Halloween Shower

If I didn’t know better, I would have thought John booby trapped the shower. When it was my turn, I found two hooks had jumped the rod. He wouldn’t have done that on purpose, would he? More likely he was the jerk, jerking the curtain aside. I climbed up and put them back, gingerly started the shower, and found I set the water too cool. That was in great contrast to the day before when I had it too hot. Maybe the next time I’ll have a Goldilocks shower, not too hot and not too cold.

We rode a train, the Georgetown Loop. I’ll skip the history, because I don’t know it. I do know we bought tickets for the open car and feared we wouldn’t stay warm enough. We piled the car with hats, gloves, light wraps, and heavy coats. It was downright cold and very windy when we stood in line to board. Brrr! To our delight, the “open” car had Plexiglas windows and some heat. Families with young children had blankets in addition to winter coats, and they soon shed most of their layers. Since we were not totally consumed with staying warm, we could look out at the majestic mountains and tumbling stream.

John offered to go by himself to the Colorado Train Museum, but the three of us agreed to go with him. Things were hopping there! It was Halloween, and most of the young children and a surprising number of adults were in costume. We non-trainaholics sat on a bench watching families line up for the ride behind a steam engine while John walked through the outdoor exhibits.

On the way home, Tom drove us through Denver. We saw some gentrified residential areas, the medical center, many interesting buildings, and the airport. The additions to the top of the building resemble mountains, some higher and some shorter. I was pleased to see Pike’s Peak almost all the way home. We weren’t close enough to take pictures, but the mountain was totally free of clouds. As Janet pointed out, the mountain has a very wide base, so you don’t realize how high it is when you see it from a distance. I’m still impressed with the ruggedness and snow cappedness, but I definitely have not lost my love of the Smokies.

Touring Colorado

Let’s get the bad part over first. My hosts and John didn’t know how I embarrassed them. We had a marvelous breakfast of yogurt and a special croissant before setting out on a tour of Janet and Tom’s area. We went to their son Andrew’s grave, a lovely site with a marker, a boulder they selected, and a bench made by Tom’s dad.

Tom, Janet, and John at Andrew's grave — Tom, Janet, and John at Andrew’s grave

We also drove through Castle Rock Canyon, a place Andrew used to visit regularly, and saw a broad view of the prairie where they live.

We ate lunch in Colorado Springs at a place that has the best French onion soup Janet and Tom ever tasted. It was very crowded. All the tables were taken, so Tom waited to stake out a table while the rest of us ordered. My mishap came when I tried to take off my coat to hang it over the back of the chair. The inner drawstring was stuck. I turned away from most of the crowd, fiddled as discretely as I could, and discovered that silly string was stuck in my zipper!!!! How do these things happen to me? It seemed forever as I struggled, wishing I were Houdini. Whew! Free at last! I relaxed the rest of the day after that horror. We went across the street to see the marvelous sculptures done by Michael Garman. We also drove by a display engine and the station for the cog railway that goes up Pike’s Peak.

Driving through the Valley of the Gods was wonderful. These fantastic rock formations could be seen by driving the circular road around them.

We got a peek at Pike’s peak, though it was covered by a cloud. I was thrilled to have seen it, because I had no idea it was on the itinerary. At times it is visible from Janet and Tom’s house.

We ended our tour by walking into the chapel at the Air Force Academy. The building was most impressive.

John, Tom, Janet at Air Force Academy chapel

After general conversation over dinner, we had a musical evening. Tom kept music playing through excellent speakers. We laughed about funny things that happened in college, and I particularly enjoyed Tom’s account of his worst nightmare coming true. A director friend begged him to sing in an opera only days away, and Tom went to two rehearsals. Having only his part, he didn’t know when he was to sing or how it fit with the other singers and orchestra. He got through it, I’m sure because he is such a good musician. The review in the paper gave him high credits and did not mention the other supporting singers.

