No Nam'e No Bueno

We made it back alive! I was a little nervous when we first started, but alas the prodigal blogger returns. Let me preface this trip by saying it was way harder than I expected. Read below:

We started the adventure on Tuesday leaving Breckenridge in the dust and headed west towards Aspen. We decided to camp out tuesday night and hike in wednesday morning. Finding a camping spot was an adventure on its own. It was one of those camping excursions where you just go and errr well just go. We drove around for over an hour trying to find the all mighty camping spot and ended up driving 18 miles with the gas light on. We went up towards Sunlight Mountain and just kept driving. Eventually we found this:

NOOO thats not a camp site. We almost got run off the road by a herd of cows. These boogers don't move when you drive up behind them. We were just short of unleashing Montana's rath when the sound of the horn got their butts in gear. Eventually we left the smell of cow poop behind and found a pretty nice camping spot covered by some trees. That was about the time the rain started.

It didn't stop.

We started our hike in a monsoon and learned quickly that wet shoes were a thing of the past. The first 2 hours looked similar to this:

We passed about 14 people on their way down and we were one group of very few hardy enough to trudge on. Luckily we did because eventually this happened:

**GASP** is that blue sky?!?! Boo...Ya

The rest of the trip was easy...NOT. The last two mile of this hike are straight up. Mentally and physically this was a challenge. Regardless, I made it:) Here are some more pictures:

The wild flower fields were fantastic. Seriously, some of the best I've ever seen.

Exhibit A.

Brett and I decided to go to the actual hot springs the next morning. It had started to rain again Wednesday night and we just wanted to stay warm and dry. It's good we decided to wait because no one was there 9am Thursday morning. Apparently dogs are no longer allowed within 3 miles of the hot springs and this was news to us. We tried tying up Montana away from the hot springs but he started barking so he ended up being closer then he should have.

All in all the trip was awesome. I'm not sure if we'll do it again but I don't regret going. It's one of those backpacking trips you need to do.

I love this picture!

REVIEW: Tread Lightly Ale

This is the first beer I've tried since my quest to become a gluten minimist began. I realized after I posted my last gluten free post I forgot to mention what exactly gluten free means. So here is a quickie tutorial:

The US FDA definition states that for a food or beverage to be labeled “gluten-free” it must not contain any of the following:

• An ingredient that is any species of the grains wheat, rye, barley, or a crossbred hybrid of these prohibited grains .
  


• An ingredient that is derived from a prohibited grain that hasn’t been processed to remove gluten (e.g. wheat flour)
  


• An ingredient that is derived from a prohibited grain and that has been processed to remove gluten (e.g. wheat starch), if the use of that ingredient results in the presence of 20ppm (parts per million) or more, gluten is considered to be in the food 20ppm or more of gluten

All I have to say is woo hoo. I've heard horror stories in regards to GF beer so I had to try some for myself. I've come to the conclusion that my GF beer informants have not tried this. It tasted like a light ale with a hint of sake thrown in (personally I like sake so I could be biased.) It goes down as refreshing and tasty in my books. Also, its only a mere 190 cal. ok maybe that isn't mere but I can name a handful of beers that have more...

Drink on.

A Condundrum Birthday

OKAY so I'm not as good at this blogging thing as I thought but I haven't given up yet:) I'm currently on day 8 of a straight 9 day working binge.

AWESOME

Good news is I'm still alive. Bad news is, well, I guess working 9 days in a row is bad enough. I deserved it though, seeing as I took a week off to go play in Lake Powell. LAKE POWELL?? Yep, I got back on the 9th and have worked everyday since.

Lake Powell was fantastic. I went for my family reunion, all 10 of us. Small family, big drinking tolerance. In between the boating and sun bathing we got to see sights like this:

and this....

I have some more pictures I'll add later.

My birthday is coming up this Thursday and Brett and I are planning on backpacking to the condundrum hot springs. Unfortunately, the weather is calling for a 40% chance of rain. Regardless, we are trudging forward and darn it I will get bare ass into those hot springs. Here is a sneak peek of what to expect following the adventure...

Until next time which could be a month seeing my track record.