Teddy looks over Boulder from the Red Rock trail in Settlers' Park. Could it be he's sad to leave, too?

Nine days after that somewhat mawkish “love at first sight” post, I am still romanticizing Boulder. Colly recently voiced my feelings while she was in the midst of a lesson at a local gymnastics gym (speaking of which, she and Kyle helped me produce a little movie yesterday about their time at that gym; scroll to the end of this post to see).

Colly’s face, which was flushed and beaming from the discovery of the high-quality facility and friendly coach, momentarily clouded over as she said, “The trouble with travel is you find a place where you want to stay, and then you have to leave.”

I pointed out the glass-half-empty perspective (i.e. if not for travel, we would not have experienced this place at all), but I also agreed with her. The trouble with Boulder is that we had to leave today.

Boulder seemed to click for our family; from Day One, we found our way around, fell into a routine and felt comfortable in the community.  It’s not perfect (I’ll mention a few disappointments below), and I wouldn’t say it’s the most charming or gorgeous Zip Code in the state. But with its university vibe and just-right size, Boulder feels very real and livable. It’s also one of the healthiest places, with the most fit-looking people, I’ve ever visited. A guy selling ice cream from a cart in the park, for example, looked like a Runners’ World cover model, wearing a 10K shirt and Ironman cap.

The city and its people seem to lean into the Rocky Mountain foothills, running up the slopes to its fin-shaped Flatirons as if to escape the flatness of the landscape to the east, which spreads unchanging as far as the eye can see.

Perhaps my view is colored by happy times with friends. We experienced a veritable influx of visitors, and oh how nice it was to socialize again! First, an ultrarunning couple we got to know back in Oakland, Garett and Holly, came over for dinner with their toddler son, and then longtime friends Adam and Jennifer, in town for business, spent Saturday with us and brought their girls Zoe and Julie.

Two things that make Colly most happy: her dog, and her friends. Here she's with Julie and Zoe.

Colly was ecstatic to have friends for the weekend, and even happier when they whisked her away for a sleepover at their Denver hotel.

And what about Kyle? He was overjoyed for two days because one of his closest friends from Piedmont, Patrick, showed up to spend the weekend with us while his mom, Kia, was in town for a Buffs game. The boys spent hours splashing in Boulder Creek and transforming our living room into a fort, always in their own world and laughing at private jokes. While it was precious to watch, I also felt pangs about separating him and Colly from their friends for the whole school year. To friends who are reading this: If you plan to travel, please check our itinerary and consider crossing paths with us — we’d welcome you!

Patrick and Kyle reach new heights in their friendship during their time together in Boulder.

Here is a brief rundown of what our family will miss about Boulder — and what we recommend to anyone visiting there.

The trails: Boulder has over 200 miles of hiking and biking trails, 35,000 acres of open space — and we tried to sample as much of it as we could. As lovely as the Boulder Creek path is, especially where it winds up Boulder Canyon, the real treasures are the trails branching off from places like Chautauqua Park and Marshall Mesa.

Pearl Street: Boulder’s historic downtown district struck me as a friendlier and cleaner version of Santa Cruz’s Pacific Garden Mall. In just a couple of blocks, between 9th and 11th, we discovered three great restaurants: Centro, Bacaro and West End Tavern. (Don’t bother going to the over-hyped and always-crowded Rio Grande around the corner — the food and service were barely passable, but most people seemed to be drinking too much to care.) The kids repeatedly dragged us to Powell’s candy store on Pearl, and we were happy to comply. On Saturday night, we experienced the full spirit of Pearl Street and Buffs pride when we got caught up in a pre-game rolling pep rally with CU’s marching band. The kids grabbed pompoms, caps and toy footballs.

Patrick, Kyle and Colly get caught up in a Buffs rally on Pearl Street.

The gym: Colly and Kyle fell in love with the Colorado Athletic Training School (CATS) and a coach named Gordy. Check out their movie below. I think we were all relieved to discover that the kids don’t have to completely give up sports and hobbies during travel; with a bit of effort, we can find places along the way where they can do their thing.

Visitors on the front lawn of our Pearl Street house.

The house: As the last post detailed, I fell in love with 207 Pearl Street — the house and its location — in spite of the unpredictability of its hot water supply and wi-fi.

What’s not to like? The mall sprawl around 29th Street, overpopulated by franchise theme restaurants and big-box stores. I felt as though we were in Sacramento’s suburbs. And we were disappointed by the Fiske Planetarium at CU. We signed up for a “Moon and Lasers” presentation designed for school-age kids. What could have been a “stellar” learning experience turned out to be a bust because of the speaker. With virtually no introduction or context, she haltingly mentioned factoids about the autumnal equinox and moon cycles, nonsensically beaming a laser pointer around solar and lunar images projected on the theater’s dome. Then, without making time for questions or answers, she abruptly started a laser show. We found ourselves staring at psychedelic geometric projections while retro “space tunes” such as “Walking on the Moon” by The Police played. The kids left completely confused, and I left with a headache. At least it sparked our interest enough to further investigate the science behind yesterday’s equinox on our own.