When I asked for it, Janet sketched out her choral composition for eight voices on the piano. This is her current project. She let me look at two books she has on modern notation. I had no idea new ways of writing music developed after I finished college. She also played a piano composition that has been performed. She can write things that her hands can’t play! My hands wouldn’t be big enough for it, either. We decided all our hands should go to bed and rest up for the next day.

I Was a Jerk

Before we even walked in the house of our friends Janet and Tom, Tom said, “I’ll show you how to work the shower.”

I thought he was teasing me about my issues with showers on this vacation and thought nothing more of it. Meanwhile we had a delicious dinner and went to choir rehearsal. The four of us had sung together in college, and they invited us to sing in their church choir – a marvelous, challenging experience!

When it was time to go to bed, Tom came downstairs with us and said he would demonstrate the shower. Golly Pete! It was the same type of faucet/shower head arrangement as the one in Phoenix. Tom took no chances with me and actually ran water, showing me how to pull down a bit of the faucet to make the water come out above. OK. I could do this.

The next morning I did as John AND Tom advised, got the water temperature to the right level and transferred it to the shower head. Don’t ask me how I do these things to get myself in trouble. I thought I gently pulled the curtain closed. No, I was a jerk. I must have jerked it, because four of the hooks jumped off the rod and entwined around each other. I was grunting, in John’s hearing, I’m sure. Those hooks behaved like fishhooks and refused to let go. They had dug in for a tough fight. I took a deep breath, slowed down, and squinted to see what I was doing without my glasses. Finally! Everything was on track, and I could get clean. Shower senility is not easy to deal with!

Marshall Pass

I heard John speak about Marshall Pass for 50 years, and we actually drove through it! In 1880 a toll road was put there to cross the Rockies. Subsequently, a narrow gauge railroad was built on it. Of course, that’s why John talked about it. In 1948 (when I was six years old) there were 48 people living there, and it had the smallest post office in the US. The rails were pulled up in 1955.

It was 19 degrees when we left Gunnison, and John wasn’t at all sure we would make it all the way over the mountain. He set a rule for himself, that he would turn around if the driving seemed dangerous. I took one photo from the car to show the mountains near Gunnison. I hesitate to say anything critical, but some of the Colorado mountains were ugly. These were brownish and bare, as if big boulders were pushed up and scraped off. Somebody forgot the thin layer of earth and hardy grass.

102815 (1) Some CO mtns are ugly — Naked mountains

We turned off the highway and soon came to a sign pointing to the Pass. An animal was beside the road — a porcupine. I jumped out of the car and took a series of pictures as the porcupine climbed upwards. We talked about how some of the needles on his back matched the surrounding grass. I kept one shot. I knew that animal was in the picture, but I could not find him on the screen, no matter which way I looked. Evidently we could see him only because he was moving.

Before long we came to real snow on the road. There were tire tracks, so someone had been there before us. John felt he had to say we should turn around, but I knew how much he longed to see that historic sight up on the mountain. It was a joint decision to continue.

We made it! John agreed to pose with the sign, and I was thrilled for one other reason. It was the continental divide. Rain falling on one side would go to the Pacific Ocean and on the other side to the Mississippi River. The sign says the Atlantic Ocean, but I think that is a stretch. It would go into the Gulf of Mexico, which I don’t really think of as the Atlantic Ocean. A child might color it that way, but I wouldn’t. We often see posts in our NC mountains about the continental divide, that being the point where water would flow to the Atlantic or the Mississippi River.

As we went down the other side of the mountain, we saw the majestic, snow-capped mountains that one expects in the Rockies. An added bonus was a lake, high in the mountains, with a tiny little boat and a tiny little man in it. Actually, I couldn’t see the person, but the boat was moving.

We came to another place where there was snow on the road, this time with no other tire tracks. Going back was unthinkable at that point. Soon we reached other graveled roads and a highway. We had lunch beside the Arkansas River where we could see men in kayaks practicing going through gates. We were in Salida, a former railroad town. I took a photo of an interesting bench made of metal, a log, and boulders. We also liked an old radiator made into a bicycle rack.

