June 2008

Buena Vista, CO latitude N 38°51′47″ longitude W 106°08′40″ elevation 8082’

The Colorado Supreme Court decided not to hear the adoption appeal filed by the Northern Cheyenne Tribe. The Tribe can still make several legal maneuvers, but I think this last decision is the beginning of the end of the fight. The adoption could be finalized this year.

We kept our granddaughter, Diamond, for the day June 1st while our kids rafted the Arkansas River. We had a great time playing in the local BV Park and blowing bubbles. Three and a half year olds are amazingly easy to entertain. Just add pizza and you have an instant party. We had a cook out for all when the kids got off the river. The river is really high with all the spring runoff making for a wild and wet raft trip. Five people lost their lives on the river in June. People just don’t realize how powerful running water can be.

We did a lot of riding this month. While out on one of our ATV rides, Susan and I saw more Bighorn sheep and I still didn’t have my camera. These sheep were within thirty yards and took turns posing on a cliff just above us. Sorry, no pictures of these either. Ok, twice is enough, I’ll start carrying the camera. We are hooked up with the local four wheeler club and are participating in the organized rides.

On the way back from one of these rides we witnessed a horrific automobile accident. A small pick up truck that was approaching us drifted off the road to the right. The driver over corrected, went into a sideways skid back on the road and rolled four or five times. I was the first on the scene. The truck was on the passenger’s side. There were two elderly people in the truck who surprisingly were still alive. Both had head injuries and bleeding badly. I made them as comfortable as possible without moving them. We left after the emergency medical services people got there.

I’ve been accepted for a local team to help map out ATV trails in the San Isabel and Pike national forest here in central Colorado. This project is part of a nation wide effort to get GPS tracks of all off high way trails. I’m making my own maps of the back country with my GPS and some mapping software. We like to ride our ATV’s in big circles. We are exploring new areas, now that some of the high country passes are open, and having a great time. Summer is here and the wild flowers in full glory. We found some beautiful western red columbines on a recent ride.

We have a contract for the land we want in the valley between BV and Salida. We put some contingencies on the purchase that we need to work out between now and August 1st. We can then close and get on with building our dream mountain retirement home base. Susan and I both worked hard on the floor plan in some architectural software. Yes, there will be plenty of room for visitors and the front view out all those windows will be of 14,197 ft Mount Princeton. I did azimuth calculations (angle of the sun starting clock wise from North) for all months of the year to keep the afternoon summer sun from adding too much heat load through the front glass. It turns out that Mount Princeton at 317° azimuth is almost perfect.

It would be really good to sell our house in Oregon prior to starting a building project out here. The housing market in Oregon is in pretty bad shape, but the right people will come along and buy our house.

Metal detecting this month took a back seat to ATVing. I found enough quarters to do the laundry but not much else. I did find a track award medallion on a High School football field. A couple of brass locks a silver key and a small butterfly charm round out the months collection. Not great, but kinda fun.

May 2008

Buena Vista, CO latitude N 38°51′804″ longitude W 106°08′741″ elevation 8082’

Our summer home Buena Vista, CO, or BV as the locals call it, greeted us with about an inch of snow the first day of May. This small town of 2100 feels like home to Susan and I. BV is location in Colorado’s banana belt of the scenic Arkansas River Valley mid way between Salida and Leadville. The Collegiate Peaks in the Sawatch Mountain Range make up the view to the west. A verga snow cell, evaporating before it hit the valley floor, moved off Mt Princeton one afternoon as I rode our recumbent trike around the north end of BV dressed in jeans and a T shirt. The large contrast of temperature and moisture between the 14K plus mountain top and the 8K valley floor was very apparent.

We are in a serious search for some land to put a house on. There is lots of land for sale here, all with very expensive prices. We made an offer on two acres near the Arkansas River with views to die for of the collegiate peaks. The land alone was more money than my first three houses combined.

An afternoon of four wheeling in the very close 4 Mile off highway vehicle area revealed the snow level is above 9,000 feet locally. This will help us plan our four wheeling trips as we wait for the snow level to rise in altitude with the temperature. We saw seven big horn sheep just off the trail. They were close, but I didn’t have a camera. By the time I got the camera on my cell phone figured out they were two hundred yards away. Sorry, no pictures.

