The first month

The enormity of pressure I had been feeling for the last month seemed to lift from my shoulders as I unloaded our ATV’s at the 10,000 foot level among the blazing yellow, gold, and orange aspens near St Elmo, Colorado for the first ride of the 2007 Colorado ATV color tour. It had been an eventful month with readying our house in Eugene, OR for sale, selection of a realtor, selling our old Class C RV, my retirement from my employer for the last 22 years, a car accident, and the death of my Mother in law.

Our long term plan is to settle within a day trip of our family in the Denver area after our retirement. We have experience with an area in central Colorado around Buena Vista and with the ATV color tour centered here in the middle of the Fourteener Mountains; it seemed a natural place for the start of our quest for the “perfect campground”.

We started getting our house ready for sale in mid August with a fresh coat of stain on the decks, and fresh bark on the yard. I started a two week vacation at that point to focus all my efforts at that project. We rented a storage unit near our home for our over flow and excess furniture. We started sorting through our accumulations of the past twenty five years for the first time. We had four corporate sponsored moves over the last twenty years, so there is little motivation to do anything other than get out of the way and show the movers where you want the stuff in your new place. We are both pack rats not wanting to discard things that may be used at some point. Can we all say junk together? I filled several dumpsters and the people at the local charities got to know me by name during this period.

We finally selected a listing Realtor on September 7th after interviewing three different realtors over a one week period from the largest agencies in our market area. We think we will be able to sell the house within the next four months with the marketing plan we helped shape with the Realtor Husband and Wife team.

We sold our Class C RV to a couple in Eugene from an ad placed on the web. The buyers are a couple about our age that really wanted an extra bedroom at their children’s place. The big thing for us was about freeing up some funds to replenish the coffers depleted by buying the truck, travel trailer, generator and ATV rack for the truck.

I finally retired from Rockwell Automation on September 7th. I worked out a deal with RA to make sure I received the referral fee due me for finding my replacement. My replacement is a fine young man with lots of industry experience and the integrity to do the job right. It was important to me to make sure what I started was supported and even improved upon.

We left Eugene on Saturday September 8th on our way to Colorado. We planned on stopping in the Steens Mountains of Eastern Oregon to ride ATV’s with the wild horses there but Susan’s Mother’s health was failing according to her Colorado care givers. We were both exhausted from our house market readying efforts and only made sixty miles of our eastward journey the first day. We got underway the next day at the crack of noon after a struggle with the equalizer hitch for the travel trailer. We made it to a Burns Oregon Safeway parking lot late that afternoon. We pulled in to get a few things we needed and I hit a parked car in the parking lot with the back of the travel trailer when learning the back of the travel trailer swings the opposite way from the truck turn. I attribute that lapse of focus to the exhaustion we were both feeling, the accident could never be blamed on my driving ability. The next day we learned Susan’s Mother’s health was failing faster than anyone expected. We drove across the rest of Oregon and most of the way across Idaho that day. The next day we drove across the rest of Idaho, all of Utah and into Wyoming. The following day we finished the trip and made it to the nursing home in Denver about 4:30 PM. Susan had talked with her Mother early that day, but by the time we got there Janice had lost the ability to talk. She passed about 1:30 AM the next morning September 13th from congestive heart failure. We were glad we were there. She had requested a direct cremation. We scattered her ashes at the top of Hoosier Pass on Sunday September 23rd at a small immediate family service. We had a celebration of life luncheon in Breckenridge afterwards.

The ATV color tour from September 19th through the 23rd was amazing. About 120 riders came from all over the US to participate. A half dozen rides were available to chose from each day with wide variety of distance and difficulty ratings. This event is on our schedule to attend again next year. The first day we rode a fifty mile loop from the St Elmo area over three 12,000 foot passes, crossing the continental divide twice. The Aspen trees are in full glory; the mountain vistas are breath taking, and the mining history of the area make for a perfect way to relax at our favorite pass time of ATVing . The second and third day we chose shorter less challenging rides that are none the less just as wonderful.

Our planned next adventure is attending the Balloon Festival in Albuquerque October 10th through the 14th then meet some dear friends in Bandoleer National Monument north of Santa Fe New Mexico the third week of October. We expect to get the RV repaired from the Safeway paring lot incident back in Albuquerque the first week of November. Thanksgiving will find us back in Denver with our kids. Winter will find us somewhere (yet to be determined) warm with good ATV riding. The mountains of southern New Mexico or Arizona are a good bet.

Let the adventure continue!

John and Susan Huggins