March 13, 2005:
Today's a decompress day - after a heck of a day yesterday...but
let's back up a few days first.
We left home on Thursday (March 10) We'd returned home to SD to
get Gus' leg operated on and get some things done around the house and
then planned to return to Colorado to
do a bit more skiing and exploring. Gus' surgery went well
and at the 2-week mark he had the stiches removed and traveling was
easier.
While at home we quickly got entrenched in several projects
around the house and hanging out with Tom, Lee and Kate. Major
work was done on the deck and the office as well
as some landscaping too. We also got our taxes done and made some
arrangements for future parts of the trip
(visas for China and insurance for Mexico) The last few days were
a flurry of activity - which for
some reason seems to be the norm and we didn't take time to visit many
folks during our stay in SD.
After 4 weeks at home, I was itching to be back on the road and
it was great to be back out there and traveling again. First
night's stop was Winslow, AZ.
We didn't stand on any corners, but we had some pretty good mexican
food and just celebrated moving again.
The next day found us heading toward Montrose, stopping on the
way at
Orvis Hot Springs in Ridgeway. Orvis Hot Springs has
several pools of varying temperatures and a sauna
in a nice outdoor setting. There are views of mountains in the
distanceand the only thing that detracts
from it are the powerlines that criss-cross your view. There is
one pool that is inside a building which is
not clothing-optional, but all the pools that are outside are.
There is one pool that is a "smoker's pool" and the
other pools are non-smoking. We debated a bit as to if we
should go clothed or optional - and decided that since
it was still light outside, most folks would be clothed. So we
headed out in our suits and after taking a
quick look around decided that our theory was
completly wrong and so when in Rome... Actually, it was much more
comfortable to be out of our suits than in. We could have had some of
the smaller pools to ourselves - but we
liked the large pool (with a gravel bottom) the best (it seemed the
most natural) so we soaked there.
After our soak, we headed the rest of the way into Montrose -
only about 1/2 hour drive - and set up camp in the Walmart parking
lot. Montrose is like Gunnison although it
seemed a bit bigger. They are both farming/ranching towns
with some really pretty mountains around
them. The next morning we drove to Gunnison and then to
Crested Butte ski area from there.
We had a pretty good day of skiing. The snow was a bit
hard in the morning, but softenedin the afternoon. We both
wondered how a month off from skiing would affect our skill,
but it seemed to have had no effect. We felt good and skied some
new runs (for me) and saw more of the
mountain than before. We thought it might be crowded since it was
a Saturday, but it was pretty nice.
We decided to quit around 3:30, and headed for the bottom. Bill
wanted to ski through some ungroomed stuff
and so we said we'd meet at the bottom.
I got to the bottom and could see Bill skiing on the hill
above me. Something didn't seem right, but I couldn't tell
what, and skied down to where we would walk out and started
taking off my skis. Every so often I'd look up and see how he was
doing. I saw that he'd stopped and was
taking off his skis, so then I thought he'd broken a binding or
something. I kept watching as he put his skis
in the snow in an "X" and started to walk down. Now I thought
that something was wrong for sure and saw
that he had one arm at his side and the other held up somehow.
Now I thought he must have hurt his arm, and I
quickly picked up my skis, dumped them in the first logical place I
found and headed up the slope toward
him. As I approached him, I noticed that his face looked pinkish
and then saw that his hand was covering half of his face
and he was bleeding alot! At this point I must have looked like I
was freaking out (which I probably was)
because he said "Diane, don't freak out! Where's the medical building?"
There was a ski tuning place called
something like the Ski Doctor that had a big red cross painted on the
building and he headed toward that, but I saw
another sign and we got headed toward the right place.
Funny thing, no one stopped to ask if we
needed help. I'm sure we were a sight, because Bill's face,
jacket and bib's were covered in blood. Maybe it
didn't show up very well since his ski clothes are all dark blue and
black.
We found the medical building and went in and said "We need some
help." and were immediately ushered to the back and they started
treating Bill while I got him checked
in. They were very nice and asked if I wanted to go back to be
with him, wash my hands etc. One of the ski patrol
guys even went back up the hill and picked up his skis and poles for
us. The main doc on duty (who happens
to be the president of "Doctors without Borders" ) stitched him up and
got the bleeding stopped and then got on
the phone looking for a plastic surgeon that could do the job
better. After calling several places, he
found a surgeon in Denver at a hospital not too far from Karen's place
and we headed off to Denver.
I had never driven our big truck with the camper on it and Bill
and I had discussed that I should do that someday - so I'd be used to
it. I knew that I was just going to
have to learn on the job and there was no question in my mind that I'd
be driving us to Denver. At least
the weather was clear - so that was one less thing I'd have to worry
about. So I packed up the truck, took
down the camper, walked the dog, stuffed some bread and cheese in my
mouth and we hit the road. It was dark,
the roads were winding, there were deer by the side of the road, and
the truck felt like a big boat - but it
wasn't too bad and we made our way to Denver. It got pretty scary
going up and over Monarch Pass because I knew there
was a big drop off on the side, but I tried to just ignore that.
We had to pull over every hour or so
to change the dressing on Bill's face. As we got closer to
Denver, it started to snow and it was snowing pretty good by
the time we reached the outskirts of town. Thankfully, it was
pretty wet snow and it wasn't building
up on the road.
We arrived at the hospital at midnight, about 5 hours after we
left Crested Butte. It didn't take long for them to get Bill
inside and have the on-call plastic surgeon come in.