Metal detecting and related activity was very productive this past month. White’s metal detector manufacturing company agreed to use two of my metal detecting stories in their advertising sending me a $100 gift certificate for each for them. I found two gold rings, three silver rings, a silver earring, and a silver medical alert bracelet. I’m finding enough money to keep up with the laundry. The first gold ring is a women’s diamond keepsake engagement ring in 14 K yellow gold size 6 ¾. The second gold ring is a 7MM wide men’s wedding band in 14 K white gold size 11 1/2. The three silver rings are all together in what is called a puzzle ring. The earring is a Mexican Sombrero. I found the owner of the medical alert bracelet and returned it to him.

There is nothing new in the continuing saga of the adoption. The Northern Cheyenne tribe did appeal the case to the Colorado Supreme Court. The Colorado Supreme Court selects the cases it hears and those cases are less than 3% of the cases submitted. There is not point of law at question in this case. I can not imagine a scenario in which the Supreme Court would hear this case, but then I’m not a lawyer.

April 2008

Española, NM latitude 36°00′07″ longitude N 106°03′53″W elevation 5600’

April brought spring to the mountains of Northern New Mexico finding us in Española about 25 miles north of Santa Fe in a valley nestled between the Jemez and Sangre de Cristo mountain ranges. Española was founded in 1598 by Spain as the first capitol of New Mexico. We chose Española for its mild weather and proximity to the extensive ATV trail system in the nearby Carson National Forest.

The Colorado Court of appeals ruled in our kids favor in Diamond’s adoption process. The Northern Cheyenne Tribe, the plaintiff, can take this decision to the Colorado or US Supreme Court, both of whom choose the cases they hear. I do not see this as likely as no Court in this adoption process has found anything worthy of reversing the adoption process our kids started more than two years ago. We all love Diamond and are delighted with this last legal decision. It’s not over till it’s over, but this is a big step in the right direction.

I rode wheelers with the Director of the YMCA Youth program one day in the mountains north east of Española. We collected lots of rocks, mostly agate, and saw some elk in a high mountain meadow. I was surprised to see a butterfly over a snow drift at about 8,700 feet. I didn’t know that butterflies would hatch and live at that elevation and temperature. The snow became impassable at about 9000 feet depending on the exposure to the sun.

Susan flew back to Eugene early in April picked up her car and drove back all in about a week. The cacti were blooming during her trip and reportedly beautiful. Sorry, no pictures. Our house in Eugene is still on the market.

A surprise snow fall thwarted our plans to ride wheelers on my birthday, April 12th. We had a quite day and dinner at Gabriel's, one of the best restaurants in New Mexico. Their specialty is making guacamole at your table. Yes, I wore the hat, and they sang. Susan has pictures to prove it. There are lots of great Mexican restaurants near here. I’m developing a taste for shredded beef enchiladas with red chili, but the green chili chicken enchiladas are running a close second. A friend taught us how to make chicken en mole which is great. Who would ever have thought about chocolate sauce with chilies on chicken?

Metal Detecting turned up a very beautifully detailed St. Benedict Jubilee Medal in an old high school football field that is now home to prairie dogs and red ants. The local sports fields yielded a brass heart shaped medallion, a silver crucifix, and a brass crucifix. I’m finding enough quarters again to keep up with the laundry. I bought another metal detector with assorted coils from a friend in Oregon. One of these coils is very difficult to find and is destined for my business partner in Las Cruces.

We moved the mobile mansion to Buena Vista, CO the first of May. Susan’s allergies were in full revolt at something in the Española air. We hope the change in location will help that issue. We are anxious to start looking for some land to build a permanent base. We plan to spend summers in Colorado and winter in Las Cruces to enjoy the warm dry climate and allow my engagement with the new metal detector business.

Two bird feeders now adore the front of the mobile mansion. We get a variety of finches feeding at any given time. The goldfinches are most interesting, because the hang upside down to feed. The male house finches have beautiful red feathers on their head. The most beautiful bird yet was a spotted towhee on the ground under the feeders. A friend gave us a bird book while we lived in Montana we use to identify our new visitors. The front window, where the feeders are located, is reflective allowing us to see out to get a very close look but not allowing the birds to see in.

