signs, etc.

Another jam with Mike McAbee

Iowa Tractors

Happy anniversary to us!

Together again at last!

Stuff goes on even in Grand Island, Nebraska! But I couldn't hang around here for long! I've got to head back home! It's our 30th wedding anniversary today!!! The old VW got me home safely and we are going out to dinner tonight!

VW Drivin'

Getting gas in Naperville, Illinois. Did you know that Naperville was named the #3 best place to live in Money Magazine?

Of course, Fort Collins was named the #2 best place!!

I'm on the road this morning driving my VW back home to Colorado. I've got my bike, the banjo, and a bunch of other stuff that we didn't load on the moving van.

In Chicago today!

The last day, packing up!

Here to pick up my car and head out West. Yep, I'm going across Iowa yet again.

Le Claire, Iowa

Two Hobos together in one picture! Here I am with Mr. Rick Gage, otherwise known as Iowa Blackie! Mr. Gage remembers the exact day he jumped on his first ore car at the age of 14, and the very moment he gave his life to the rails. He was given the name Iowa Blackie by a group of hobos in 1984, at a hobo "circus" in Minneapolis. We exchanged a number of banjo jokes and went on our way!

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Tipton
Bennett
New Liberty
Maysville
Eldridge
Argo
Le Claire

Tipton, Iowa

WELCOME TO TIPTON!

This is weird! Banjo and accordions in Tipton, Iowa!

We played 'Mama don't Allow No Banjo Playin' 'round Here'

The guy in the red shirt worked for the local newspaper. We might be in it!

It turns out this guy and his wife are staying at a house about 20 feet from my tent. It looks like we might be doing polkas all night!

(The guy's name is Ken Harris from Boise, Idaho. His band is called "The Hoochie Coochie Men". Listen here for samples!)

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
North Liberty
Solon
Lisbon
Mount Vernon
Martelle
Morley
Mechanicsville
Tipton

North Liberty, Iowa

Too much jamming last night! I rode into Tama about 8:30pm and had to pitch the tent in the dark.
Today it is cool with a light rain. I'm keeping the banjo playing to a minimum. At the free trade coffee place, I broke the D string on the banjo, so I had a good excuse not to play!
Gotta hump it over to North Liberty to get to our hotel early (I hope!)

Bikers on the internet! In Belle Plaine, Iowa!
Waiting to use the facilities in Belle Plaine

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Tama/Toledo
Vining
Chelsea
Belle Plaine
Luzerne
Blairstown
West Amana
South Amana
Homestead
North Liberty

Tama/Toledo Iowa

Playing banjo someplace in Iowa

Jammin' with Mike McAbee

...on a farm maybe 24 mile from Ames

WTF??!! I'm on a bike and gas is only 17 cents!!!

In Colo, Iowa

Playin' at the fillin' station

Fixin' an arm





Someplace 2 miles outside of Ames

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Ames
Nevada
Colo
State Center
Albion
Green Mountain
Le Grand
Montour
Tama/Toledo

Ames, Iowa

Today we ride into Ames, Iowa!

Jammin' in Boon, Iowa

There were two crossing guards at the railroad crossing. I stopped there and played banjo for their entertainment (and the Ragbrai riders too!)
In Ogden, Iowa I found the public library and there was a computer that was free to use, so I was able to load some pictures.

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Jefferson
Grand Junction
Dana
Ogden
Boone
Ames

Jefferson, Iowa

Cute cartoons on a pink bus
Paul Bernard's Mr. Pork Chop Bus!

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Harlan
Kimballton
Elk Horn
Exira
Larland
Coon Rapids
Scranton
Jefferson
Near Coon Rapids, Tom H. (of the Roadside Boys) and I played music for the riders at Mr. Pork Chop (Paul Bernard)

Harlan Iowa

Here we are in Harlan. We are camping out. Some crazy people let us camp in their back yard. There are 74 of us! How much toilet paper do you need? David, our flying dentist decided to take off in the back yard!

David doing his thing.

All these women are named Jeanne!

They ride in The Jeanne Pool!

