A life long local said in the gym yesterday that this was the longest Fall she’s seen ever in Durango.  Considering she’s almost my age or better that’s saying a lot.  I’d call it an Indian Summer (if that’s still politically correct) because the day I returned from my ride it froze. And before that single night freeze I guess they’d had a couple of weeks of super weather as well. So this long 3 week stretch qualifies as a bone fide  summer extension after the first freeze.

We’ve enjoyed warm afternoons, great hikes (even with hunting season) and even better, the last Sunday bike ride up the Animas Valley.  The clear deep blue skies beg you to get outside and enjoy the Fall weather.  Saturday I went on a short hike just to test out some new gear before the season completely closes us out of the high country.  See if you can guess what my new gear was from the photo.  I’d really like to work in an overnight but it will probably have to be south of here, because the overnight temps in the high country are in the 20’s and my three season ultralite set-up is too light for sleeping at those temps.  I have gotten a number of new additions to the gear list and think that my next overnight hike could have a base weight about 8 1/2 pounds including a stove this time.  Now if I can just improve the food selection, I’ll have it all dialed in for some sort of thru hike.

As you can see from the deck photo we’ve put up all the deck plantings and have just a few more pieces of furniture to bring in for the winter.  Fall colors have lasted considerably longer than we remember and the Animas river is the lowest we’ve ever seen it.  And it you haven’t checked Ivan has almost finished his cross country ride.