I did a meteorite and a metal detector presentation for some at risk kids that were at the YMCA teen center. Espanola recently made the front page of the New York Times for its drug and gang issues. Evidently Espanola is one of the first stops on the drug highway from Mexico to the US. Some of these kids ask good questions about astronomy and meteorites. I passed around my meteorite collection which helped put some reality in the presentation. I think the thought of handling 4.5 billion year old rocks is enough to impress anyone. The metal detector presentation had fewer participants, but there was a lot of enthusiasm digging coins in the park afterward. We detected until dark that night. If I just sparked one thought with my presentations, my time and effort was worth while. The Director of the program gave me a unique gift that I just have to share with all. It’s a 175 million year old dinosaur turd. This is truly a treasure that I will cherish from now on. Thanks again Ben!

March 2008

March ushered in the launch of Treasure Masters (Las Cruces’ only authorized Whites Metal Detector dealer) and the newly formed LLC of the same name and a partnership with a fine young man to support the venture when I’m out of the area. We are set up in my partner’s wife’s relative’s gun shop and run our receipts through his books. Our business profit goal is financing a two week trip to Costa Rica next winter.

My business Partner, Joe Leos, and I held a hands on Metal detector event in a Las Cruces to local park to help kick off the new business. Susan and his wife Cyndi helped. About 40 or 50 people turn out for our White’s metal detector Jamboree and we sold some stuff.

Susan and I rode our ATV’s about 35 miles on the Benson Ridge trail system in the Lincoln National Forest just south of Cloudcroft, NM. It was a great day and made me remember why we haul these ATV’s around on top of our truck all the time. We stopped by the great Mexican food place in Tularosa for dinner and watched the March full moon rise over the mountains as we drove back to Las Cruces.

We meet a dear friend, Rita Barnhart, in Bernalillo the last week of March. This little bedroom community near Albuquerque gained its fame when Coronado visited in about 1640. There was much shopping and good food involved with Rita’s visit.

Susan flew out of Albuquerque back to Eugene on April 1st. She will pick up some essentials, her car, and meet me in Espanola in a few days. Espanola is about 25 miles north of Santa Fe near the Carson National Forest. There are lots of good ATV trails in the area. Notice how we are moving north as the weather warms. We will spend the Month of April here and plan to move to Buena Vista, Colorado in early May, weather permitting.

I am healing well from the ATV accident with only a few bruises and hard spots in the left arm. I have lost some mobility in my left arm and neck. I just don’t heal as well as I used to. This getting old stuff is not for sissies.

Metal detecting this month turned up a dinosaur design sterling silver ring, a Susan B. Anthony dollar, six wheat pennies, a 1919 Mercury dime, and a lapel pen showing the Olympic symbol, the Mexican flag, and the coca cola symbol. I also found about $40 worth of current coins. I’m finding enough quarters to keep up with the laundry cost again. My favorite metal detecting story involves a lost and found wedding ring. It all started when I was lost, looking for the local Chamber of Commerce. I stopped to ask directions from a couple of guys in front of a YMCA Teen center. The Director of the center gave me good directions and we struck up a conversation about our shared interest in wheelers, rock hounding, and metal detecting. He told me about a local park that might be good for metal detecting. I ran errands around town and wound up at that park in late afternoon. I was doing my Pied Piper routine with a group of kids following me around as I showed them where to dig coins.

A guy approached me asking for help finding his white gold wedding ring lost the day before. He showed me where he had taken off his base ball glove while practicing with a team he was coaching. He raked the infield area the night before for hours searching for the ring. I found it with the metal detector in about 15 minutes. He was extremely pleased and gave me a $60 reward. I took the reward back to the teen center and bought pizza for the whole group. It was gratifying to feed a bunch of kids who might not otherwise have had dinner.

The Director of the teen center and I are planning a wheeler ride in an area north west of Espanola. This guy knows the area and tells me to bring my rock hammer for a wide variety of local minerals. I’m really looking forward to the ride.