Our stop for the night was Buena Vista. John made sure I was able to use the computer before he set out to explore a small road that matched one on the other side of the mountain. I don’t think they ever broke through there. From our motel window, we could see snow on the mountains in the distance. There were two framed pictures over our beds, about five feet square, of mountain scenes. By day or by night, we were guaranteed to see mountains.

Shower Saga Continues

After John read about my problems with the motel shower, he said he wanted to be there the next time to hear me yelp. He followed that with a brilliant suggestion – get the water to suit you before you step in. Well, duh! I never thought of that. Up till now, I’ve always been able to command the shower to do what I wanted. What power I had back when I was young!

Not wanting to get my head wet, I took John’s advice. All was going well, or so I thought. I flicked back the curtain, stepped in, and turned to close it. With disbelief, I looked at what I had done. You know the two magnets that are often at the lower ends? They had hooked themselves together, leaving great triangles of open space at both ends of the tub. I could imagine water going everywhere, wetting the towels and my clean clothes. Aaauuugggghhhh!

I am now officially shower senile. Good news for you, though. I’m not showing any photos.

Feeling at Home While Traveling

There was a gorgeous full moon hanging in the sky just above the mountains as we headed for Gunnison. Of course, the photo does not do it justice. It looked so big that you felt you could almost reach out and touch the huge orb.

We were a little late checking into the motel, according to John’s timetable. It didn’t matter at all. We took a side trip to drive through Telluride. Over the years we’d heard so much about it that we longed to see it. I was amazed that so many of the houses were squeezed up – narrow homes of two and three stories jammed onto tiny lots. It’s a good thing there was plenty of mountain air, otherwise people would have been gasping for breath.

Our motel room was just inside the back door and across a hallway from the lobby. Surprisingly, it wasn’t noisy. Perhaps we were the last guests to check in. My thoughts were, it will take about 10 steps to get to breakfast. Be sure to put on outdoor clothes, because this isn’t your own home.

Before I opened my eyes the next morning, I was transported way beyond North Carolina, back to my childhood home. There was that very familiar smell of burned toast. I’ve talked about it enough that most people know my mother burned the toast on a routine basis. There I lay in a motel bed, thinking it was time to get up to go to school. But, wait! There was no scritch, scritching of Mom’s scraping the burned edges off the toast. This was a motel room, and I wouldn’t have to eat the morning burnt offering.

I did not feel at home with the shower. At our age we are constantly on the alert for signs of irreversible aging. I’m beginning to think the first thing to go for me is the ability to deal with strange showers. The normal things were there – tub, faucet with a lever, and circular hardware for turning on the water and adjusting the temperature. There were no instructions. The silly thing had no color cues, either, so you didn’t know which way meant you’d scald yourself. I think the water pressure was regulated by pulling the lever, and the temperature was controlled by twisting. When things seemed right to my feet, I transferred the water to the shower head. I didn’t know I could jump and scream at the same time, but ice cold water shot out with great force. I wonder if the military has ever considered ice warfare. Soldiers could be immobilized by instant freezing wetness.

While we’re on the subject of not feeling at home in a motel, I want to know who decided you need 5 to 6 pillows on a bed? It’s the in(n) thing now. OK, I can understand one under your head and one to hug, but 6 pillows for two people????

I did feel at home after breakfast when we opened the curtains. Light snow was falling, so I read the newspaper while John looked at email. We stayed at Gunnison two nights, one day being set aside for John to ferret out train history here while I caught up on email and blogging. This began to feel like a vacation instead of a fast paced tour. And maybe, just maybe, a nap in the afternoon!!!!! That would be the most homelike thing I could do away from home.

