After the flood

We were able to return to the Glen on the 16^th of September. The flood fortunately did not cause any major damage to the property. We moved back in to pack, because we already had made plans for an extended road trip starting on September 19 to go to South-west Utah.

 There are a number of National Parks in this region and although we had visited Monument Valley, Lake Powell, the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, and the southern part of the Escalante National Park, we had never visited Zion, Brice Canyon, Cedar Breaks or some of the other parks in this region.

We opted to take the scenic route, rather than traveling on the express way, which would get us to Cedar City, Utah, at the end of a two day trip. 

We thought that Cedar City would be a good stopping point because of easy access to most of the sites in SW Utah from there. We spent five nights here at a Bed and Breakfast and were able to make day visits to Zion, Kolob, Cedar Breaks, and do some special sight seeing on the way to these special spots.

During our trip to SW Utah, we found so many scenic sights on the way, that we decided to take three days on the way back to experience these sights in more detail. The last 2 days we would take to get home from the Moab area, after seeing the Arches National Park again.

We took way to many pictures, which is a bane as well as a benefit of digital photography, but I'll refrain from sharing too many, – even one a day would be 11 pictures. How can one share the beauty of creation in such a limited way? I did not even finish our Mediterranean Cruise travel blogs yet...

Maybe I'll spend a blog on each of the special places we visited, it would give me data for about 10 more blog posts. I'll plan to finish last year's cruise as well.

Memorial Day and beyond

My last blog was written at the start of the Memorial Day weekend, but on the 27th of May, the actual Memorial Day we went for a hike.  
We revisited “the scar” and went to an overlook of Queen’s Canyon.  On the way and at our destination we could really see some of the fire damage reslting from last year’s Waldo Canyon fire.  
A lot of mitigation work to prevent severe flash flooding and debris flow has been done in the area.  Monique and Rick were with us and they went right up to the edge of this overlook.

This was scary to me, because I don’t like to get close to any edge, even more so, if it is very high.  With proper encouragement, however, I did make it to the edge as well.  The Monique only picture shows Palmer’s dam in Camp Creek, which runs through Queen’s Canyon.  At this dam the water is diverted to a collection and pipe transportation system, which replenishes some of the reservoirs, now in Colorado Springs.  Also this picture shows the fire damage on the other side of Queen’s Canyon. 
 In a previous blog I published a picture in this area where a flood mitigation fence was built. 

 This time I included a picture of the new castle lawn as seen from this overlook area; it is beautifully green.  We all pray that there won’t be any flash flooding in the area.  Not only to preserve the beauty of Glen Eyrie, but also the area in the city where Camp Creek is canalized.

Meanwhile there is a large fire in the NE area of Colorado Springs, known as Black Forest.  Again the resources of those who fight fires are being stretched.  Many people have lost their homes and possessions.  Today, June 14, there is some rain in the area. 

 In Iowa the drought is over.  There is actually some minor flooding and the rivers run at flood-stage. We took a long motorcycle trip on June 13.  The weather was beautiful; no wind to speak of, sun-shine, and about 80 degrees.