The First Day of Spring

Ah, the first day of spring.  As winter comes to a close, nature comes alive as flowers bloom, animals awake, and the trees green.  Having spent the winter preparing for a wedding, I was ready for an adventure, and what an adventure we got.  My old roommate, Petr, suggested we try to head up to the Keyhole on Longs Peak.  Now, the two of us had already survived Longs once before, but neither of us could resist the challenge of scaling the Monarch of the Rockies in winter.  The weather on Longs is notoriously unforgiving for all but July-September, and ideally, we would have picked a day based on weather conditions, but unfortunately work schedules ultimately dictated when we could set out.  Regardless, the weather was most likely going to be bad either way.  However, as we headed into the mountains early Thursday morning, it appeared we'd have a four hour window where the perpetual blizzard would calm.  Now, four hours isn't enough time to get to the keyhole and back, but it would be close. 

We arrived at the trailhead soon after 8am and we began our ascent.  Things were going pretty well other than being a little out of shape and out of breath.  Spirits were high and snow fell gently through the tall pine trees.

As we headed higher, the winds picked up.  Still within the safety of the lodge-pole pines, the roar of the wind began to drown out our conversation, and you could see the snow streaking by above the trees.  Determined, we pushed on.  The higher we went the worse things looked.

Approaching treeline, we stopped to grab some lunch before heading out into open alpine.  We marveled at the wind as we ate huddled against the trees.  Things weren't looking too good, but we were optimistic nonetheless.  Pushing forward, we headed beyond the trees into the storm.  Before we knew it, the trail was gone and the wind was making it difficult to stand up.  I called over to Petr and told him to hike through the snow so we would have a way down if we needed to turn around.  Nearly half a mile we climbed on, faces down, through the snow drifts. Unable to find the trail and uncertain where the mountain was (usually a non-issue), the two of us huddled together to discuss our priorities.

Remembering back to earlier in the day, Petr had told me a story about his preparations from the previous night.  As he prepared his belongings for the upcoming hike, his girlfriend distracted him.  He quickly retorted that he needed his full attention because he was trying to make good life or death decisions.  Lost, we both agreed turning around now would definitely be a good life or death decision.  We stayed on our "summit" for a few minutes, enjoying the harshness of the climate and trying to come to terms with our failed effort.

Picture of us on our "summit"

Defeated, we headed back down the mountain.  However, our brief discussion had given the wind enough time to do just what we'd feared; our tracks were gone and we were lost.  Fortunately, we had stopped when we did, and it didn't take too long before we found the way we'd come.  Relieved, we headed back to the car.

As we descended, the clouds parted and the winds calmed.  Apparently we got above treeline a bit too early as our four hour window appeared as forecasted.  Nonetheless, we continued down the mountain, arriving at the trailhead around 11:30.  Suddenly, the weather was great, and we decided we still had some adventure left in us.  We jumped in the car and drove thirty miles around Longs into Rocky Mountain National Park for the next adventure.

After mulling over the options, we decided a hike up to Loch Vale Lake would be a good idea as it was fairly sheltered, and I had just completed the hike with my old college roommates (hopefully a future post) just months earlier.  As we headed up, we noted the stark differences in the weather from just an hour ago.  Suddenly, the sun was out and the winds had subsided, making the trek uphill rather warm.  It wasn't long before I decided that my outfit wasn't exactly fitting of a nice spring day and adjusted accordingly.

Unfortunately, mother nature determined I wasn't quite ready for a tan as the weather quickly changed.  We actually watched the wall of snow come down from the mountains, and suddenly we were back in the blizzard.

My companion enjoying the big flakes

My favorite thing in the world is hiking through the woods while it's snowing.  For me, there is nothing more peaceful or beautiful.  The snow was back and I was loving every minute of it. 

I don't know how we got to the lake when I hiked with my roommates because the way Petr and I went was a totally different trail.  The only part I recognized was the hike up the creek leading up to the lake.  It was just as pretty and difficult to climb the second time.

