The calendar says it’s October but across much of the country you’d think it was still mid-summer. My better half and I actually went kayaking at our local reservoir a couple of days ago and it was just darned hot, even out on the water. Normally folks would be hauling their boats out of the water and waxing up their skis in anticipation of cooler temps and white flakes lazily falling from the sky but this year… not so much.
The news says it’s in part due to abnormally warm ocean temperatures near China and Japan that’s pushing the jet stream northward and allowing abnormally warm temperatures to rein across much of the United (?… maybe we need to change that name like someone did with the Gulf of America) States. I know the snow and cold will ultimately make their presence known, but for now having summer extend well into autumn is okay with me.
Up in the Colorado hills it’s been a fantastic fall foliage season, perhaps the best I have ever seen. That is, if you could actually get up there to witness it. In Colorado one mountain town closed the exits from the interstate due to the hordes of folks descending on the town in their annual pilgrimage to see Populus Tremuloides (the quaking aspen) go from its summer green to its fall yellow. And this year there was also a lot of gold, red, and orange as well. A year or so ago my better half and I had spent a considerable sum on a fall foliage cruise up the Atlantic seaboard from Boston to the Canadian maritimes and while I know the fall colors back east are amazing on that trip at least the colors we saw paled in comparison to what our local aspens put on display this year.
It’s getting to the point that if you try to get to the Colorado High Country on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday it may not be worth your bother. What’s normally an hour and a half to two hour jaunt can easily turn into a five or six hour ordeal - one way. But not to worry… its only anticipated that our state will grow by another 1.72 million people by 2050. I’m fortunate enough to be retired so I have the luxury (and luxury it has truly become) of being able to head to the hills during the middle of the week when mid-week traffic on I-70 is only as bad as weekend traffic was five or ten years ago. But I digress.
Once you made it above 8,000 feet, traffic notwithstanding, you were treated to some amazingly vibrant colors. I spent my time around Twin Lakes, Leadville, and Estes Park (went to Estes because of the government shutdown thinking the crowds would be smaller and they…. were!). Here’s some of what I saw:
Of course all those vibrantly beautiful leaves must fall and much of my time over the next couple of weeks will be spent dutifully raking and bagging said leaves so that my trash company can do me the honor of hauling them away one trashcan-full at a time. Not quite sure where to put the rest of our household trash, but that’s a topic for another day. For those of you who were fortunate, and brave enough to get into the hills to see this year's changing colors… congratulations! You were among the few and the proud and your efforts are to be applauded. And for those unlucky enough to have been caught up in the traffic nightmare that I-70 routinely becomes, my condolences and please don’t read this while driving on the mountain highway… well on second thought, go ahead… you’re not going anywhere anyhow.