Tucson

John’s high school classmate Ron and wife Kathy had fun things planned for our visit. They drove us about Tucson for a little while before going to Pinnacle Peak restaurant. There are a group of stores and restaurants with a Western theme clustered about a small train. We ate dinner at a fun place where the rafters were full of men’s ties. Years ago they declared it an informal eatery, and any tie being worn would be cut off. There are shops that sell ties for 3 or 4 dollars, so you can buy a cheap tie and wear it there. We were in luck. There was a big announcement that two people were wearing ties. Wait staff clapped, brought out the scissors, cut the ties, and called for general applause. One boy was wearing a tee shirt and a haphazardly knotted tie. You should have seen the grin on his face as they hacked his tie.

After dinner we rode the little train and poked about a few shops before going home to continue talking.

Ron picked out a marvelous church for us to go to. It was a Presbyterian church that was nearby. They were celebrating the reformed heritage on Reformation Sunday. There was an excellent bagpipe band that piped the choir and ministers into the church in a formal procession. Many people in the congregation were wearing tartans in one form or another — a hat, a stole, a skirt.

We sang A Mighty Fortress, and the first rate organist played several chorale preludes based on that famous Reformation hymn. Ron couldn’t have known that I grew up in a Presbyterian church or that my family came from Scotland in the 1600’s. John and I were pleased with the Lutheran bits, knowing some of the churches we often go to might not celebrate the day as enthusiastically as this group did. We learned that Kathy also went to a Presbyterian church when she was young.

After brunch at a marvelously preserved hotel, we reluctantly said goodbye to Kathy and Ron and headed toward Colorado again.

Ron, Kathy, John, and Anne at lovely old hotel

Phoenix

Driving from Williams to Phoenix, we topped a hill and found ourselves in the desert. I’m classifying desert as the sudden appearance of cactus plants. The first ones we saw were low growing, but soon the huge saguaro (g is pronounced like w) cacti were standing proudly, arms pointing to the sky. The toy camera couldn’t resist taking a photo of a bathroom sign at a gas station.

Actually Phoenix was the starting point when John was planning our trip. We had been invited to a 50th anniversary party for our friends Karen and Jim. The party was subsequently canceled because they will celebrate when their children come for Christmas. Meanwhile, John had mapped our whole trip with this as the focal point. It was wonderful to see our old friends again. We arrived in the afternoon and went to their church Halloween event. Jim had constructed five games, and Karen did the lettering. When the church found the price of renting games, Jim offered to make some. He is very talented and makes good use of his woodworking shop. It saved the church a ton of money, and they can use the games again. Jim agreed to pose with some of his games. The quality of the shots is poor, but you get the idea.

After we walked through the church grounds, we went out for dinner for an informal celebration of their anniversary. I had a great shot of a photo taken from their wedding album, and I accidentally erased it. I’m still kicking myself for that. If I hadn’t been so clumsy, you’d be able to see what they looked like 50 years ago.

Karen and Jim are very gifted at working with their hands. John drooled at Jim’s complete woodworking shop, and I admired Karen’s craft room. Pictured are two Halloween mugs Karen decorated and a cutting board Jim made from scraps. Their house is fully decorated for the spooky holiday.

I asked about a lush tree in the yard, and Karen pulled off a bowlful of limes for us to take with us. There is a bit of grass there for their dog, but otherwise the plants are desert natives. Thinking of outdoors, Jim said they get fantastic lightning shows because there is a lot of metal in the mountains behind their house. That might explain why there was so much activity at Mesa Verde the day we were there.

They let me out of the car to photograph desert plants while on our tour of the neighborhood. I snapped several shots and felt a prickle when I moved to another spot. Carefully I tried to pull off a ball of thorns and stabbed myself. I finished the photos, pried off the painful ball with a stick, and went to the car to show them. Everyone laughed, saying they had watched my drama unfold. Karen said it was a jumping cactus. Appropriate name!