As we reached our destination, we stepped out of the relative safety of the trees into the full wrath of the wind.  We didn't take time to enjoy the view as wind made sitting out in the open unbearable.  We quickly found a rock to hide behind and enjoyed some tea.

 

Our view of the lake

View of the lake 3 months earlier

As we sat and enjoyed our tea, a little bird swooped down next to us.  He stared us down before flying off.  A minute later he was back, but this time he landed on my foot!  I motioned for Petr to grab the camera, but he flew off before we could get a shot.  Again, he returned, this time landing on my knee!  Petr struggled to get the camera out of his bag, but alas, he flew off yet again.  This time a few minutes passed before the bird returned, but this time he landed on my head scaring the daylights out of me!  In my panic, the bird flew off.  Scared, he didn't come close again until Petr dusted off the crumbs from his sandwich.  Finally, I managed to get a picture of the little guy.

Cold and tired, we began to pack up.  As we were picking up, Petr mentioned how we came all this way, we better get out on the lake.  It sounded reasonable to me, and I dashed off to the middle of the lake.  We played and slid around for as long as we could stand before heading back to the trees and out of the wind.  Maybe ten feet from shore, Petr collapses.  Before I can ask if he's okay, I suddenly feel the ground fall out beneath me.  Water fills my boot, as I quickly pull myself out of the lake.  Both of us had broken through the ice and suddenly we had another big problem on our hand. Up 10,000+ feet high in blizzard is no place to be wet and cold.  Realizing the potential severity of the situation, we ran the better half of the hike back to keep warm.

The rest of the trip was uneventful.  We arrived at the car exhausted, but satisfied.  We had come out that morning looking for an adventure, and what an adventure we got.  In the end, we experienced wild weather, getting lost, and breaking through a frozen mountain lake.  Each of these problems could have easily been worrisome, but we kept calm and instead had the time of our lives.  What a crazy spring day.

Until next time...

(Whoa, I never knew this, but maybe the rest of you did.  The tiny size and formatting of the pictures on this blog has always been my biggest complaint, but apparently if you click on the picture it gives you the original image.  Cool!)

Summer Hi/LowLites

Wow, where did the summer go?  It seems like its been only a few day since I've moved out to Colorado.  Nonetheless, the holidays are just a few days away.  Today, I wanted to take a look back at the dog days of summer.  I've tried for over a month now to write this blog, and I never really got the formatting right.  As such, I gave up and just made an album on imgur (Summer Pictures).  Check out the comments below the pictures for commentary, and I apologize in advance for the cell phone camera quality pictures. 

A Heated Debate

Despite the fact that this blog has been filled with fun, amusing posts, I've decided that it's finally time to get down to the facts and target some pressing issues that are pertinent to today's times. In all seriousness, let's be serious. With that said, I've decided to post a rather controversial topic that may leave some feeling upset and others alarmed as the small shell they call their "world" may be turned upside down. Nevertheless, the heated topic of Caribou Coffee VS. Starbucks will now commence.

Before unraveling my review, I must attest to the fact that I am NOT a coffee expert; however, I would consider myself a "deliciously sweet, overpriced blended coffee drinker connoisseur." Therefore, I will only be reviewing the blended coffee drinks known as a "cooler" at Caribou Coffee and a "frappuccino" at Starbucks. As many of you know, I am a dedicated Caribou Coffee fan; however, I promise that my thoughts will be unbiased and simply a matter of my own findings. My review has been broken down into several components:

 1. APPEARANCE

a. drink appearance - I ordered my first  Starbucks drink a few weeks after moving to Fort Collins. After receiving my drink, I was shocked at the familiar appearance. The blended drink inside the cup was a rather appealing beige, caramel-like color with cloud-like whipped cream floating on top. The whipped cream was then drizzled with ooey gooey caramel and placed inside a clear cup. If I were to base this review solely on the look of the drink itself, Starbucks and Caribou would be on an even plate; however, I am also going to discuss the design of the cup as well as the size.

