Nature at it's finest - peak fall color in the mountains

Another week gone by with family back for another great visit. This time Paul and Sherry were back for hunting week and fall color. The elk hunting sadly was not successful but the fall color certainly was.

Gorgeous color and people everywhere - photographers galore.

We trekked up to CB and Gothic to take a look at the color there too. 

Fun dusting of snow on the peaks. It is that crazy time of year when you don't know from day to day what the weather will bring.

The end of the bull saga. He refused to leave for a number of days but finally was escorted out. Bye.

Hawk, cowboys, bull, and travel

 Lots happening here. We have been doing a little traveling of our own this time in between company. A lovely trip to NY visiting friends in the Hamptons and a quick trip to Santa Fe were completely different and fun. And fall is quickly marching to peak color. We're down to our last few weeks at Star Mt. before we leave for the winter to Naples (Florida, not Italy...)

A vineyard stop as one of the many fun activities on our visit to Alex and Donna's home in the Hamptons. What a gorgeous area. Golf, restaurants, museums, shopping. Thank you Alex and Donna for a wonderful time. 

Our quick trip to Santa Fe was so great. Seeing the family after two years was terrific. A magnificent outside dinner with sunset at Charles and Lisa's lovely home. And they sent eggs home with us from their chickens. Thanks for everything!

Per Lisa's suggestion we made a detour in Antonito on the drive home. This is Camo's Castle - mostly made out of beer cans and miscellaneous metal by a veteran who lives across the road, not in it. Not safe? He's been working on it for 35 years and still going. It was worth the stop for sure.

Taylor Reservoir. Another moose sighting - one quite small with a larger female. Just off the road paying no attention to the people and cars.

The cowboy was here at Star Mt. with his partners moving the cattle out. It's always a fun sight to watch. And an interesting development since my last post. Remember that steer I took a photo of and said how much it looked like a bull? Well, it was a bull and is still here wandering around Star Mt. It belongs to a neighboring rancher and they have yet to come get him. I walked by him many a morning thinking nothing of it. Ha.

Red tail hawk in flight. Scared it off our fence as we drove in from our trek to Santa Fe. Keeping watch while we were gone I guess.

Santa Fe company and all the mountain delights

 

Whee, the days are flying by. I mean as fast as they can go. We've had a continuous stream of fun company and still more to come. We are actually going to take a trip next week to NY to visit friends. We get to go places too you see...

Drove to Cumberland Pass for a fun side trip, something we had not done for years. Still beautiful but slightly different as now there are four wheeler trails all over. Not a big fan....

The 4 amigos except they added one

Doe and fawn turning gray. How does that happen so fast?

One of "our" steers. They are extra enormous this summer from all the rain/great grass. Looks like a bull right?

The latest critter sightings. My one and only bear sighting - half grown cub right by the road on Ohio Creek. Mark has seen this one three times - doesn't seem to understand the dangers of the road. I theorize it's an orphan cub. Hope I'm wrong.

Our last bit of mushroom hunting. Almost no mushrooms of any kind this time. Clearly the end plus it's hunting season, so not safe to go again. I debated on whether to post the above photo. We don't know what kind of animal but it (actually there were more skulls around) was clearly marking a place for hunters to set up. Kinda creepy...

More visitors! Nancy and Rod popped over from Santa Fe. It had been way too long since they'd come. Great visit - they went kayaking with their new matching kayaks and then cooked for us. Green chili pepper bison burgers and pisole. I've only recently learned about pisole- a marvelous corn side dish. Don't wait so long to come back!

The winding down of summer in the mountains

 

It's late summer here. The color everywhere is changing to a golden hue. It catches me unaware every year. Soon the aspens will turn their magical yellow, orange, and red.

The hummingbirds know it's getting late in the season too. Over the last few days at least half of our giant mob have left. They have a long trip - they come back and forth every year from Mexico.

The big activity up and down the valley has been haying. We had so much rain this summer the hay growth has been spectacular. The ranchers keep a portion for the winter and sell the rest. It mostly goes to Kentucky horse farms as it's considered premium quality from our Ohio Creek Valley.

More lovely family visiting, this time Cliff and Tish. One of the activities was mushroom hunting. We went back to the same area and thought we'd found a whole lot of edible mushrooms. Sadly not. I found the one and only edible - a single chanterelle I ate with my eggs for breakfast. This mushroom identifying thing is quite difficult even with Cliff's app and our new mushroom book. 

Double rainbow over our house in the background from our neighbors vantage point. Photo courtesy Kim Doering

The changing light and color has me snapping photos all over. And then Kim sent me this fabulous rainbow photo. She swears they see rainbows over our house all the time. Gotta be a good sign right?

Fawns and their mommies are all over Star Mt. I saw three sets just this morning on my walk. That's all for now. I'll be back after our next set of company come. It's been a wonderful summer seeing so many friends and family!