Summer's Coming

Memorial Day, the unofficial start to summer is coming up. It feels like summer has already started in Colorado. It has gotten into the mid-80's at my place. Yesterday, it was in the 90's at Ft. Collins and other front range towns. 90's has been in the forcast for Denver the past two days. Clouds are the only thing that has kept that from happening. (Actually, I just saw on the news that there was a record high of 90 at the Denver airport today.) Anyway, here is a new picture.


The Chapel on the Rock - Mt. Meeker & Rocky Mountain N.P. is behind the chapel.

This Is The Picture

This is Echo Lake near Mt. Evans on a sunny day in May.

-MM

Life Is Hard

New posts have been scarce as of late. I figure ought to share a couple pictures since I have not done that in a while. With temperatures approaching 80 today in Denver, I decided to eat lunch on a cliff that overlooks Coal Creek, Pinecliffe, and the railroad tracks. I was hoping a train would go by while I was up there; no such luck.


Looking west towards Pinecliffe and the Continental Divide.








Coal Creek and the railroad tracks

IV

I heard a noise outside my apartment. I thought it might be a coyote. However, I didn't see a coyote, so it it must have been something else. I took a picture just in case the camera saw something I missed.













Anyway, I want to wish Cara a Happy Birthday!!!

-Uncle Mike

Return To Deer Mountain

Yesterday, I hiked to the top of Deer Mountain (10,013 Ft.) in Rocky Mountain National Park. I tried climbing this mountain last April, and I got to about a half mile from the top. Unfortunately the trail disappeared and the snow was too deep for someone without snowshoes. I vowed to come back, and yesterday was the day. There is not a lot of snow this year; however, I still lost the trail in the snow at about the same spot as last year. This time I had snowshoes with me. So I put them on and took a direct path to the top. It wasn't the easiest way, but it got me there. I probably could have done it without snowshoes. The snow is not even close to what it was last year. The top of Deer Mountain has a good view of Estes Park, Moraine Park, and Longs Peak. From the top I was able to find the actual trail and follow it back to where I lost it.




Longs Peak, Moraine Park, & Me.









Estes Park









Me on the summit of Deer Mountain

Signs

The weather in Denver has been sunny and nice. Denver set record highs 3 days in a row last week. Anyway, I was out wandering the trails along Bear Creek when I came across a sign. It was a Happy Birthday sign for Pops. It was in the same area where someone put a Happy Birthday sign for Carter about a little over a year ago. I was surprised to see the sign so I took a picture of it.













Happy Birthday Pops!!!

-MM

The Blog Remains The Same

It has been an interesting week to say the least, but the blog remains the same. Onward with today’s adventure where I went to Rocky Mountain National Park for hike. I broke out the snowshoes and hiked to Emerald Lake. It was a relatively easy hike. The snow was hard packed. I probably could have gotten away without the snowshoes, but it was more fun to have them. Anyway, here are the photos. It is hard to capture the beauty of this place.





Nymph Lake










Dream Lake











Emerald Lake











Me on Emerald Lake






Looking up at Hallett Peak







Ice on Emerald Lake

Looking at Longs Peak & Glacier Gorge

Eponymous

I went for a hike at Castlewood Canyon State Park on Sunday. It is a beautiful park east of Castle Rock. Castle Rock is south of Denver. Cherry Creek flows through the canyon. This is the same Cherry Creek that flows into the S. Platte River next to the REI in downtown Denver. I ended up hiking about 7.5 miles today. The weather was nice. I was able to wear shorts and a t-shirt hiking. There were some nice views of the Front Range from the canyon rim. I hiked by an old dam that was built in 1890. The dam failed in 1933. Here are some pictures.



The Dam from the Rimrock Trail






Me along the Rimrock Trail





Castlewood Canyon with Pikes Peak on the horizon.






Castlewood Canyon below the dam







Dam site









Dam from the former lake bed.

Pikes Peak

Dos a Cero!!!

Dos a Cero!!! Dos a Cero!!! Dos a Cero!!! That’s a favorite chant when the U.S. plays Mexico. It means 2-0, which has become the common score line when the U.S. beats Mexico. Once again it was the score on Wednesday night; the U.S. beat Mexico 2-0 in a World Cup Qualifier in Columbus, Mexico. I was there for the festivities along with my brother, my cousin Ray, and Hunter. I’m back in Colorado now. I’m tired, hoarse, and happy.

