in the back of his dodge ram in Brooklyn)

We enjoyed some time down by the river between movies on the first nice weekend we've had all year.

And headed to town park for some movies under the stars with friends after the sun set with a few light sprinkles.

Camping at the Grand Canyon

It's been a long winter without as much snow as we'd like to see so by the time the last chair fell silent we were ready to get out of town. Dave took a week and hit the east coast to spend some time with his dad while I stayed home to work and pack for the next adventure. I happen to be a very OCD packer and made a very comprehensive list to ensure our comfort for our adventure. We also packed a ton of food as my research didn't yield much for gluten free friendly dining at the park.

We loaded the 4Runner full of dogs, gear, flip flops and food and headed southwest towards Grand Canyon National Park. We had four nights booked at Mather Campground at site #308 in the Pine Loop. I'd been keeping an eye on the weather and the forecast said we were headed into warm weather.... but the first few nights were below 30. This would have been fine but our sleeping pads deflated and offered no cushion and more importantly insulation from the cool ground. We had three sleeping bags for the humans so we bundled up and dealt while the dogs had a shared bed and a few blankets. They have doggie softshells and wore those each night as the sun and temperatures dipped. Mayhem did crawl into a sleeping bag with me one night while Chaos's thicker coat served him well.

Grand Canyon is one of the more dog friendly of the National Parks and the dogs were allowed on the paved Rim trail for some great walks each day. They joined us for a sunset at Mather Point and enjoyed attention tourists across the world. Mayhem had played rough and cut a paw so he wore his Ruffwear shoes to prevent further injury to his pads. He had a lot of folks laughing at him but overall enjoyed the attention. After sunset the parking lot cleared out and we took the opportunity to play ball with the pups. We found a new light up ball which rocked Mayhem's world and allowed him to get some serious energy out at night. It made some great photos in the dark parking lot with the dog's glowing collars and the disco light ball.

We had a ton of photos from the little s6000 and from the D100 and each worked our skills a bit. We narrowed it down to the highlights from sunrise to sunset and a bit of Chaos and Mayhem.

Turtle takes a walk

How about now...any guesses on where the turtle is now?

Where is turtle going?

Go turtle!

The turtle says goodbye to the Wilson Range and Telluride for a few days as he meanders towards the big ditch...

Snug as a bug

These two are recovering from bath time on a chilly spring night... at least they smell beautiful.

An Ipswich ale

Turtle is trying to enjoy the trip and taking a break for a brew.

My little travel buddy...

Go turtle! The first of 3 flights today, good times in the land of stale air and grumpy travelers as we wait.

Travels

We're not spur of the moment kind of travelers but can be if needed. Trip booked less then 24 hours ago and almost ready to board the first leg of our flight to Boston. Dogs are with friends and away messages have been set. Thankfully we had tome to stop for some glutaded snacks despite all the chaos as it's a long day of traveling.

campchaos welcomes a little mayhem

It's offical... campchaos is now also home to a little mayhem. We picked Mayhem up yesterday and he is settling in well to life at campchaos. Mayhem is almost a year old and a pure golden. We weren't able to see photos before we picked him up and were pleasantly surprised that he looks similar to Chaos. We've been talking about getting a second dog and this was set into motion around Christmas when we asked our landlord. She knows Chaos well and consented. Last week she called and asked if we were interested in an older puppy. She had a friend who's daughter had a golden that needed a new home. It was a big week and we decided to have Mayhem join campchaos. We kept it quiet in case it fell though... what if they backed out? what it the puppy was a monster? 
So Friday morning we were up and on the road before the sun to go pick up our new pup. We did drive through a storm because it was the first time we've ventured past Montrose all winter and that's the way the world works. Since we drive the car so infrequently we also learned at the top of Monarch Pass that it was time to invest in some new windshield wipers for the 4Runner. Thankfully there are a number of places to pull over a clean the windshield.

Chaos has the entire back of the 4Runner to spread out in on the way there and ended up curling up on top of our bags. The normally six hour drive to Colorado Springs turned into an 8 hour drive and we all felt a little cooped up by the time we arrived in the Springs. (Go Turtle!)

We picked up Mayhem and went over to the nearby Garden of the Gods Park to walk the boys together. The weather was moving in and we grabbed a quick gluten-free dinner at PF Changs before the long drive home. They just added a few more items to their gluten-free menu and it was great to be able to try them out.

21 hours after we left, we returned home with our new monster.

This morning I took the boys out for a walk and Mayhem had his first gondola ride. He slipped his collar and was afraid to get on but Chaos climbed in like a seasoned pro and I scooped up Mayhem and added him to the cabin. He rode it fine after that and I tightened his collar for the exit.

We had a good walk and the boys romped in the fresh snow.