(They had been contacted in advance and should have been expecting us -
but I think only the plastic surgeon
knew we were coming.) Dr. Stacy Folk showed up and proceeded to
irrigate/clean/poke and then sew up Bill's
face. It was very strange to see Bill with part of his face
hanging off to one side. Interesting and
kinda gruesome at the same time. I thought I'd be squeamish, but
it wasn't too bad. However, there were some
parts of the procedure that I decided to just not watch - like when she
was shooting the pain killer into his face
and had the needle (about 4 inches long) pushed completely into the
skin. Dr. Folk did a great job
stitching him up - very painstakingly putting in two layers of
stitches, one set inside, which will dissolve and a second
set on the surface to close up the wound. It's hard to describe
how much better he looks all stitched up. I
think unless you saw him un-stitched, it would be hard to
imagine. I think he looks great now.
We got out of the hospital and to Karen's place at around 3 am
and were in bed by 3:30. I have a greater respect for Bill after
watching him go through everything that he
did. He was complemented by all the medical personnel for being
such a good patient and he was very good in the car
all the way to Denver - even though I know he wasn't very comfortable
and was probably scared that I was
going to drive us off the road at times. We may snip at each
other at times, but when the going gets really
tough, we're good together. I feel closer to him after
this. (Although I'd rather find a less dramatic way
to feel closer. )
March 16th, 2005:
We spent the last couple of days driving around the Front Range
area. On Tuesday we went up to Fort Collins and looked around
that area. While there we took a tour at the
New Belgium Brewery (One of their most well-known beers is called Fat
Tire). We thought it would be
kinda neat to see a brewery, but this tour turned out to be really
interesting - not because of the beer, but because of
the company and the brewery they have built. The culture of the
company is very employee oriented and
enviromentally concious. The employees seem to have a great time
working there - our tour guide (who looked
more like Dave West's brother than his own brother) was gushing about
how fun it was to work there. Each
employee gets to take home 1 case of beer/week, gets a custom
bicycle on their year anniversary and is taken
on a trip to Belguim to visit breweries there after they've been there
for 5 years. They have lots
of training and team building exercises also. The really
impressive part of this company to me was the actual brewery and
how they have built it with the enviroment in mind.
The brewery is run on wind generated electricity (which the employees
voted to give up their profit sharing for 3 years in order to make
happen).
The mash (grain left over from the brewing process) is sold to local
farmers to feed their animals.
Part of the brewing process requires heating up water and another
requires cooling down the beer so they have a heat-exchanger that
transfers heat from one part of the process to
another - saving energy to heat or cool water.
Rather than put the waste water from the brewing process into the local
water treatment plant, they have built a water treatment area ajacent
to the brewery where they treat their
own water and then use it for many uses around the plant, cleaning etc.
. They don't use it for brewing -
yet- but plan to install a reverse-osmosis filtration system so they
can someday.
They capture the methane produced from one part of the process, (I want
to say the water treatment, but I don't know if I remember that
correctly) to generate power and use that
power to run the plant for 5-6 hours every day - in a the peak usage
time so they take load off the grid.
The brewery itself is a great looking building and evidently the
grounds have some really wonderful gardens - when it's not
winter. And they make some pretty tasty beer too.
:-) If you like beer and want to see a company that does have a
culture that's more about taking care of
people and the enviroment, this is a great place to visit. (and
the tour is free)
We came back to Denver and had dinner with my cousin Nancy and
one of her daughters, Lauren. It was nice to spend a little time
with them, although we'd planned to go out
hiking and we just never could make that happen. Oh well, maybe
in the future. I did tell her
about Geo-caching and it turns out she has a cache close to her house -
so she's kinda excited about it.
On Wednesday, we headed out to Estes Park and just drove around
the
area and looked up at the mountains in Rocky Mountain National
Park. While driving we got an idea for a
company that would make grain-based or bio-based fuels in a
closed-loop type of factory like the New
Belguim brewery. We need to do some more thinking, exploring for
ideas etc. on that.
March 17, 20005
We headed out today to check out another hot spring. This
time we drove to Buena Vista and visited Cottonwood Hot springs.
They have a few pools of differing
tempertures as well as a lodge and massage/spa services. There was a
storm moving in and a very cold wind was blowing
- so we (and almost everyone else) stayed in the hottest pool and I
even wore my ski hat. :-) The
water didn't seem as hot there as at other hot springs areas that we've
been to. Perhaps it was due to the fact
that it was really cold outside and the water was cooling down as it
was piped into the pools. We
also both got massages, and were pleased with them. The
therapists seemed to be trained well, which isn't the case at some
places we've gone.
Buena Vista is about a 2-3 hours drive from Denver and we had
come via 285, but decided to go back by heading up to I-70 since the
storm that was blowing in had
arrived. We drove through quite a bit of snow which made
the trip home a bit slow-going. (At least I wasn't driving!) I've
gained an
appreciation for the weather and how quickly it can change in this
area. I can see how people get caught
outside in bad weather and the importance of being prepared.
March 23, 2005
We're back home - and ticking things off the to-do list before
we head out to Mexico. We left Colorado on Friday evening
and mostly just drove straight home - stopping at a
couple of rest stops to sleep. My favorite rest stop is in
Colorado, just east of Glenwood Springs and is called
NoName. We stayed there on the way into Denver in January.
Camping is not allowed at most rest stops, but
this one does allow it and it is far enough off the road so that it is
quiet. Mostly you just hear the trains
that travel along the river below.
Bill got his stitches removed on Friday morning in Colorado, and
he's healing fantastically. Again and again I am amazed at the
difference from day to day.
We're leaving town in a couple of days, Bill's been improving
the camper even more, the latest additions being a lockable box in
place of the rear bumper and a frame for an
awning off the side of the camper. I've been running errands and
working on the sprinkler system in the back -
we've been lucky to get so much rain but I know it's going to end soon,
so I need to get those back in
shape.
Thanks for the emails and visits - I'll try to update from
Mexico, but if not the next update will be in about a month.
Talk to you later! Bill, D- and Gus