The fun began Wednesday around lunch time. We went to Claddagh Irish Pub in downtown Columbus for lunch. Sam’s Army was hanging out there. We watched some soccer and ate lunch with a whole bunch of people wearing U.S red not Buckeye red. From there we went to Ruby Tuesday (not the chain), where the American Outlaws were hanging out and having a good time. Ruby Tuesday is a dive bar in a neighborhood that is mainly Ohio State students. The Hudson Street Hooligans, a Columbus Crew supporter’s group, use it as their hang out bar. The bar is in walking distance to the stadium. So we hung out there for a while drinking beer, singing songs, etc. Captain America, Abe Lincoln, Rocky, and company were at the bar. They were same guys that I met in Colorado and saw in D.C.




Crowd Shot at Ruby Tuesday










Me & Hunter in the crowd at Ruby Tuesday

Singing Outlaws Video

Cold weather is the reason for having the game in Columbus, Ohio in February. The idea is to freeze the Mexican players since they are not use to the cold. It worked in 2001. This time, the weather was in the 50’s at game time. However, it started raining in later half of the afternoon. Columbus was under a tornado watch. About an hour and a half before the game, there was a hail storm. There was concern about getting the game in. Fortunately, the dangerous weather did not last long, but it was extremely windy the rest of the night.

We had great seats for the game with one exception. We were in the middle of a huge Mexican section. That was disappointing. The crowd was probably split 50-50. Not exactly, the home field advantage the U.S. Soccer Federation was looking for, but it is better than playing in a huge stadium. It was hard for us to be heard until the U.S. scored right before halftime. The Mexican fans got a bit quieter after that. The U.S. got their second goal right before the end of the game. Click here for game highlights.





Game Over









Dos a Cero!!!










Ray, Jim, me, & Hunter





Dos a Cero!!! Dos a Cero!!! Dos a Cero!!!

-MM

On A Plain

I went for a hike at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge on Saturday. The Rocky Mountain Arsenal is a little bit more out on the plains then I usually hike. The Arsenal is the site of a World War II chemical weapons manufacturing center located northeast of Denver. The site was declared contaminated in the 80's. The site has been cleaned up and is considered safe for animals and soccer fields. So I figured I checked it out since I've never been hiking there before. Here are a couple of pics.



Lake Ladora with Longs Peak on the horizon








I'm being watched.







A World Cup Qualifier between the U.S. & Mexico is this Wednesday. If you are not jumping on a plane to go to Columbus to see it, you should check out on TV or at your local soccer pub. It is on ESPN2 at 7:00 P.M. Eastern & 5:00 P.M. Mountain. It should be a good one!!!

-MM

Sitting Still

Because of my knee, you can say I've been wasting time sitting still for the past month and a half. I haven't done a whole lot other than sit on my bum and watch TV. Hence, there hasn't been much in the way of new posts. I hope to change that. I went for a short hike around Harriman Lake today. Actually, I went around the lake twice for a total of 2.8 miles. It is the longest I've walked since the surgery. I have a little bit of an inflammation issue that has kept me from pushing myself as much as I would like; I just have to pace myself until it gets better. Other than that, the knee is fine.



Harriman Lake with Mt. Morrison in the background




Anyway, I am looking forward hiking again as well as the big soccer event on February the 11th

-MM

Changes

It has been a while since I have done a post. That's mainly because I haven't had anything to showcase. While my knee is getting better, I'm not ready to go off hiking. It is shame too. The weather has been nice. We have had a few 6o degree-days recently. Hopefully, I will be back in action soon.

Since I don't have any new pictures to share, I will share a You Tube clip of David Letterman's Farewell Tribute to "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches".

While I have no intention of making this a political blog, I'll just say that I hope the new Administration makes comedy writers do a little more work.

Cheers,

-MM

New Year's Day

All is quiet today. No kids, airplanes, lions, elephants, motorbikes, etc. Just beer, pizza, and football. (Go Dawgs!) I got back home yesterday after spending a week visiting family in North Carolina. It was a week of eating, hanging out with family, and playing with Carter & Cara. In other words, it was a good Christmas. I hope everyone else had a good one. Thanks to those who sent me Christmas cards. I got quite a few that had their kids on them. I don't have kids so here are a couple of pictures of my nephew and niece on Christmas to substitute for that.





Carter











Cara







Happy New Year,

-MM

Eight-Eight?

Happy Birthday Carter!!! Since I know you love NASCAR, I was hoping to get the driver of the number 8 car to stop by and celebrate your birthday with me. Unfortunately, the driver of the number 8 car was not available. I had to settle for the driver of the number 88 car. I hope that is all right. Hopefully two eights will be better than one. Here is a picture of him in my kitchen.

