February 07

February found us in Las Cruces (The Crosses), New Mexico in the Mesilla Valley, home of famous hatch Chilies. The locals just call this city of 75,000 “Cruces”. Cruces is the home to New Mexico State University giving the city a nice little college town buzz. We both really like Cruces because seems to be big enough to have everything you might want and still small enough to be friendly. We will make this our winter home. You gotta love those sunny 70 degree days in February.

Life has a way of telling us we need to slow down and pay attention. I got such a wake up call the first week of February. I broke my left arm and badly strained my neck and back in a ATV accident. One of the ATV ramps broke under me as I was loading. The wheeler fell on me from about five feet. My left elbow has a compression fracture in the socket of the radius. The radius is the big bone in the arm above the wrist. This led to a couple of trips to the hospital emergency room, many trips to the chiropractor and an Orthopedic specialist. The Orthopedic Dr sent me for four to six weeks of physical therapy to reduce the hematoma (swelling and internal bleeding) and to regain as much motion and strength as possible in my left arm. He says there will likely be some loss of mobility of the elbow because of the location of the break and the inability to surgically repair the damage. So, I guess there goes my chances of winning big on the senior golf tour, but then, I never had much of a golf game to start with. The chiropractor tells me the back and neck strain should be manageable on an as need basis after three weeks of treatment. That likely translates to one visit a month for the next six months and less often after that.

I really am recuperating much better than all this sounds. The biggest inconvenience is the almost daily doctor visits. I thought my largest disability would be typing with one hand while my left arm was in a cast, but found the loss of that hand that didn’t change the speed of my typing all that much. Pretty sad, isn’t it! I still remember being thrown out of Mrs. Bucannon’s high school typing class with the short sighted thinking of it really didn’t matter. There is more to that story that I care to write or you care to read.

My forced slow down while allowing my body to heal gave me some time to reevaluate this next chapter of my life, so I created Treasure Masters, a business selling metal detectors and supplies. I am now an authorized White’s Metal Detector Dealer in Las Cruces, NM. White’s did not have a dealer here and the Distributor for this area was only too happy to have me. I placed my initial order on February 22nd and now have stock to sell. One of my best friends predicted my entrepreneurial spirit would not long tolerate inactivity in retirement. Cliff, you were right as usual. This venture is really good for me on several different levels and if I make some money along the way, it is just an added bonus. I have a grand opening event planned for March 22nd. There is a lot to do before the event, and it feels good to work on this type of goal.

Some really great people we met here that took us to Kilbourne hole about 20 miles south of Cruces. Kilbourne Hole is a crater actually called a marre. Scientists theorize that lava flowing from nearby Aden Crater flowed over the earth's surface and cooked the wet limestone beneath. After a time, there was a steam explosion that produced the Kilbourne Hole. The view is spectacular from the south rim. The "hole" stretches for more than 1 1/4 miles across and reaches a depth of nearly 300 feet in places.

The reason for our trip to Kilbourne Hole was to search for semi precious Peridot (pronounced pear-uh-doe). Peridot is terrestrial green glass made under the tremendous pressure and heat usually associated with volcanic activity. Kilbourne Hole is one of the only places in the US where an individual can collect gem quality Peridot. We found lots of Peridot, most of it in granular form, the size of a BB or smaller. We did find one larger stone of gem quality. Peridot is of interest to me because I’ve been collecting the extraterrestrial form called Tektites for some time now. Tektites are formed when meteorites strike sand causing enough heat and pressure to fuse the sand into glass. I think the most beautiful of these is the Granny Smith apple green Moldavite from the Moldau Valley in Czechoslovakia.

I got my brand new looking wheeler back from the repair shop this week. We are already planning a treasure hunting trip into the Caballo (horse) Mountains, about 40 miles north of Cruces, where Indians raided a group of Chihuahua-Spanish in 1598. During this particular raid, the Indians killed everyone in the group. The Indians of course had no need for the valuables they stole therefore, they took the gold bars, silver and jewels by horse and mules to a hidden spring that used to run through Caballo Mountains. Here they buried the loot under various big rocks in the Canyon.

