We had a wonderful Father’s Day. It started at 7:30 am when we left the house to meet our friends, Tim and Marilyn, at the foot of our driveway. Tim works part time in the pawn shop and fishes with Jay, Marilyn is an Assistant Dean at Pueblo Community College Fremont Campus, where Jay taught last spring. Our first target was Salida CO for the annual FIBArk Whitewater Festival. We got to see the freestyle kayak finals, wandered through the park and vendors, then had lunch at the Boathouse Cantina restaurant, right on the Arkansas river, where we had seating at an open window, with a view of the river antics. Watching the dogs enjoy the water was especially entertaining. After delicious fish tacos, chips and salsa, we left lovely Salida and headed out for stop 2.

Our second target was Elevenmile Canyon, through which the South Platte River runs. This was where Jay, Tim, and Charlie fished last Thursday. The river was running briskly, the water was high and the banks were littered with fisherpersons of both sexes, campers and their families enjoying the brisk water, and plenty of dogs! We saw several groups of people with climbing gear, attempting to climb the vertical cliffs. Without fishing equipment, we took only pictures, and although the guys caught trout on Thursday, we did not see any of them for dinner, since this is a catch and release area primarily. We took a rough dirt forest service road out of the park, heading to Guffey, CO. This forest road was bumpy, lumpy, and rough, but not the worst we have been on. Thank goodness for high clearance in the Tahoe. On the way to our third stop, we visited Spinney  Mountain reservoir, which feeds the part of  South Platte River that runs through Elevenmile canyon. You can use fishing boats on this reservoir, and I think Jay was totally scoping out boat launches for his 16′ bass boat that is sitting in our garage.

Our next stop was Guffey CO, to have a snack on the way home. Guffey is a small rustic mountain town, which the guys visited on Thursday as well. The Guffey garage was open, but looked like no garage we had ever seen. It seemed like a museum, which in effect it was. It was very eclectic, with lots of animal skulls and skeletons around. Bill, the proprietor, owned all of the historic buildings in town and sent us on to explore the City Hall Saloon and Museum on our own, giving Marilyn the key since she seemed reliable! LOL, which she is. Along side the closed antique store were a row of claw foot bathtubs. Marilyn insisted that we take a picture in the tubs, apparently not a unique idea in this town. Bill invited us to come to his 25th Annual Fourth of July Chicken Fly.  At first I thought this might be like a pumpkin chunk-in, but it isn’t. Apparently chickens like to fly, so they take them up a short tower, and release them somehow to see how far they can fly. The record was 138 feet, if memory serves. Bill says he has about 150 chickens on his property available to rent for the chicken fly or you can bring your won chicken. There will also be an antique car show, 3 bands, food, etc. We all agreed that this would be our 4th of July activity this year. One of the more bizarre displays Bill had in the yard, was a prison wagon, driven by a pretend human skeleton, pulled by the actual real skeletons of two horses. I asked Bill if he knew the horses and he gave us their names, and offered that they had been shot, but no further details. He said he had two more horse skeletons to put together, but the animals kept dragging the bones away and he didn’t think he had enough to put them together anymore. The local bar was quaint and cool, and fun. We all shared an appetizer plate of nachos, with a beverage of choice, before heading home to Westcliffe. We look forward to additional visits to Guffey CO, especially on the 4th of July this year. Guffey may become one of the regular tourist stops for our guests, it was that unique.

Father’s Day calls from the kids topped off the day, they found us in various and sundry places throughout the day, sending their good wishes for a nice Father’s Day to Jay.

Ok, this post was timely (kind of), watch for another post from 2009 coming soon.