I wanted to take him out to your birthday sign by the creek. The sign should be up. But I didn’t think my knee was up to the walk. So I wasn’t able to see the sign this year.

I hope you are having a wonderful Birthday,
-Uncle Mighty Mike

Getting Better

If you don't know, I had my knee scoped last Monday. I'm able to get around and take care of things with just a slight limp now. It feels better each day. I would like to thank Pops for staying the week out here with me. It was good to have him around despite him complaining about being really cold all week when the temps were not that bad. Well he got out of town just in time. It really is cold now. It is currently -15° F at DIA. Based on the reports I'm seeing, the temperature is probably in the 0° to -2° range currently at my place. While it is not as cold as the airport, it is cold enough.

I didn't take any pictures of my knee right after the surgery. The swelling has gone down but is still visible. Here is a picture of what it looks like today.


As cold as it is today, the bandages should not melt.





Thanks for the get well wishes. I'm getting better. No Worries.

-MM

108

My number one fan is out here for a week. Pops flew in Saturday. We went driving around the mountains today.


Pops climbing around at an overlook at Juniper Pass near Mt. Evans




I even got him to go on a short hike. We hiked up Mt. Falcon at an elevation of 7,851 feet.




This is the results of the drive and hike.

Out In The Cold

Colorado got a lot of snow this weekend. I hear Loveland Ski Area got 43.5" over the past 3 days. It snowed Friday night and Sunday at my place. There maybe 6 inches of snow on the ground locally. It is a wet snow, which is good for snowballs. Too bad Carter is not around; I could throw snowballs at him. Here are a couple of pictures of the snow on Sunday.

In Reverse

Happy Thanksgiving! I had a laid back Thanksgiving. No ski trip this year for multiple reasons. Even without those reasons, I doubt there would have been a ski trip. The snow conditions are not that good this time of the year at least from the standpoint of someone who lives here. Anyway, this year I brought back the old Thanksgiving tradition of climbing a mountain and eating a sandwich on top. I climbed the Brother. It is an easy hike near Evergreen. I did this hike with the family this past summer. To make the hike a little different, I did the hike in reverse and hiked by the Sisters before climbing the Brother. It was a bit chillier this time around as well. It was about 32° F and overcast. A front has come through bringing cooler temperatures.




Me and a sandwich







Happy Thanksgiving,

-MM

With My Own Two Hands

I attended the US v Guatemala game tonight with my buddy Mark and some of his friends. The US won 2-0 with goals from Kenny Cooper and Freddy Adu. We had seats in the front row behind the Gatorade next to the US Bench. It was quite fun being down that low. Mark had fun giving Guatemala’s fans the business. We had a loud group a few rows back from us. Overall, the crowd was disappointing turnout. All things considered, the game was mid-week and meaningless to the US. There was absolutely no advertising for the game. The tickets were the most expensive of the three home games this round. I’m not sure why, they had to expect this game would be meaningless. I hope US Soccer Federation considers all of this when thinking about future games. Anyway I had fun at the game. I even got my hands on the game ball. The ball bounced my way about a minute before the half, and I caught it.

As for the game, I think the US did well. Guatemala did not offer much. I was surprised; I figured they would go all out since they had to win. They sat back more then I thought they would. The US defense was never really tested until late in the game after it was already decided. US soccer fans got their wish of having Altidore, Cooper, and Adu in the line-up. They did well after settling down after some bad touches early on. Altidore assisted on Cooper's goal. Adu nailed a free kick. He did have quite a few poor dead ball kicks before that though. I thought Adu looked dangerous overall in the run of play. Overall, I was happy with the team's play considering that it was a mix of the "C-Team" with "A-Team" hopefuls.

I attended the American Outlaws Tailgate Party before the game. It was cool. Nowhere near as big as the one in D.C. It was still a good atmosphere. Free Beer and Food. I got to meet Captain America, Abe Lincoln, Neil Armstrong, Rocky Balboa, and Paul Revere. They are from Pennsylvania. They were the same guys we saw in D.C. last month. Here are some pictures from the tailgate and game.




Neil Armstrong plays soccer







Warm-Ups





Brian Ching and Conor Casey getting ready to go into the game.




Cooper, Adu, & Altidore on the bench after getting the job done.

Smile

Greetings all. Not much in the way of new adventures to report this weekend. However, out of the blue, my favorite nephew sent me a picture in the mail. He shared his picture with me, so I decided I would share it with the rest of the world.













Thanks Carter! It put a smile on my face.

-U.M.M.