Pregnant Alpacas, Ancient People, and Barking Puppies

Alpacas carry their baby for 11 1/2 months. That's 345 days. Today I am grateful I am not an alpaca.

I know this fascinating tidbit because we stayed at the Pleasant Journeys Alpaca Farm in Hesperus, CO for a couple of days and it was highly instructive, as well as gratitude inducing.

Harvest Hosts is an app that allows travelers to stay for free at various farms, museums, vineyards, golf courses and other interesting stops with ample parking that might not be used at night.  The cost to join is nominal (about $80-100 a year) and the stays are free as long as you courteously patronize the host's offerings, such as produce, t-shirts, museum tours, etc. Sue and Glenn Kacsh's Alpaca farm was idyllically located outside of Durango, CO amidst gorgeous green pastures and mountain scenery.

We toured the maternity pen and it was adorable to see the babies follow their mamas every step they took.  

The males are kept separated from the female because…obvious reasons, and we learned a whole new meaning to the phrase “spit test.”  Once a female is bred, she’s no longer interested in mating.  I mean, REALLY not interested. So Sue and Glenn will put the female back with the male after breeding and if the female isn’t pregnant yet, she’ll be amenable to another go-round.  If she’s already pregnant, she will hiss and spit at the male – hence the “spit test.”  It’s not scientific but Sue says it’s pretty reliable.  I have about 2000 jokes I would like to make here, but I’ll just let you insert your own.

I took the puppy for a run morning and night and the scenery was just breath-taking.

Sue’s store carries alpaca yarn she hand-spins and it seriously felt like angel hair.  Loads of cute socks, scarves, wraps, mittens, etc.  Way back in the day I dated a guy who had been to Peru and he brought me back an alpaca sweater.  I wore it for about the same amount of time that I dated him (a hot minute.  Get it? “Hot” minute?)  It was maybe the itchiest, scratchiest, HOTTEST sweater I had ever owned and that was my entire experience with alpaca.  Sue explained that a baby alpaca’s first shearing is the softest, and that in subsequent shearings there are two kinds of hair that need to be separated to get the fine, soft wool present in her shop.  I’m a believer – I bought a great pair of socks and a cute Christmas ornament to remind me of this fun visit.

Choo Choo...

In Durango we took the D&SNG Steam train to Silverton, CO.

I gleaned just enough nerdy train knowledge to tell you that D&SNG stands for Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge railroad.  And narrow gauge literally means the train tracks are closer together than regular gauge and this allows the train to climb steep mountains and make narrow turns easier.  I think.  If you’re a train person you probably know way more about it than I do, and if you’re not you probably don’t care. The important part was the stunning scenery as we barreled along at the breakneck speed of 15 mph around cliffs, mountains and rivers.  

You can choose an open air car, a closed car, or a narrated historical car for the 3-hour ride to Silverton.  We took the narrated tour and learned all about Otto Mears, the man who started the railroad and built it up.  

Silverton is a cute town we’ve visited before that has kept most of its historic charm, since most people only live there a few months during the summer and it’s basically closed up all winter.  Last year we met the piano player at the local saloon and she told us she was headed to FL when the season ended!

Cliff Hanger Ahead

Mesa Verde National Park called us as it was only about 60 miles away, so we miraculously secured a camping spot inside the park (Patrick has mad skills) and headed in that direction. We snagged a great spot tucked into the woods, got tickets for the Cliff Palace tour the next day, and set off driving the loop around the park. At various overlook spots they have markers pointing out some of the cliff dwellings and I mostly stood there like a dummy until I could finally find them with the binoculars.  Then I stood there gobsmacked that people not only accessed the cliffs, but hauled water, food, animals, building supplies and stuff there to live. The park not only has the cliff dwellings, but also earlier pit dwellings and pueblo houses.

The ranger-led Cliff Palace tour the next day was unreal.  We met at a dusty clearing on the edge of a cliff where there appeared to be nothing but great views, and then we started down. DOWN steps, DOWN narrow stone paths, DOWN REALLY STEEP inclines that only occasionally had a hand rail but did have inspiring views DOWN of our imminent death... until suddenly we turned a corner and saw this.  

This is NOT a diorama - see those life-size people on the far right corner?  This is an entire village!

We huddled under an overhang while the ranger taught us about the people who settled here around 1200 AD, and then we were able to walk all through the dwelling.  It was seriously the coolest thing ever and mind-boggling to see the hand-made bricks and thousands of years-old logs used to make this community.

The climb back up involved several ladders, steps, and a narrow passage through a stone crevasse that made me regret every croissant I’ve recently consumed. 

