The League of American Bicyclists has awarded the town of Fort Collins the “Platinum” level for bicycle friendly communities. That means that this town is at the same bike friendly level as 1) Boulder (I don’t like biking in Boulder as much as the fort: Too hilly!);Â 2) Portland OR (There are a lot of cyclists there because of an overabundance of commuters who have lost their driving privileges); and 3) Davis, CA (Well, OK, they are decades ahead of everyone else, but who likes California anyway?)
Bike to the rails
Asad and Jimmy in front of car #21
These two were happily taking passengers from City Park to the historic Avery House and beyond (beyond being a block and a half further down Mountain Avenue) aboard the 94 year old Birney trolley. There were groups of CSU graduation parties who had time to take an historic ride before leaving for DIA on Sunday night.
Bike to the park:
Not the Yangtze River
But along Spring Creek at the College Avenue crossing there are these figures (possibly drawings on paper glued onto the concrete) that appear to be of ancient Chinese people. At least the two on the right look like depictions of Qin Warriors from the terracotta army of Xian.
Bike to Java ?
And lastly, a Javanese Gamelan Orchestra
Who were short one drummer and enlisted the trolley conductor as a last minute stand-in (He still is wearing his conductor hat)
…All on a Sunday afternoon.
The next Level is called DIAMOND. No towns in the US are that bicycle friendly… yet!
bugman, May 19th 2013 |
Posted in Bike
BONEDALE is the name of the annual bike to work week in the town on Carbondale, Colorado:
A Possible BONEDALE logo?
I thought that this logo would be sold on a T-shirt somewhere in town but I didn’t see one. Oh well, we might as well take in some music:
At Steve’s Guitars
Usually there is live music on Friday night at Steve’s Guitars of Carbondale. On this Wednesday there was a group of folksingers doing their thing; We just happened to be there at the right time.
And then near the old Carbondale jail:
Some goofy left-handed banjo player
At the Carbondale PAC3
On another evening, Junior Brown was in town to play his “Guit-steel” double necked guitar at the Performing Arts Center on third street (PAC3) . The PAC3 is a great venue to experience live music in a casual setting. It’s why we made the trip to Carbondale in the first place. Our concert seats were comfy couches about 15 feet from the stage.
Sharing the couches with us:
Two Carbondale celebrities Shawnna and Debbie. Just like us, fans of Junior Brown.
The Coke ovens Basalt
The town of Basalt is about 10 miles north of Carbondale. These ovens were built around 1880 and were used for smelting coke for about 5 years until someone discovered coal near Aspen.
Avalanche ranch
We’ve been to the hot springs pool in Glenwood Springs before, but there are at least two hot springs locations near Carbondale that offer a more natural setting.
Jeanne on 2nd street
With Mount Sopris, the unofficial symbol of ‘Bonedale’ in the background.
BONEDALE: Carbondale without cars! Get it?
bugman, May 16th 2013 |
Posted in Music
Science Fair time again:
One of two Science Fair projects, sponsored by the FoCoMOD
The district science fair was pretty good this year. There were two entries having to do with reading on a computer screen versus reading on paper. The display shown above won a “Superior” award while the other similar entry entitled “Do Fifth-Graders Remember More from Reading Text on a Computer Screen OR Piece of Paper?” won “Best in Show”. Interestingly the two entries had opposite conclusions. Clearly, if you just test 10-year-olds, you will find that they remember better while reading on a screen. If you include older people in your study, i.e., moms, you will find that your test subjects tend to remember more from what they read on paper than from on a computer screen. Speaking of text, check out this link for even more strange stuff.
bugman, May 4th 2013 |
Posted in FoCO Discovery Science, Scientific
In Vermillion, South Dakota there is this “Shrine to Music” that has many odd examples on display:
Hurdy Gurdy
Stove Pipe Cello
and a Barrel Cello
Made by Palmer N. Roe of Canton, South Dakota in 1955.
bugman, May 3rd 2013 |
Posted in Museums, Music
It’s that time of year for the weekend of local music called the Fort Collins Music Experiment. Here’s some new/old ones we haven’t seen at the experiment before:
The commoners at Odells Brewery
Elmer Funk at Fort Collins Brewery
Colorado Swing at Everyday Joe’s
The Lincoln Jam Band at Avo’s
The Lincoln IB World Middle School has an incredibly talented group of young musicians. This band pictured above are 6,7 and 8th graders who practice daily and are mentored by a member of the band Euforquestra, a band we’ve known about since the day they moved into town from Iowa.
bugman, April 21st 2013 |
Posted in FoCoMX
It started to snow a few days ago…
And it’s still coming down. Duncan Madog is having fun at least.
This morning the pile on the deck bench was 14 inches high.
No school today, maybe no school tomorrow either. The good part: Some ski lifts may open for extended Spring skiing and maybe, just maybe the mountain snow pack will be near normal conditions.
bugman, April 17th 2013 |
Posted in Environment
Gotta get in that last bit of Spring Skiing:
Looking out of the back of the lodge at Snowy Range
And here is the “Magic Carpet”
It’s a moving sidewalk for the bunny hill skiers. No rope tow, chair lift, weird stuff to confuse.
bugman, March 29th 2013 |
Posted in Recreation
Oh boy, I got to take some pictures of
An Indian Spice selection in a tin
An original poster from the 2012 election
Signed by Terry McNerney
Terry did the mural on the outside of Rockin’ Robins.
Some earrings
Lots of other stuff too.
bugman, March 25th 2013 |
Posted in Entertainment
And it won’t be the last:
View from across Lake Lindenmyer
We actually were going to buy a house in the area of the Galena Fire back in 2008. Certainly not as big as the High Park Fire, but it’s just a reminder that we have to be very careful what we do here in the foothills. I believe this fire was started when a retired nuclear physicist was goofing around with his homemade electric fence.
bugman, March 19th 2013 |
Posted in Uncategorized
The town of Loveland is only 7 miles from the south side of Fort Collins, but can you actually go skiing in Loveland?
It says here you can!
And for 75 years people have been coming to Loveland to ski. How do they do it? There is no ski resort in Loveland! It shouldn’t take long to realize that the Loveland ski area ain’t in the town of Loveland; It’s located in Loveland Pass about an hour and a half by car. Both the town and the pass are named after William A.H. Loveland who ran the Colorado Central Railroad back in the day.
It’s much higher than the town of Loveland.
I don’t know, around 13,000 feet; something like that. I didn’t take lift #1 to get to this point, and it certainly was not a rope tow!
bugman, March 15th 2013 |
Posted in Recreation