 b. size - After I examined the appearance of the drink, I then began to focus on the size. I couldn't believe how tiny the "tall" frappuccino (Starbucks' version of a small) really was! I was almost positive it was smaller than Caribou Coffee's small. I researched the information and discovered that a tall frappuccino contains 12 fluid ounces and a small cooler from Caribou Coffee contains 16 fluid ounces. 

c. cup appearance  - Although there are many people who believe a person shouldn't judge a book by its cover, I'm not one of them (and I have definitely read my fair share of books). In regards to the Starbucks cup, it is simply the Starbucks logo which depicts some type of sea creature which many refer to as a mermaid or siren. The design is clean, simple, and great for advertising as almost anyone can identify it. On the other hand, Caribou Coffee's cup currently contains a variety of inspiring quotes, sayings, etc. in fun, different fonts. I can't help but really enjoy reading these little blurbs on my coffee cup while I sip my drink.

2. PRICE

As I'm sure you know, the price of just about anything can change depending upon your location. The cost of a small caramel cooler from Caribou Coffee in Rochester and most areas in Minnesota is $4.10. This price includes tax, but it does not include the 10 cent discount from the question of the day. 

On the other hand, a "tall" frappuccino from Starbucks costs between $4.20 and $4.25 with tax in Colorado. Therefore, a frappuccino from Starbucks not only costs more than a small cooler from Caribou Coffee, but you would also receive less. Definitely not cool.


3. TASTE

In my opinion, taste is the most important aspect of any food product. It's what makes us enjoy certain foods more than others, and it even causes us to dislike foods as well. With that said, I'm going to do my best to describe the taste of both drinks.

The frappuccino is good and encompasses both flavors of coffee and caramel. The drink is blended nicely, with little chunks of ice. Moreover, the whipped cream is light and fluffy, but tastes a tad artificial. Despite the aformentioned good qualities of this drink, the overall taste is far too bitter for my liking. The blended coffee tastes almost burnt and doesn't exhibit the freshness that I so enjoy.

On the other hand....

The caramel cooler from Caribou Coffee is light, airy, and perfectly blends the sweet flavor of caramel and the wonderful, rich aromas of coffee together into a harmonious union. The drink is literally the perfect comfort drink in my book.

 So, in closing, I must say that Starbucks' frappuccino is decent, and I can understand why some people enjoy it. However, It definitely doesn't compare to a caramel cooler from Caribou Coffee. The wonderfully sweet, perfectly blended taste is incomparable to any other blended coffee drink and reigns supreme. 

At the Denver Airport enjoying a caramel cooler from Caribou Coffee. :-) 

By the way, if you actually read this entire blog entry, Congratulations! I commend you on your efforts. :-)


 

The New Pad

I figured it's about time I added my two cents to this blog and I thought I would start the same way Amy started; with a tour of my house.  Now life in southeast Fort Collins isn't all its cracked up to be.  Let me tell be the first to tell you that the weather here is just down right silly.  Sunny and 70-80 degrees everyday?! Come on now nature, where's your sense of adventure?  Bike lanes, roundabouts, and comically short green lights add to the madness.  In all seriousness though, why isn't there a highway in this town.  Nothing kills a few hours like having to drive to the other side of town.  Nonetheless, as I'm sure you've seen from the other blog posts, Amy and I have managed to cope.   But I digress, situated just a few minutes south of Amy's townhouse, this is the place I currently call home.

While the place might look welcoming, visitors be warned.  A ferocious, man-eating beast lies just behind that front door.  The monster lies in the shadows most of the day, coiled, ready to launch herself at the first unsuspecting victim to the open that door.  The locals and those lucky enough to escape with their lives have named the legend Bandit for the black spot that covers her eye.  If you're brave, have a gander yourself.