I sent pictures to my brother and asked him to show them to my dad who is a huge history buff.  My brother showed him and said, “Tanya said these were built about 1200 AD,” and my dad casually said, “Yeah, I know. I was there.”  Happy 88^th birthday, dad – you’re old but not that old. Yet.

This guy still works every day.  For a little while until it's nap time.

And now for the Random Roundup:

Puppy News: We got our Havanese puppy, Tilly, about 3 weeks before we started traveling.  

Patrick took her with him on the drive to Las Vegas and basically had her housebroken by the time I arrived a couple weeks later. If you had any doubts about my brains (or lack thereof) this should confirm I’m no dummy.  She’s been a really good traveler – just hops in her bed when we start driving and patiently waits for the next stop. 

She LOVES everyone and wants to exuberantly race to greet them, barking “Hello! Hello! Hello!” every step of the way.  Unfortunately, to non-dog people this can sound very much like YAP YAP YAP YAP YAP.  Since I've pretty much always been in the “meh” camp when it comes to people’s animals, I determined that her enthusiastic barking had to be nipped in the bud.  (And before all you animal lovers come after me with pitchforks, let me just say that it’s not that I don’t like cats and dogs, it’s just that they always fell in the “one more thing to take care of” camp and I’ve had plenty of children/animals to take care of in the last 30 years or so.) 

Anyhoo, we read a bunch of training twattle on the internet that suggested we reward her for being quiet (ummm…how is the dog gonna know she’s getting a treat because she hasn’t made noise?) or firmly telling them “NO” when they bark, etc.  As if she can tell the difference between “NO, don’t bite my ankles” or “NO, don’t chew up the map” or  "NO, don’t chew the electrical cord.”  This clearly didn't work well either.  See picture below of Patrick splicing back together my laptop electrical cord that she snacked on.

So we bought a First Alert NO BARK thingie that emits a high pitched tone supposedly only dogs can hear.  Every time she barks we sharply say NO and press the button and miraculously it seems to work.  The first couple of times she cocked her head like  “WTH?,” but since then she’s been much better.  Now she cleverly just low-key growls while she looks at us as if to say, “What about this?  Is this acceptable?” and for the most part it is.  Gotta pick your battles, I guess.  

Tilly with all will to live gone if she can't bark at everyone.

Next on the list is teaching her not to jump on people in her never ending quest for ALL THE LOVE AND PETTING in the world from EVERYONE IN THE WORLD. We welcome any suggestions on this front.

Mushy Patrick News: I try to refrain from being overly adoring about Patrick - it inflates his ego too much, but we were in line somewhere and a woman behind us asked Patrick if he used to play soccer. He told her he did as a child and asked why.  She said because his calves were so developed she just assumed he was a serious player.  (Patrick says it's from riding motorcycles for so long.) Gratuitous leg shot below.

However, lest you think I'm terribly shallow and only interested in his calves, one of the things we have in common is music. On one of our first dates we took a motorcycle ride and when I saw that Patrick had an extra iPod dedicated just to music for the bike, my heart did a little hop skip. Then, when about every other song was an obscure track that I had on my own playlists I knew this guy was a little different and music has continued to be a big part of our happiness together.

We’re ridiculously corny -  he decided that Ed Sheerhan’s“Perfect” song was our song and I can’t even count the times he's sent me a screenshot of it playing on the radio when we're apart, telling me we’re perfect together.  We blast Imagine Dragons' “On Top of the World” when driving through the mountains and sing along to John Denver’s "Country Roads" when the scenery is too beautiful.

But here’s one of the most darling things about Patrick…we both have wide and varied musical interests and we pretty much recognize and know the lyrics to every song that comes on the radio.  I can't carry a tune in a bucket, so I'm a whistler/hummer, but Patrick unabashedly sings along until he forgets the lyrics and then he just goes “la di da di dah” in time with the music until a phrase comes back to him.  I don’t know why but I find that unspeakably adorable.

And that's probably enough mush, pregnant alpacas, and puppy talk for today. So here's another shot of this wide, wonderful, beautiful world we live in. This happens to be Silverton, CO but I'll bet your corner of the world is just as beautiful in its own way.

The Big Rock and Bakery Tour

 We didn’t get enough of southern Utah last year, so we headed back to Moab to explore and drove through the Monument valley which we somehow missed last time.

It’s the perfect introduction to Moab where you will be knocked flat from the stunning landscape at every turn.  We took the jeep 4-wheeling to the Gemini Bridges – it was an excellent wild ride but upon arrival we looked around in bewilderment for the Gemini Bridges.  We knew we were in the right place, but…there was no “there” there.  We finally noticed faint green painted arrows on some of the rocks and began to pick our way across the scrubby ground until suddenly….there it was. BENEATH us.  We looked down and realized we were on top of it all along.

