It Takes A Team

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Wagonteamster

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12/9/10, La Garita, CO - The best days of our lives seem to pass all too swiftly. Since I last blogged on Thanksgiving, I’ve been hither and dither, but through it all I’ve had a great time. A week ago, I flew to Mississippi for more rounds of Doctor appointments (the lawsuit involving my wreck in February of 2009 still drags on). The past week, I’ve had a great time here in La Garita. Saturday morning (12/11) I’m driving to Seabrook, NH to start a short term contract job at the nuclear plant, at which I was previously employed. I’m looking forward to returning to New Hampshire. Along with the job, it will be a great opportunity to visit with friends and family, with whom I haven’t seen in a long time. It’s been 2 1/2 years since an fairly inexperienced Teamster hitched four horses to a wagon, left New Hampshire and set off to see America.

This is a picture of my grandson, Aiden. Not yet nine months old, he has already started training to become a teamster. Besides walking, he’s developing a strong grip and broad shoulders so he can later handle the lines of a head strong team.

The past few days, we have had some great weather in the San Luis Valley. The temperatures have been mild and the air crystal clear. With the clear air, low humidity and with very little light pollution, the nighttime sky is as full of stars as there is grains of sand on a beach. The great band of the milkyway is a blaze of light across the sky.

The following pictures help tell the tale of life here, between the San Juan and Sangre De Cristo mountains.

Antelope, laying in the field with the town of La Garita in the background. This morning, while driving to town to pick up some fencing supplies, I got caught in a La Garita traffic jamb. A large herd of 60 to 70 antelope were on the road, caught between the fences on each side. While pronghorns are extremely fast, they are poor jumpers, and won’t normally jump a fence. Instead, they go under it or climb between the strands of barb wire. Unfortunately, I didn’t think to take a picture at that time.

Some of the breakfast crowd at the trading post. They include farmers, ranchers, truck drivers and retired folks (and of course Jerry, who is standing up, leaving him with some mobility for the morning conversation).

This is the last day the lads get to enjoy the large pasture down the road. Tomorrow, I bringing them up to the three acre paddock behind the store. I’ve spent the last couple of days getting the paddock ready. Tomorrow, we pick up several one ton bales of grass hay.

A few clouds rolled in at sunset, just enough to make a glorious light show.

^{There is a large community of Mennonites in the area. Tonight, Jerry, Bonnie, I, and about 300 other people attended a Christmas fellowship dinner, put on by the local Mennonite Church. They traditionally serve chili and homemade cinnamon rolls (a terrific combination). For those that don’t like chili, there’s also some homemade chicken soup.}

The Mennonite community also has a large semi-covered ice skating rink in the area. If they ever cared to, I think their hockey team would be in serious contention for the Stanley Cup. Monday night we stopped over to watch them practice.

The dessert table at the dinner really caused a dilemma - If you really work at it, you can sample everything. But, what do you eat first?

To cap off the evening, the San Luis Valley Mennonite Youth Club sang a great selection of Christmas music