Assuming most of you won't have what it takes to stand up to a such a wild and savage animal, I've provided the meek and weak an inside look of what lies inside fabled 2915.  Only the bravest have managed to see what I'm about to show.  Even fewer have survived....

 

For best results, view on 720p full-screen

Happy Fall!

Hot chocolate, pumpkins, leaves, chilly weather, apples, and Halloween are just some of the many amazing things that I love about Fall! September 22nd was the first official day of Autumn, so Matt and I decided to commemorate the special day.

We took a bike ride to a nearby town called Windsor and marveled at all of the lovely views. There were some prairie dogs too, so that made the trip even more fun! 

Later that evening, the fall festivities began. I had a craving for pumpkin bread despite the fact that I had never made it. As such, I found a recipe online that looked easy enough to follow and headed to the grocery store to pick up a few ingredients. 

 Not only did I grab the ingredients for our pumpkin bread, but I also picked up some delicious hard apple cider that Matthew had been raving about. Blog world, I introduce to you, Woodchuck Apple Cider. We tried the granny smith flavor, but there are several others available. The cider was simply wonderful and accompanied our pumpkin bread perfectly! 

 

The pumpkin bread turned out to be a success! It was better than I had even imagined; in fact, I already made a second loaf as I had enough ingredients for two! 
 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This past weekend, Matt and I took a day trip up to Trail Ridge Road which encompasses parts of the Rocky Mountain National Park. The views were absolutely spectacular! We entered through Estes Park and continued our way up into the mountains. 

This picture was taken with Matt's new smartphone, a Galaxy S2 by Samsung! It's quite impressive, and he seems to enjoy it a lot. Mainly, I think he's just happy that it's not an iphone; however, he's hoping to eventually purchase an Intel phone once they become available in the U.S.

 

What a spectacular moment! It was so beautiful.

We stopped at one of the keynote lookouts and were welcomed by many hungry chipmunks! I didn't actually have any food, but I pretended I did so they would come over to me. 

A few updates: 

* Matt and I recently finished watching Season 1 of Once Upon A Time! We are finally all caught up and just watched the first episode of Season 2. I can't wait to see what happens next!
 
*  Matt and I met with Colorado State University's priest to learn more about the marriage preparation process. We're both looking forward to starting our marriage classes soon!

* We have been participating in a weekly Bible study sponsored by Blessed John XXIII (the church we have been attending) which meets on Thursday evenings. It's directed towards young adults, so it's perfect for us! Ironically, the person who leads the study was actually a keynote speaker at a FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students) conference that Matt and I attended two years ago!
 
* We ordered our Save the Dates from shutterfly.com a week or so ago and have been preparing them for delivery. We're hoping to get them in the mail by Monday, October 8th. :-) 
 
I'm definitely looking forward to the holiday season beginning. We can't wait to head home for some much needed family time!

Oh, the places you'll go on a tandem bike

I just love Dr. Seuss and couldn't help but incorporate the title of one of his popular books into my blog title! Anyways, this past weekend was truly splendid in several ways. 

Beginning on Saturday morning, Matt and I drove to Old Town and visited the Fort Collins Bike Library. Isn't that the coolest thing ever? Fort Collins has a bike library where you can rent several different kinds of bikes, including a tandem bike which Matt has had his eye on for some time; oh, and it's free too! We picked up our prized tandem bike (which took some practice as it would "fishtail" every now and then if we weren't careful) and tootled around town for a bit. We eventually took the Poudre trail back home and almost ran over a praying mantis with our large bike.

Now I know native Coloradans would probably find this picture silly; however, I've never seen a real praying mantis, so this was pretty cool! 

The bug was determined to climb onto one of our bike tires and was actually somewhat hard to remove!

After a near death experience with the praying mantis, we stopped at Dairy Queen for mini Blizzards before we made it home! 

