Colorado, Part 1

Colorado is beautiful. Shan and I arrived in Durango at about three o'clock Wednesday afternoon, after a picturesque six hour drive through the mountains. Tuesday we stayed the night in Denver with Shan's friend Rob and his wife Nicole. For dinner we went to a Mexican restaurant where it happened to be mariachi night, which was interesting. It was really nice to be in a bed after sleeping on the floor of Shan's empty apartment and then in the front seat of the truck.  I'm in for some more nights of roughing it, for sure. Tonight we'll sleep on the floor in Jared's tiny room, and then we'll be hiking and camping out for the weekend.

Rob and Nicole's dog, Donald.  

Or, as I would like him to be called, Donnie Barko.

Jared is currently sharing a two bedroom house with five other people he works with in Americorp.  They're rarely ever using the house at the same time since they spend weeks camping and working.  Right now two of the others are here. There's Chase, who is from Texas. He has dreadlocks and a pickup truck.  Megan is from Pennsylvania. She has long blonde hair and bakes bread.  Crazy collaborative paintings by some of the residents adorn the walls, along with odd pages from magazines. It's your basic flop house, with a modge-podge of random stuff lying around, lots of outdoor gear and empty beer cans, all with a very temporary air. I can see why my brother loves it here.

As soon as Jared got done working and we got back to his place Wednesday night, the boys cracked open some beers and we sat on the front porch in the evening sun, while Shan explained to us some of the ideas from a paper he's recently submitted to Nature. Over dinner, Jared talked about the future and what he wants to do with his life.  It's always great spending time with my brothers, talking about life, love, science, books.  I often say that one of the reasons I refuse to give up faith in guys even though they really seem to suck most of the time is because my brothers are really awesome, good people.  At least I know they’re out there.  I'm glad I have a family like that.

Shan explains the Great Non-Conformity

Jared tries to understand what the f* he's talking about

Today we had breakfast at Carver Brewing Company, a restaurant/ brewery in Durango.  Ava, the woman who owns the jewelry store I work at in Lancaster, is from Colorado. When I told her I was going to Durango, she told me I had to make sure to go there and say hi to the Carver brothers for her.  I guess Ava lived in a big house with them way back when.  I got to meet one of them, Jim, and got a picture with him. He’s really nice, and is originally from Wisconsin.

I started reading Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs again.  I think I've started it about three times before, but I've never finished it.  It's funny because as we were driving over here, I kept thinking of the part about how there will never, ever be a time when there is no road construction.  The thing is I could not remember what book that was from or who wrote it, so when I started reading it again last night and got to that part it just seemed right.  I think this time I'll finish it, I was just waiting until the time was right.

On deck for today is floating the Animas river on inner tubes, then bridge jumping after Jared gets off work.  Hopefully I don't die or break anything...yesterday we stopped along the road at a place called Treasure Falls, and while doing some off-trail exploring I managed to bang up my knee pretty well.  Let's hope that will be the full extent of my injuries on this trip.

 Fording the River

Oops.

Totally worth it.