Gadgets and gizmos were a hallmark of their house. Most were not interactive for guests except the shower. I never cracked that code. John came out of the bathroom and asked if I knew how to work the shower. I looked at it and saw no lever to make the water come through the shower head rather than the faucet. We were laughing at ourselves, but there was no recourse but for John to don clothes and go ask Jim how to work it. Jim said it was done with the faucet. Back in our bathroom, we made another attempt. He and I twisted it a little, but that had no effect. Luckily he was still dressed. He went out again, and Jim took John to another bathroom to demonstrate it.

“What is the trick?” I wanted to know.

John answered, “You don’t turn the faucet; you pull it down.” He finished his shower, dressed, went out, and promptly disappeared.

Thinking I knew what to do, I stepped into the tub and started the water. Obviously, I was naked as a jay bird. I pushed the faucet. Nothing happened. Maybe John said to pull it up. No, that wasn’t it. Wiggling it did nothing. Was it waiting for a rain dance? My feet were wet, and I refused to dry off, dress, and get help. I never thought I’d stoop so low, but I washed using the water flowing near my knees. It’s lucky I hadn’t planned to wash my hair! If I could have made a funny story of it, I would have told the others. I was halfway to an embarrassing confession, anyway, with my face beet red from being sunburned at the Grand Canyon. As it is, they’ll have to read it here.

I followed voices and found Jim and John chatting while the dog exercised on the treadmill. Jim explained that when he began to use the equipment, the dog let him know he wanted to try it. Toby tried to get on, but there was not enough space for man and dog together. Now Toby waits until Jim gets off, and he takes a turn. He goes at 4 miles an hour. Jim has to stand right there with him because the machine will throw the dog off if he stops running. That day Toby wanted on again when Jim thought he’d had enough. He wondered if it were a bid for attention. It may have been, but it was good exercise for the dog.

The Grand Canyon

The canyon was magnificent. We spent most of the day there, walking along the rim. Cool breezes were counterbalanced by the warm sun. We saw some people wearing shorts and others sporting ski outfits, complete with knitted hats. I was awed by the scenery. There is nothing like seeing it with your own eyes. The thing I wasn’t prepared for was hearing many different languages spoken. It was like being in Kennedy Airport! I couldn’t understand half the things I heard. Isn’t it marvelous that people come from all over the world to see something so special?

Several promontories had paved walkways with sturdy rails so that you could feel safe leaning out to get a good photo. I was surprised and pleased at the lack of fences. The walkways were lined with small boulders which you could easily step over. People did go out to places where I would not have felt comfortable, but they were free to do so. I feel that if bureaucrats and activists from New York were in charge, no one would be able to visit the park at all. They have already outlawed the selling of large sodas in Manhattan. I enjoyed the freedom we felt at the park.

John had done his homework. He planned for us to eat in a historic hotel that had been there since the train began the run. The lobby and restaurant looked as they did in old photographs. We could see the canyon from our table. The food was delicious, beautifully served, and cost no more than something comparable in New York.

After eating, we resumed our walk along the rim, going back about halfway before catching a free bus to our starting point. There was a partial rainbow in the canyon that intensified as we walked. I’m sure one of those photos will be our favorite for the whole day.

Four Corners

We packed the car and stopped at a pharmacy for a few items before leaving Durango. John said he couldn’t have planned it if he tried, but the train was just leaving the station. We hopped across the tracks where I took six shots of the engine. John agreed that I could delete one.

The most amusing road sign out of Durango was one for elk crossing. I missed it the day before, and when we passed it going fast, John offered to make a U-turn so I could take a photo. Wasn’t that kind? I said I could live without it, but I’m very happy to have it.

We stopped at Four Corners where we could have our feet in four states at once – Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona. I call that last state Arid Zone, because my lips and hands felt as dry as could be. I took a picture of my feet in Utah, because niece Chrissie was in that state for a meeting.

Williams AZ was our stopping point. Does anyone recognize Williams as a center for trains? I didn’t. I thought we were going to the Grand Canyon. We were, but John needed an evening of train watching. This suited me fine, since I would have time to write while he was out.