June-July 2009

Following our return from Charleston we were fortunate to be able to spend a few days with our friends Ed and Tina Burke from Merlin, another Pacific Seacraft 40. They live north of Washington and drove us down to visit George Washington’s house and plantation at mount Vernon. Despite queuing in a very intense rain squall to visit the house itself we had a great time.
It quickly became apparent that George Washington was not only an able leader and politician he was also an important innovator in the world of plantation farming. This site is a National Monument with huge numbers of visitors each day but the whole thing runs very well. The house is amazing and the grounds run right down to the Potomac River close to Washington. We discovered that it would be possible to anchor near the shore here and visit by dinghy!

Mount Vernon House - preserved as a museum
The peaks of the Sangre de Cristo mountains viewed from the Wet Mountains Valley
The west side of the Medano Pass with the Great Sand Dunes beneath the Sangre de Cristo mountains
The Great Sand Dunes stretch across the valley below Medano Pass
The tiny little vertical 'ants' are people climbing the sand dunes

Back in Colorado it was fun to see how Aspen and Christopher had grown and been developing in our absence.

Almost immediately our friends Gail and Tom inveigled us into our first camping trip of the year. This one took us to the Wet Mountains Valley to the south of Pike’s Peak between the Front Range and the Sangre de Cristo mountains. The four of us took our Jeep over the Sangre de Cristos mountains using the rough road of the Medano Pass. This trail includes rough rocks, fords and deep sand on the west side as you arrive by the back door into the Great Sand Dunes National Park. For the return trip we passed around the south of the mountain range and then north again to the campsite. The following day we hiked on the western slopes of the Wet Mountains Valley.

The columbine is the state flower of Colorado
A mass of blue spikes around a tree trunk
Yellow flowers - name not remembered
White thistles
Penstemon flowers
Blue bells - name not remembered
Blue daisies
Yellow star shaped flowers

The Spring flowers were captivating and full streams rushed down the slopes to the valley floor to the east. Views to enjoy!

Rainbow in the ice crystals of high cirrus cloud

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Above us amongst the cirrus cloud was a rainbow!
In the evening we went to Westcliffe to see an open air performance...

...Twelfth Night in a torrential squall of rain meant actors and audience all had to flee to the theatre and try to dry out!