Today we are biking through these fine towns:
Missouri Valley
Beebeetown
Underwood
Neola
Minden
Shelby
Tennant
Harlan

In Harlan, a big wind came and blew my tent into several pieces! The storm didn't last long, but I will have to buy a new tent tomorrow!

Misery Valley

Car and Banjo

The car is staying in Chicago, but the banjo is going to IowaThis morning is the bus ride to Missouri Valley via the famous RAGBRAI C.U.B.S. (Chicago Urban Bicycle Society). We will camp out there tonight and then tomorrow morning it's off to Harlan, Iowa!

Unloading the bikes in Missouri Valley. Tomorrow we ride to Harlan!

Again, ON THE ROAD!

I'm at a library using the 10 minute computer! Let's see if I can do this in time!
OK, Took the bus from Fort Collins to Denver airport.

Took a plane from Denver to Chicago.

I won't get a chance to see these dinosaurs, but I did take the CTA and Metra trains to where my car and bike are located. In the morning I will be taking a bus to the West part of Iowa for the RAGBRAI! I will update this blog when I can!
oops! Time's up. BUE!

Going to Iowa?

This morning I am heading to Chicago where I will pick up my car, my banjo and my bicycle. From there I will be traveling to Missouri Valley, Iowa on Saturday to be a part of 10,000+ other crazy bike riders on the "Registers Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa", otherwise known as RAGBRAI. I am not sure if I will get a chance to update this blog during the ride, but I will be taking pictures, so eventually they will be posted!

Don't go there!

At the Amalgamated Sugar Company in Loveland...
If they didn't want anyone to go there, wouldn't a simple "KEEP OUT" be sufficient? Unless they really meant to "KEEP OUT NO PHOTOGRAPHERS" which means that even if you were a photographer and did not intend to take a picture, you were still welcome?
Actually, since the area has heavy railroad traffic, they probably meant "NO RAILROAD BUFFS". I can't see any other reason to be there. NO SUGAR LOVERS ALLOWED? It's a mystery.

Kathy Fromme

Did I mention that I just LOVE the bike trails in Fort Collins? I've completed the following trails this past two weeks: Mason, Spring Creek, Poudre River, Power, Fossil Creek, and just this morning, Kathy Fromme.
The Kathy Fromme trail is unusual because it goes though some open land with prairie dogs, rattle snakes, and osprey, to name a few natural critters!

But most of the trails are not through open land. On the Spring Creek and the Poudre River trails they have all the kinds of amenities that you would expect from world class bike trail, like free air for your tires!

Trail maps you can read!

Free beer!

... and emergency call boxes when you can't find your way home!

July Signs

I don't think that we have been to any of these places in town yet!

Estes Park!

I attempted to ride out to Estes Park this morning. I started out around 8:00 am and by around noon I was half way there!

Here's the Big Thompson River Dam

And here is an example of what I saw on the way to Estes.

Looks like a face in the mountain! Who does it look like?

Here I am!

Here's Jeanne! See! She's alive and well!
Jeanne met me for lunch. Estes Park seemed a bit too commercial, so we traveled to the real attraction. We bought a year's pass to the Rocky Mountain National Park. Here is Jeanne in RMNP's Hidden Valley!
We decided to miss the rodeo in Estes Park!

General housekeeping

... consisting of waiting in the Larimer County Courthouse to get our new automobile title and license plates, opening a new bank account, unpacking boxes and other odds and ends.
Still can't find certain items. I think the movers purposely hid some of our boxes that were clearly labeled "MASTER BEDROOM" someplace in the basement storage area.
Tomorrow should be fun: We are going to the Estes Park rodeo!!! Yahoo!!

Windsor Colorado

When we returned from our first trip out west to find a place to live, we saw on the news in Chicago about Windsor, Colorado. On May 22, 2008 an EF3 tornado devastated the town of Windsor and many areas of Weld County and Larimer County, killing one and injuring 100 other people in its wake. The tornado was preceded by golf-ball-size hail and torrential winds which knocked over 15 Rail Road cars, vehicles and semi trucks.
Colorado does not get many tornadoes, so it was unusual to hear about this one. Today I rode my bicycle out to Windsor to see how things were going:

Many houses around the town were getting new roofs. You could hear the nail guns going off in all directions! I came upon this small shopping area on the east side of Windsor. You can read the sign, but not much is left of the stores:

Lots of trees were pulled out of the ground and thrown about.