Chaos has a lot to teach his new little brother... Mu-nee Kitty checked out his crate last night and has not made an appearance yet today to make comment on this new addition.

heading west again...

after plum island (it's in Mass... google it) Chaos and I headed to NH to meet Conor and catch up with JJB then to CT to see Carol. We caught up on some work and worked in a hike as well. Gertie, our trusty GPS, sent us down to South Carolina through NJ/NY instead of PA and we listened... while it made for some fun city driving it was a long day in slower traffic.
chaos has been enjoying the warm weather...although the high of the trip was 95 degrees in new hampshire... he had kendra direct him to every park and water fountain available and took a day off in AC comfort while we visited with family in North Carolina.
Today Kendra took us outside the city and to Rainbow Falls. Chaos loved the hike except for the part where he had to go down a pretty good sized obstacle. tomorrow it's back in the car where we hope to make it to a new time zone by the evening...

a little drive....

so for off season i thought i would use up some vacation time and go for a little drive. We left Telluride two weeks ago and ended up back in maine. Dave came along for the first part of the trip and we went bouldering on our drive in Kansas, stopped in MA to see his parents and visit Fenway then hit Sugarloaf for some Reggae and time with good friends at sno dundah. Dave flew home then i hit the road with chaos to visit family in northern maine then will head to south carolina in a few days before making the drive west again.



Here's a little video of Elvis and Chaos playing this morning at a park in the county (super northern maine). My brother has a pretty sweet computer hookup and last night I played Elvis some videos of her cousins in Asia.

winter days... on the disabled list

Chaos has been loving his new toys! I am also happy to report that the turtle has lasted over a week. I knew the Planet Dog collection would since they are the most durable, fun toys ever. The turtle is from the egg babies collection and has small eggs that go inside and Chaos is suppose to pull out. The eggs all squeak and chaos has always loved pulling the squeakers out of toys so I thought he may like this. He is only allowed to play with it while we are home and has done really well with it.

We went for a moonlight snowshow with Steve and Jess for the full moon. We had Budo and Mako with the group... chaos stayed behind with Jared since he is not able to walk 500 yards let alone a few miles. He is healing... we graduated to the front half of the cast but it got wet and began to rub. I called Dr Taylor and she told us to take it off but then he had to take it easy. No more friends for him until things are more stable. Budo is gentle but also loves to wrestle... then he'll kiss Chaos until we make him stop. Chaos isn't using his foot much but that should improve soon. He has a few sore spots and his foot is getting used to not being constricted.

I worked 7 days straight over vacation week with some long days. At the end of the week we found a great diversion on the way to pick up Chinese take out... we brought Mu-nee kitty along for the 15 minute ride to town. Silly but her spaziness was full of entertainment! I think she was nervous on the way there since we told her we were going to trade her in for an entree.

We also hit the climbing wall with Jess and Jared. It was fun to be able to show Jess the ropes- literally. Jared had done it before but it was Jess's first time. She was able to make it pretty far up and also became a champion belayer. This is important since I do fall and she handled it like a pro... even while the wall guy was talking to her.

somebody call singer...

Because these guys ripped it up in Telluride!

Good times in Telluride~ Sara and Colleen made the trip out this winter and we had a great visit... they skied hard, hit all the telluride hotspots and had no turtle travels! Whoo-hoo!

the return of the travel dog...

Our travel dog has returned! We made the big venture cross country in 40 hours and 4 minutes. The trip this time was a little harder as we weren't well rested and started the long journey out tired. We quickly fell into a pattern of sleeping and driving and Chaos became really good at the sleeping. We'd stop along the way and take walks on dirt roads in Iowa with the monster.
We faced a few traffic snafus- two hours of total stopped traffic in Iowa and a long creeping delay near Chicago. Go Turtle!
Chaos seemed very happy to be the travel dog again. He did a great job staying hydrated and eating his snacks along the wasy. He was pretty excited to pull into his grandparents house on Sunday afternoon and find his friends waiting for him.

Go Turtle....

So every time I drive anywhere in Colorado-other then our shopping trips to M-town- it snows. Yesterday rang true to that. I always told my parents it was a good thing I drove in every storm the first year I had my licence and this is what it was preparing me for. I did have a good drive despite the sketchy start. It was fun and I got to stop and get a great smoothie from the coffee shop in Gunni and drive by the house on Georgia Ave that I lived in for my junior year. I even got a shot of this crazy phenomenon.... the one arch McDonald's.

Yep- that's no joke. I even saw another today in Denver but had to work on my city driving skills and not take photos while shifting the truck.

In a somewhat related item the truck has mascots from our trip last spring. Here's our McD's turtle navigating for me... in my defence of my ramblings and silly pics I'd like to let you all know that Denver happens to be a bit of a drive. It would be like driving from Sugarloaf to Boston and halfway back all at once. But this is the fun of living out west in wide open spaces.

The turtle does have a bit more history as well... this winter when our dear friends from Sugarloaf came to visit Mother Nature presented them with weather challenges the whole time... snow before they left Maine, delays, lost luggage and other challenges. Chaos & I ended up driving to DIA to ensure that they would make it to see us. Of course it snowed and I drove across the state to find roads closed so I took a more roundabout way to get to Denver. Once I hit the interstate I thought I'd have smooth sailing... turns out that I went 5 miles in one hour! Our friends (who had been through a lot already) were hanging out in DIA trying to entertain themselves. Sara looked over at Farva and asked what could be delaying me. Farva explained to her that I was getting ready for a big turtle race and ensuring the rests stops were all in order for the turtles. (if you don't think this is funny then you need to get delayed in an airport or have a 6-7 hour drive take 8-9 hours!)

I'm here until Friday then I head over to Summit County and meet up with my puppy monster and Dave. Then Sunday it will be time to hop in the truck for another drive across the state. Who wants to bet it snows?