It a well known fact that Durango has 300 days of sun each year, the monsoon rains start on July 4th, and above all, if you don’t like the weather in the San Juan’s, wait 30 minutes. However I don’t recall a cold wet May like we’re experiencing. Of course, if you round up I’m 69 and it’s probably time for me to start wearing three shirts and a coat in the house, but it’s just not right to be cold in May. Sure we’ve lost quite a number of tomato plants here in the last 32 years, but that’s only with overnight temps close to 32°. Normally when the sun’s up, it’s warm, especially in our Feng Sui sunroom/office. It’s almost June and the deck sliding door hasn’t even been cracked for more than a pass-through.
Stanna’s put up the deck garden between thundershowers, and the drip system is installed and waiting for sun to dry out the slushy potting soil enough to need water. All this cold wet weather is welcome because the snowpack, water levels and lakes are well below average, it’s just hard not to be outside enjoying Spring. Every time we plan a backpacking excursion, it’s not the nighttime lows that cancel our plans, it’s the daytime lows of high 40’s low 50’s, and high 60% chance of snow/rain that discourages us.
We did have a Warmshowers guest, Jack Day, who is completing a two-year circumnavigation of the “west”, as defined by all those states west of the “midwestern” town of Des Moines, where he started and plans to finish by July. Jack was, like all the crosscountry cyclists we’ve hosted, a welcome and enjoyable guest. Jack probably takes the prize for the most gear on his bike. He even had a full-sized bicycle floor pump bungied on.
Jack was even game to help when I went over to friend Will’s house to finish off his 5.2 KW solar array project we’d started the week before. Mike Taylor and I had helped install the panels earlier, and this time Jack and I strung electrical-code-required chicken-wire on the back-side of the array. A task far more difficult than the initial installation.
The weather hasn’t slowed down the Purging Program though. Stanna is in Stage III of “Giving With A Warm Hand,” sifting through family heirlooms this week: jewelry, photos and paintings, china, silver, and linens all selected to be parceled out to younger interested family. It would be a good time to put your name on anything we’ve got, lest it goes out with the recyclables.
My only productive claim during this cold spell, is rigging a hands-free Chrome Dome umbrella set-up for my backpack. The umbrella has accompanied me on several outings but never when it’s rained. Just seems fitting to figure out the rig while it’s raining outside.
Eager to get back on the trail, but it looks like it will have to be after we get back from Portland in mid-June. Hope to see Don & Janice as well as Ivan & Jeanie who’ll be there at the same time.