Here just a metal frame remains.

Just the windows and everything inside this building are gone!

There are crews working to clean up the area right now.

Not much can be salvaged from this mess.

Which one was Marks Funeral and Cremation?

I think it's this one.

...or maybe that one. Oh, I don't know. According to Mark, his 8 ton animal crematorium was still intact, so maybe his business will return.

I will return to Windsor before the winter and see how its going.

War planes!

We saw some special aero-planes flying in the sky this weekend. They landed at the Fort Collins-Loveland airport, so I rode my bike out to the airport to see if I could get a good look at them. I found out that it is not easy going to this airport on a bike, but I made it there all the same!

I got to take a look under a Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress

I am not sure if I could have fit into the turret even if they let me try!

Front view of the B17

The Consolidated B-24J Liberator

The North American B-25J Mitchel

You could get a ride in either the B24 or B25 for about $425. The B17 was a bit higher: $4000.00 !!!

Loveland Light Heat and Power

I seem to be going south via bike most of the time. When I do that, Loveland gets in the way.

I thought that this was for sale, but it is only for rent. I wonder how much they want?

Cheese it! It's the Police!

We had a great time last night in City Park listening to the Fort Collins Symphony Orchestra! They also had a nice fireworks show in the park.
The City Park is near CSU campus, so we got to witness a lot of drunken parties in the area. It reminded me of the 'good old college days' at U of I. But I am glad we live in the quiet area of town!
While I was out on the bike (Jeanne's bike actually, my bike is still in Chicago) I saw this huge building:

It's the new Fort Collins Police Services Building!

Built in 2007 at a cost of $33 million, it was designed to be eco-friendly.

Ask any FoCo Cop what it was like before this, and they will tell you all the crap they had to put up with before the city finally got them out of their last police station built in 1957!

Happy 4th You'all

We have been busy unpacking and have not figured out where the fireworks are going to be. It's really dry around here, so there are many warnings about lighting ANYTHING around town.

We have met about five neighbors so far and they seem to be very nice and willing to help out flatlanders like us. Nobody seems weird, but we will TRY to fit in as best we can!

We got it!

Wow! We actually got all our stuff delivered before the 4th of July! HOT DAMN!

Here comes the big truck at 8:30 am. How nice it looked!

The boss man-driver was kind of a jerk, but his two helpers did most of the work and were fun to joke around. I even played some banjo music while they were on break. They really enjoyed it! I don't know if you are supposed to tip movers, but I gave these guys each a $50 bill when it was all over. I'm glad that's over with!
...now we gotta unpack all this stuff!

Exploration time!

We think our furniture is in Kansas this afternoon. By tonight it should be near Fort Collins. So, maybe we will have delivery on Thursday!!! It could happen!
Anyhow, lets take a walk west of the house to see what's there:

Here's the back yard, looking from the green belt.

About 20 feet west of the fence: It's the extended parking lot for Front Range College.

About 50 feet north there is an agriculture test site.

...and looking south from that point are the houses facing the lot.

The yellow arrow is about where our back yard is located.

I can walk out from my back door, go across campus and be at the Harmony Library in 4 minutes!
(That's where I am right now using their wireless internet to update this blog!)

More bike path sculpture

I went South on some of the bike paths in town. Here are some examples of the bike path sculpture art along the path.

I never saw this kind of stuff in Illinois, so it was unusual to me.

It's kind of neat actually!

We have some furniture in our new house! We purchased a bed for our master bedroom. The old bed will go into the guest room (when it gets here!) The movers say we might get delivery by Thursday, maybe. Don't bet on it!

Loveland, etc.

I was trying to get some video of the prairie dogs in action, but they didn't want to perform for me today. I guess I'll have to talk to the manager!