Brrr! We found ourselves in a snow storm today. What a treat!

So goodbye, Boulder. Now we’re making our way back through Telluride and Arizona, briefly stopping at the Grand Canyon and Sedona, and then to Southern California by early next week. At least we enjoyed a taste of winter today, hitting a glittering snow storm that coated the pines and enhanced the golden hues of the aspens. Our one day of winter, before heading to spring and summer in the Southern Hemisphere, won’t be forgotten!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Related posts:

1. Love at First Sight in Boulder
2. Magic at Mesa Verde and Along the San Juan Skyway
3. 36 Hours in Telluride, CO

We found our rental, 207 Pearl Street, through vrbo.com (Vacation Rental By Owner). Choosing a rental through this website is like throwing darts blindfolded, since all the properties look and sound good — or rather, too good to be true. We felt drawn to this place because of its alluring history as a settler’s farmhouse, and because the map showed it backing up to a green swath of open space yet walking distance to Pearl Street’s shopping district.

But we had done that research months ago, and I hadn’t bothered to recheck the website and reservations before arriving. Consequently, I remembered little about it and couldn’t even recall how many bedrooms it has.

An IPhone snapshot of our arrival Sunday night at 207 Pearl Street, Boulder.

We pulled into the two-story stone dwelling slightly frazzled after a daylong trip from Telluride, which we made longer by missing an exit on the freeway by Denver and then driving two sides of a large triangle. A symphony of crickets greeted us as we parked, and I paused briefly to read the plaque on the home’s side, designating it a city landmark. Then we opened the unlocked front door.

The plaque on the side of the house detailing its history.

We discovered two downstairs rooms that look charmingly anachronistic, framed by distressed wood floors, low wooden ceiling beams, double-hung windows, and chunky rock walls built with gravel-laden cement. In the midst of this antiquated setting stood gleaming stainless-steel appliances and a flat-screen TV. The kids ran from room to room, hollering at the discoveries of whirlpool jets in an oversize tub, skylights that open with the touch of a button, and a fireplace that turns on with a switch.

Meanwhile, I toured the place with my jaw dropped, disbelieving that we found ourselves in such a special place — a home that feels old yet updated, large yet intimate, luxurious yet rustic. It has two bedrooms (three if you count the queen bed wedged into the laundry room) and two baths, but it was built on a mid-19th-century scale, which means doorways and stairways are narrow and just a tad crooked. Taller people surely would hit their head on the low beams.

I puzzled at how the sheetrock against one wall mysteriously stops at a rough edge, revealing original stonework underneath, and how the slate tiles in the upstairs bathroom floor gape open and unintentionally create a little window to the washing machine in the room below. Here and there rusted pipes emerge from walls and go nowhere. Like any truly historic home, it reveals clues about its past that hint at how each generation and every repair added layers to its character and pages to its story.

Teddy feels at home in the small downstairs living room.

Teddy also likes hanging out at the foot of our bed.

We ate a late dinner at a trattoria on Pearl Street and fell into bed exhausted. I woke up when it was still dark outside and worked through the disorientation that comes from spending the night in a new surrounding — where am I? what day is it? My muscles ached from the race I ran Saturday, and my head ached from last night’s wine, so I knew I had to get out and run. I tiptoed around to find running clothes and headed out just after 6 a.m., the sun glowing but not yet showing over the mountains.

I ran no more than a couple hundred yards, to the junction of Pearl Street and Canyon Boulevard, before stopping to take in and fully appreciate the open space preserve so close to our front door. “Settlers Park,” the sign said, named after the settlers who camped under the red rock outcropping that rose suddenly at a trailhead before me. Still not fully awake and scarcely believing the good fortune that led me to this trail on which I could welcome the new day, I began scrambling up the rocky single-track. Midway up I stopped and had second thoughts. I had no idea how steep it was or where it went. This would be a great place to bring the kids and Teddy, I told myself, vowing to explore it with them later. I felt like relaxing my mind and muscles on a gentler and straighter route, so I headed back down and rejoined the main bike path that meandered along Boulder Creek.

Colly and Kyle in the shadows by the trailhead at Settlers Park, which we explored later in the day.

Another 200 yards and I paused again to look around at a grassy area and playground called Eben G. Fine Park, next to the picturesque river. I was at the mouth of Boulder Canyon and the paved path kept going on indefinitely along the shoulder of the river, hugging the sheer canyon walls. Picking up my pace, I discovered the pavement ended after about a mile and gave way to a well-groomed dirt footing ideal for running. No wonder Boulder is a runners’ mecca, I thought. And then, as if to prove my point, the first of several sinewy, elite-looking runners sped past. Faster and more frequently they came, some in matching outfits signifying their place on a team, all of them looking serious at a distance but then smiling as they passed.

I returned after about five miles, just as the others were waking. The kids and I walked a half-mile east on Pearl for breakfast at the nearest cafe while Morgan headed off on his bike.

