After days of partying, I finally got back out on the trails today.

This afternoon I hiked the Volcano Trail at the Petroglyph National Monument about 10 miles west of Albuquerque. It was a clear and windless day but cold, just above freezing. Still, I was dressed warmly and the day was extremely pleasant. The volcanos had last erupted thousands if not millions of years ago. So the chance of getting too warm today was minimal.

I actually climbed the three volcanoes, Vulcan, Black, and Ja, on the west side of the monument. The Vulcan Volcano is more than 6,000 feet high and the other two volcanos that I climbed were almost that high. Of course, the surrounding plain is just about 200 feet lower. Still, it’s the first time I ever climbed three mountains in one day!
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After going with Karen to her office, I took her car and headed toward the mountains, specifically to the Three Gun Spring Trail in Sandia Mountain Wilderness. Karen got her exercise the first thing this morning by going for a run while I had my coffee.

It was a glorious day. Bright, clear, cool in the 40s, but not so cold that I needed a jacket or gloves. Only a little snow remained on the ground from last week’s storm. Albuquerque and Boulder are at exactly the same elevation — 5400 feet — but Albuquerque is, of course, further south and therefore somewhat warmer.

The trail was wonderful, but one of the hardest to follow in my life. It was only supposed to be about 4 miles round trip to the spring. But the sign for the turnoff was wrong and I went at least a half mile too far before encountering two people who told me that. In fact, they — Greg from the university and his daughter Airie (spelling?) who was visiting from L.A. — walked down the trail with me and pointed me in the right direction. Then, I missed the overgrown trail to the spring several times before finally finding it at 3:30 — with just enough light to get back to Karen’s car before dark.
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For all the time that I have lived in Boulder I have wanted take the pictures I took today. Just as you approach Boulder from Denver you come to a vista point along the freeway with the best view of Boulder Valley.

But it has to be a clear day, there has to be snow on the mountains, it has to be early in the morning so you aren’t shooting into the sun, and you have to take your camera with you. All four of those requirements were with me today.

We got another 2.6 inches of snow yesterday on top of 16 inches in the past week, and I snowshoed in it for a couple of hours. It was cold, reaching 23 degrees max, and cloudy.
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We got a lot of snow here. Yesterday 6.7 inches fell on Boulder, according to the local newspaper. That’s on top of almost 10 inches in the last few days.

But it seemed like more:
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Much more snow fell last night and this morning. We now have four to six inches on the ground. Perfect for my new snowshoes.

I was beginning to think about going out in the snow when I got two signs. The snow stopped and suddenly the clouds lifted on a sunny scene. And the power failed.

That was enough to get me moving. I bundled up in my full winter regalia so well that the elements couldn’t reach an inch of my body.

In addition to the winter gear that I have been wearing, today I wore my gaiters, snowshoes, and had my new ski goggles to protect my eyes from the cold.
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Snow doesn’t scare me now. Ice doesn’t intimidate me.

It used to. The only auto accident I ever had in the 56 years I’ve been driving happened in 1958 or 1959 when my 1948 Mercedes got stuck in some streetcar tracks on a bridge over the Main River in Würzburg. We slid in slow motion for 30 or 40 feet into another car stopped at a light at the end of the bridge.

I also remember my car sliding on ice once in Washington, but fortunately stopping before making contact with the rest of the world. I hate that lack of control!
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As much as I love my work, it can be too much of a good thing. It was today.

Even though I work alone at home, I am surrounded every day by virtual people, otherwise known as email. Right now I have 100 messages in my in-box that I have glanced at and know that I have to answer or link on my website or write an article about. But there’s just not enough time in a normal work-day.

My work is fascinating. I am working on writing about so many earth-shattering developments that I can hardly keep track of them. I’ve lost track of all the articles that I need to research and write about.
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When Karen visited me last week, we ended our two hikes from each end of the Mesa Trail at the Mallory Cave Trail. That’s the trail I took late this afternoon.

But instead of hiking parallel to the Flatirons, I hiked from NCAR, crossing the Mesa Trail at right angles to it. I had walked the short nature trail above NCAR maybe a dozen times. But I never continued down and then up and then down again to the Mesa Trail from there. That’s because when I started hiking in Boulder, even that little hike would have been too challenging for me, and until today I never got out of that mind-set.

In fact, it’s only 0.6 mile and a net gain of 180 feet each way from NCAR to the Mesa Trail. That explains why we met so many people there!
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