The ATV rack Dealer sent me a new set of redesigned ramps. I installed a winch on Susan’s wheeler, mine already had a winch. My loading process now uses the winch as a safety line keeping the cable tight as I drive up the ramps. This will keep the wheeler from falling over backward or on me if anything ever goes wrong again. I feel much more comfortable with this loading procedure. The Dealer is paying for my ATV repair and my medical bills.

Metal detecting this month was limited because of my ATV related injuries. I did find a child’s gold ring, a silver ring with diamond chips, a Pog slammer, and an Air Force ROTC medallion from New Mexico State University. I did not find nearly enough quarters to keep up with the laundry. I plan to do a lot better in March.

We spent Christmas with the kids in Denver. Way too much snow for me, but it was great to spend the time with family. Something about having Christmas with a three year old that makes it special. Diamond made her first ever Chrismas cookies in the picture to the left. The unresolved adoption process is taking it’s toll on the whole family.

January 2008 found us in Alamogordo (Fat Cottonwood), New Mexico nestled in the Tularosa basin between the White Sands missile range and the Lincoln National Forest. We chose it for the temperate climate, access to the four wheeling opportunities in the Lincoln National Forest and the availability of reception for our computer edge card to get on the net. Alamogordo is home to Holloman AFB thus swells and contracts with the fortunes of the AFB. It is currently in a contraction mode. The economy and mood are depressed. That doesn’t keep us from experiencing the local museums and culinary establishments. . On the recommendation of a friend, who once lived here, we found a really great Mexican food restaurant in Tularosa about 17 miles north. If you are ever in the area, Casa de Suenos (house of dreams) http://www.casadesuenos.info/ is worth a look. The stacked green chili chicken enchiladas are to die for.

The New Mexico Museum of Space History is worth seeing along with the IMAX theater on the same site where we saw two presentations. We learned the US seized parts to build about 60 German V2 rockets at the end of WWII. One of those rockets test fired at White Sands crashed just east of Alamogordo in the National Forest. I think I found a part of the engine cage with my metal detector. I’m not sure, but it makes a good story anyway.

Metal detecting in the local parks and sports fields yielded almost enough change to do the laundry, an ancient Saint Christopher medallion, Two sterling silver rings, one with a huge purple stone, the other with mi amor inscribed on the outside and my love on the inside, a colored glass sterling silver necklace slide, a sterling silver bracelet, a $10 Mexican coin, and my first of the new presidential $1 coins.

Four wheeling this month was shared between the gold mining area around Orogrande and the lower elevations of the Lincoln National Forest. The snow level is just above 7500 feet in mountains that go up over 9000 feet. We can ride up to about 8000 feet. I nearly had a big four wheeling story to tell. I parked my wheeler on the crest of a very large hill to take in the 360 view. I turned to see my wheeler rolling backward down the hill. Susan didn’t know I could run as fast as I did to catch it. I set the hand break and locked the break lever down with the latch. Evidently I didn’t pull it hard enough to truly lock the wheels. Anyway the break slipped allowing the wheeler to roll. The wheeler stopped on it’s own before I got to it, and I learned an inexpensive lesson to use the park position on the gear shift.

I’m getting a lesson in desert flora and fauna. I can now name five different kinds of cactus and several trees indigenous to the area. The mourning doves are nesting waking us each morning with their mating calls. The males collect the raw material returning them for the female to weave into a nest.

We will go back to Albuquerque next week to get the RV repair finished then to Las Cruces for the month of February. We like to get into the history of a place, see the local museums, and sample the local food and culture. Retirement is good, the only thing I miss about working is money and a few of the people.

The house in Oregon still has not sold. The market there is soft and my crystal ball is not very clear about future prospects. We will see. I do not expect to go back to Oregon until it sells. We will then put the rest of our stuff into storage.

Susan and I have started doing the Tai Chi form of Chi Kong every morning to stretch our bodies get the blood moving. This form of exercise seems to invigorate both of us. I’ve been riding a bike and metal detecting for additional exercise.

It finally occurred to me that I was retired the other day when I woke up from a mid day nap and had to decide whether to go metal detecting or four wheeling. The weather was sunny and high sixties here in central Arizona. Metal detecting won that day and four wheeling was great the next day.