Oh, and here's my little shout out to one of my best friends, Anna Miller and her husband, Nate, on the birth of their beautiful baby girl, Lillian! I'm so excited for them!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On Sunday we did some relaxing before we drove the tandem bike back to Old Town. 

Here we are! The tandem bike was so fun to ride! I'm thinking we just may need to rent it again :-). 

After returning the bike to the library, we had a few minutes to spare before church. We happened upon this store, and I just knew we had to take a look! 

The Butter Cream Cupcakery had several flavors to choose from; however, we decided upon chocolate cake with vanilla butter cream frosting.

And here's the scrumptious, sugary confection! It was pretty spendy for one cupcake, so we decided to share just one. I definitely think we'll be visiting this place again to try more delectable cupcakes. (Erin Badzinski, this store reminded us of you!)  
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sorry for the non correlated blog pictures. I wanted to post them, so here they are! 

Here is our attempt at banana bread. Matt called his mom several times to make sure we had the ingredients correct. It tasted good, but I think we'd definitely use one more banana (which is what the recipe called for). I also prefer milk chocolate chips verses semi-sweet.

Matt bought me flowers for our one year anniversary of being engaged on September 10th. It's crazy to think it has been that long! Pretty, pretty daisies! 

And last but not least, a YELLOW watermelon! Yes, it's meant to be that color. Matt and I had never seen one, so we were quite surprised to discover the color when we cut into the melon. Apparently, it tastes more "honey-like" :-)

"If you never did, you should. These things are fun and fun is good." - Dr. Seuss

Aloha from Colorado!

Matt and I both had a busy, but fun weekend! Intel sponsored a party on Friday evening called "The Island Getaway" and each employee was allowed to bring one guest. I'm just so glad that I made the cut! 

The gathering took place on this rather large island surrounded by a small, shallow lake. It was a Hawaiian themed party and all people were encouraged to dress up for the occasion; plus, there was a costume contest and the winner would get to take home $50. That was a pretty good incentive for me. 

Unfortunately, the weather had less than tropical temperatures in mind for Fort Collins that day, so we ended up with barely 70 degree weather and random misty rain. Nonetheless, I persisted and wore my "tropical" attire, while Matthew decided to wear pants and a flannel shirt. Could he look anymore Minnesotan and opposite of the occasion? Oh well...

We arrived at the party and were transported to the island via pontoon. The island was awesome! There were waterfalls, tiki torches, delicious smelling food, several bars, a floating band, and cats. Yes, I know! It was so weird, but the cats were quite friendly. We headed to the buffet right away, filled up our plates, and found a small table that overlooked the lake to enjoy our meal. Just as we sat down, one of the "island cats" decided to pay us a visit. 

Isn't this cat adorable! He/she loved the attention and hung around us while we ate our supper.

After dinner we walked around the island, went paddle boating, and eventually found ourselves at the bar. Intel hosted free beer, wine, and margaritas. I had a margarita with salt around the rim, (I don't think I'll ever have the salt again, ick!) and Matt asked for a Fat Tire beer. Yes, it's true, Matt actually tried an "adult" beverage :-).

Sorry for the picture, but I just had to prove it!

Don't you just love how Matt's winter clothing matches nicely with my tropical dress? He didn't have any Hawaiian clothing which wasn't a big deal since quite a few people didn't dress for the theme anyways.

Ahh... paradise

 Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that I was the only non employee of Intel that made it to the finals for the costume contest! Matt claims I got third place. Overall, the party was a blast! :-)
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On Saturday, Matt and I rode our bikes to Old Town, visited some of the stores, and had dinner at Ingredient. It's a chef owned restaurant and quite tasty! Here are a couple random pictures of our day:

Colorado State University (CSU) has about 30,000 students.That's almost twice as large as MSU!

Matt insisted we visit Popperazi, a gourmet popcorn store, as they had free samples! This picture shows just some of the various flavors of popcorn they sold. Matt bought a bag of traditional kettle corn.

Until Next Time!