Backcountry flowers beckon. (Click all images to enlarge.)
The 1947 Willys Jeep sits mothballed in our driveway, shrouded like a mourning monk in a Walmart econo grey car cover. Like being whipped in the face by a three-inch spruce limb, to deny the call of the “Rumble Bee” does sting. But after a long season of decadent frolic in snow castles from Canada to Austria, catching up on house repairs and building a storage shed at the WildSnow field office is our penance. We tick off items on the to-do list knowing that absolution will come when we are again free to play in frosted mountains. The chores consume day after summer day, until a special visitor arrives and we have our excuse to enter the peaceful realm of our beautiful backcountry.
Our son comes for a visit... excuse to resurrect the Willys and go for a ride.
Work before play -- Progeny helps out on the shed project.
Buzzin around in the Rumble Bee.
Wild raspberries are in season and we gorge like bears out of hibernation.
View of Marble Peak in the summer.
What grace have we to live in such a breathtaking place.
Fooling around on a spire chimney.
Rocks and lichen are as spectacular as the wild flowers.
Louie hears a thunk and we stop in time to remove this log before it breaks the emergency brake line. Good thing since the narrow road home is steep and treacherous. Lou says he built the 'Bee' for rock crawling, not 'log dragging.'
They say if you don't like the weather in Colorado, wait five minutes and it will change. Clouds rumble like Nascar racers threatening to overtake our little Jeep as we scoot back to town.
After a few minutes, the sun shines again.
Slow Groovin BBQ in Marble has become our favorite place to celebrate whatever event we can think of, in this case safely returning from a Jeep ride (our son's visit was celebrated the day before). Even though we have our favorites, we always try at least one new item. Deep fried okra gets gobbled up fast, as tasty as everything else on the menu. It's all good.
6 comments
Looks like fun and tasty. Thank you for sharing!
That looks like the road up Whitehouse. I was under the assumption it was private. Or, with your amount of time in the Marble area, know the right people? I have always felt like a criminal using the (general) road cut up Whitehouse even for spring skiing; like closer to town, you can’t help but notice the signage telling people to stay away.
Hi Josh, it’s private and we got permission to go up there, probably something we’ll only ever get to do once as the folks in control of access don’t really want a lot of people using the road (it’s super narrow, no turnouts, quite dangerous). As far as I know it’s ok to walk the road so long as you gain access without passing any no-trespassing signs. Lots of USFS land around there, along with the parcels of private land. Along with sight seeing we were looking at the land parcels, may try to acquire one up there, so we had a commerce reason for being there as well. As with many gated access roads, this one has some controversy surrounding it in terms of access, which would not be appropriate for me to get into in public as I only have hearsay. Lou
Oh Lou, some juicy gossip from the Quarry Rd? “Hearsay” you say? When has that really stopped you before? :wink
An gems on those hills?
AO
Wow, what a Jeep! Nice, place for sure this Colorado 🙂
Back from the days when real Jeeps were built, not bought. Now that’s changed and you can get a pretty good one off the shelf, that even has a heater! (grin) Lou
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