These are a few of the metal detecting finds from the last month or so. Four rings, three silver and one gold with a diamond (small) but a diamond nonetheless. A couple of balloon pins and a pin from South Africa.


On a personal note, We are both working on separate writing projects now that we are a two computer family again. I bought some computer based learning software and am learning to read music, something I always wanted to know. We are learning how to live simply in a lot less space that we are used too.

In October we did tourist things traveling through Idaho, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah then back to Oregon doing the things we thought we never had time to do. The weather turned colder in Buena Vista, Colorado in mid October. We visited the kids in Denver for a few days then followed the sun south into Bandoleer National Monument for a week to visit with some dear friends traveling from Oklahoma.

Bandoleer is located in the beautiful Jemez Mountains in Northern New Mexico near Los Alamos, the home of the first atom bomb. We hiked along the Frijoles River where, a thousand years ago, indigenous Anastasia people grew beans, corn, and squash while living in cliff dwelling and carving pictographs on the canyon walls around them. For me, the pictographs are the most amazing things in this landscape. Carving Rock Art was no simple task with the tools available at the time. These people wanted to express something that is lost to the current civilization. One can not help but wonder what that message was.

We toured the science museum in Los Alamos where we learned the story of the creation of little boy and fat man, the A bombs dropped on Japan that ended the second word war. The first day of power shopping in Santa Fe was enough to last me for another twenty years. I declined power shopping outings after that, opting for solitary walks and practicing with my five hole flute under the towering Ponderosa Pines. Our friends left us after five days to continue their vacation visiting family in Arizona.



We then spent a couple of days in Albuquerque during the balloon festival, sampling the local restaurants and starting our Christmas shopping. Then to Arizona for the Painted Desert, the petrified forest, meteor crater, and the Grand Canyon. Meteor crater is of special interest to me feeding into a hobby of meteorite collecting, and yes I do have a 100 gram specimen of the meteor crater fall called Canyon Diablo. Meteor crater was caused by a relatively small 200 foot diameter rock from space traveling at cosmic speed of 26 miles per second about 50, 000 years ago. That creator is over a mile wide and 600 feet deep. The dinosaurs were wiped out by a mile diameter asteroid striking near the Yucatan peninsula 65 million years ago. That crater is over 20 miles in diameter.





The Grand Canyon visit was a first for both of us.. It was Susan’s birthday, so, we celebrated with a flight over the canyon. I think flying over the canyon is the only way to get a perspective of the magnitude of the gash the Colorado River cut through this landscape in the past couple of billion years.

The next stop was Paiute ATV trail system in south central Utah. This 275 mile trail system forms a big loop through several small towns that are ATV friendly allowing ATVs on the city streets. Many riders make the loop in a week or so, supporting the local restaurants and motels. We couldn't make the loop because we were late in the season with lots of snow above 8000 feet. Maybe we can make the loop next year.

It was time to return to Oregon to deal with some details around Janice’s estate, our house that is still on the market, and to see our doctors to renew prescriptions. We spent a couple of days with good friends in central Oregon then back to Eugene. We spent about a week in Eugene where we stayed in the mobile mansion in some good friend’s driveway, not wanting to hinder the marketability of our house. We spent another night with our good friends in central Oregon on the way out. Then back across Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming. We stopped in Laramie, Wyoming to do some scouting for a home base. We ruled out Wyoming for a lot of reasons and are centering our home base search in central Colorado near Buena Vista in the Arkansas River valley. We made it back to Golden for Thanksgiving with the kids running in front of a snow storm. Next was a trip to South Dakota to move our no state income tax residency forward and dinner with some good friends. We spent a few days in Denver then headed back south in front of another snow storm. That satellite TV weather channel is great for planning dry pavement trips. We spent another few days in Albuquerque sampling the local cuisine hoping to get the mobile mansion repaired but the parts were delayed so we fled to Arizona to find some sun. We are in Camp Verde, AZ enjoying the warm days and cool nights. We plan to be back in Denver for Christmas then back south to warm weather for the winter.