Dead Horse State Park was next - we had heard so much about it and it didn't disappoint.

As we were slack-jawed at the view, Patrick spotted a faint dirt road winding through the bottom of the canyon and said, “How did those people get down there?  That’s where I want to go.”

So of course the next day we set off up Kane Creek Canyon to Chicken Corners.  How did it get it’s name, you ask?  Well, its so precarious that in the narrowest parts if you’re chicken they used to let people out to walk across.

From Moab we headed to Panguitch, UT to see friends of mine in town who were there visiting their parents.  Panguitch is a beautiful little town with one stoplight that was celebrating their annual Quilt Walk by hanging actual quilts out on the street and from building windows.  In the WIND and RAIN and SUN and WEATHER.

As a quilter I only hyperventilated once or twice at the thought of the beautiful quilts being exposed to the elements.  As a city girl I wondered what prevents people from stealing them, but it was neat to see them everywhere and great to visit with my friend, Wendy.  We knew each other in Atlanta for 13 years and we solved a lot of world problems together.

 We wandered our way north, traveling through Capitol Reef National Park so we could stop at Fruita, a town with an orchard inside the park maintained by Park Rangers.  We stopped there specifically because we read they sell homemade pies made from the harvested fruit.  How did we know about this?  I’m pretty sure by now Patrick has the French equivalent of a homing device that leads him to pies, pastries, and all things sweet.  His apple pie did not disappoint.

On to SLC where we biked the Jordan River bike trail, toured Temple Square, swooned over the homemade rolls at the Lion House, and met up with one of my old college roommates for breakfast.

Patrick has learned to accept that no matter how far off the beaten path we are, there’s a 50/50 chance I know someone who lives there, so a blanket apology to all the family and friends that I’m missing as we travel around. In this case, my friend Terri and I met when we were about three years old and went through puberty, high school, and off to college together so there was no way we were leaving town without seeing her.  We caught up on 20 years worth of life and attempted to solve the world's problems but mostly we ate a Cracker Barrel breakfast and reminisced.

Patrick always wanted to see the Bonneville Salt Flats so we took a day and drove to the Great Salt Lake and on to the flats.  Unfortunately, Utah has had an unprecedented amount of rain and the flats were still flat,…but covered in water.

We managed to get some fun pics.

And also an odd pic.  These kind of pictures always distress me because I wear myself out wondering a) how did they not notice they didn't have shoes? and b) what did they do when they finally realized they were shoeless?

We lost our flipping minds going to Kneader’s Bakery several times a day  to get ALL the croissants and baguettes and pastries galore!

We then headed for Steamboat Springs, Colorado and fell in love with the little town.

We hiked up to Fish Creek Waterfall

Biked the Yampa River trail that was one of the nicest bike paths we've ever been on - it wound along the river, through the Botanical Gardens where they had this adorable fairy garden, and every view was gorgeous.

And then we stared at each other in shock when Patrick dropped his iPhone in the river while taking pictures of kayakers battling the rapids.  (Actual picture below taken SECONDS before he ceremoniously donated his phone to the river gods.)

We spent the rest of the day finding a phone store and iPhone. I wisely chose not to memorialize this process in photos and we will never speak of it again.

We built some campfires and had a cutthroat marshmallow roasting/s'mores competition, of which there should be no doubt about who won.

Most importantly, Patrick bought a cowboy hat that  makes him look like a movie star. We're pretty sure this makes us honorary Coloradans.

However, Steamboat Springs looked like this up in the mountains:

So after hitting the "Smell That Bread" bakery for emergency croissants (and where I found my new life motto), we headed for warmer weather.

In Alamosa, CO we stayed at a Farm Brewery and met the cool folks who decided to save their farm by converting it to a brewery.

We enjoyed the tour, their hospitality and the wide open vistas.

Then we continued south to Taos, Santa Fe, and Albuquerque, NM where no one (least of all Patrick) should be surprised that I have family to visit. My uncle Jimmy, a highly decorated Marine veteran, and his lovely wife Teresa went to dinner with us and we thoroughly enjoyed catching up on their lives.

If it seems like we're going in circles, you're right...and our GPS tracker confirms it.

We started in Las Vegas, went north, then east, then north, then south, etc.

And the thing is...we're ok with that.  We have a loose idea that we'd like to come down the Eastern seaboard in the fall to view the foliage, but other than that we're just following our feet and warm weather.  Patrick is from France and we've often talked about going back there to visit and someday we will, but we are both constantly amazed as the beauty of this country we live in and how much of it there is to explore and appreciate.

So for now....it's big rocks and bakeries and views like this one that keep us happily wandering in circles.