By August, there's no more garden planting to do. Still planting in the beds that the hoophouse will be rolled over for the winter, but that's only eight 3'x10' beds. Instead, the homestead has moved into harvest and process mode, starting to store up for winter, especially things that can be dried or canned, as the root cellar is way too warm for long storage at this point.
Here's some kale, to be strung up in bunches from the hay garage frame, to dry for winter soups and to add to backpacking meals.
August was hot and dry. The goats are good at finding those shady spots to do some goat meditating (cud chewing). Tulip, Jasmine, Amanita and Jewelweed.
Amber decided to keep Jasmine's two doelings, Amanita and Jewelweed, and with our barn at capacity, found a home for them across the valley. That meant that she'd be busy with her own chores at the same time that ours would need to be done (goats get milked on a fairly tight schedule, partially because goats are routine oriented, and partially because altering it messes with their milk production). So Amber let us know she'd be moving out of the tiny house in September, and another responder to our tiny house barter ad, James, agreed to pedal our way (long distance bicyclist) in October.
With Amber's help again, we left for another trip, this time backpacking (Jeanne's favorite outdoor activity) into Gunnison Lake (an alpine lake accessed via a somewhat obscure "route" that climbs about 4000' in about 4 miles) for two nights, and one night car camping in Crested Butte where we could indulge in Linc's favorite, mountain biking.
On this trip, we remembered the bug dope, but we use the non-DEET stuff, and the mosquitoes don't seem to really notice it that much. Linc, enjoying hanging at the lake.
Jeanne tried jumping in the water to get away from the bugs, but given there was snow still melting into the water, her swims lasted about 10 seconds each.
And, it was beautiful, as always there.
The Trout could stay in the water a lot longer than we could, especially since we hadn't brought any fishing gear.
Backpacking is Jeanne's favorite outdoor activity, and she loves crocheting. Here she's peakcrochetbaggging (crocheting on top of all the highest mountains). We're thinking that she might be the only one doing this, so she might be the world champion!
It's best to crochet with a view. Gunnison Lake below, during a day hike from our shore-side tent on the second day of the trip.
Looking towards west Beckwith and Mt. Marcelina. The talus/conifer line gives the visual impression of mountains floating in a lake.
On the 3rd morning we hiked back down the mountain, drove to Crested Butte, and Linc biked Baxter Gulch Trail, a wonderful new single track hiking/biking option south of CB, while Jeanne did some shopping in town. We found a great car camp site up Washington Gulch, and rode a nice loop from town the next day, Snodgrass, Lupine, Lower Loop - a little over 22 miles of wonderful aspen and mountain meadow single track, satisfying Linc's (and Jeanne's) mountain biking addiction for at least a few days.
Jeanne with Mount CB behind.
No comments:
Post a Comment