I knew, and the kids knew, that we should get back to the house and start the day’s schooling, but we shared the sense that we’d rather explore. “Maybe we could do PE first,” said Kyle, “PE” being our tongue-in-cheek term for legitimizing playing and running around.

“Yeah, and it might get cloudy later, so we should go out now,” Colly added. Easily persuaded, I agreed that we should walk to the park.

Morgan, the kids and Teddy reunite on the bike path this morning.

Walking along the bike path, we soon spotted Morgan riding the other way. He turned around and went with us to the playground. First the kids played on the swings, then they splashed in the river.

Kyle and Colly "doing PE" in Boulder Creek this morning.

We were in no hurry to go anywhere, not compelled to do anything. Eventually the kids agreed it was time to go back. Morgan and I helped them with their schooling for a couple of hours, then we took a break, and then we spent more time reading and writing. The wi-fi was fickle, so we took more breaks. We made plans to buy groceries and take Colly to a drop-in gymnastics class tonight. Morgan ran an errand to the camera store.

And that’s all, and that’s why I love it here.

Colly and I spent time together this afternoon writing in the little office off the master bedroom, overlooking a terraced garden in back. The room probably used to be a back porch.

Related posts:

1. Boulder For Real
2. 36 Hours in Telluride, CO
3. Magic at Mesa Verde and Along the San Juan Skyway

Looking through a window in time in Mesa Verde's Balcony House.

Morgan crawls through the tunnel exiting the Balcony House cave dwelling.

Inside a cave perched high on a cliff face in Mesa Verde National Park, where remnants of rooms built from stone have stood for more than 800 years, I got down on my hands and knees to crawl through a dark tunnel only a few feet high and barely wide enough for my shoulders. I crept forward on all fours like a baby in order to follow an exit from a cave dwelling known as Balcony House, which Ancestral Puebloans built under the overhang of a massive rock. Soon — thankfully — I reached a point where a shaft of light filtered in and the passageway opened up nearly high enough to stand, and I gazed up at a perch where the park’s archeologists theorize a person would have sat guard to stop or allow those who tried to enter the pueblo. Then the tunnel narrowed to a crawl space again, and I took a deep breath to keep claustrophobia at bay before pushing through to reach sunlight and a spectacular view of a canyon.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from our trip to Mesa Verde, but I didn’t expect this: to squeeze between rock crevices and climb up 30-foot ladders, and then to walk through the homes and gathering places where people thrived and a society developed to surprising sophistication in this spot for some 700 years, around 600 – 1300 AD. Never before had I experienced such an intimate and not-entirely-safe visit to a national or state park. I’ve grown accustomed to seeing attractions from a distance, accessed by trams or well-maintained walkways. At Mesa Verde, however, visitors — after hearing repeated warnings about strenuous climbs and narrow passageways — are allowed more access than I would have imagined. Morgan and I kept echoing our kids’ exclamations, “This is so cool!” and “Look!” as we marveled at the ingenuity of the Puebloans and listened with genuine interest to what the park ranger was saying about the history and geology.

The view approaching Cliff Palace. "They look like fallen condos," said Colly. I thought it looked like an intricate sand castle from a distance.

It’s one thing to view artifacts in a museum or read history in a book; it’s another to stand where those people stood a millennium ago and muse, Would I have been able to weave sandals like that from yucca or paint such intricate designs on pottery made from hand?

The kids gaze at the soot-blackened ceilings of the cave and learn how water flowed through the porous rocks, creating fountains known as seep springs.

Colly and Kyle climb a 32-foot ladder to access a cliff dwelling.

Our day-and-a-half at Mesa Verde was the high point in a quick road trip to explore Colorado’s Southwest corner. I’m grateful we didn’t try to tour Mesa Verde in just a day, because there is so much to see and the park is so vast. We arrived on a rainy afternoon and checked into the park’s one motel, the Far View Lodge, a collection of one-story boxy buildings likely built in the ’60s that look like dormitories but were clean and comfortable. We spent the afternoon getting oriented at the visitor’s center and museum, then had an unexpectedly gourmet meal at the lodge’s main restaurant, Metate (the word for the stone slab on which the Ancestral Puebloans ground corn).

The next day we toured three of the park’s main attractions: the cave dwellings known as Cliff Palace, Balcony House, and Spruce Tree. To see, inches from my face, the stone craftsmanship that constructed those walls and the cave paintings that decorated them, and to peer through the windows to the tiny rooms where families would have slept and cooked — it all left me in awe and grasping for words, to think that generations of people made a living in these caves tucked in these remote canyons, climbing up and down the cliffs to haul supplies and access the fields of corn they grew on the flat mesas high above.

Kyle and Colly try a hand at the matate, used for grinding corn.

At day’s end, we headed east about an hour to spend the night in Durango and spent the next 24 hours marveling at the dizzying scenery from there to Silverton and Ouray. (This post — like our too-brief visit — in no way does the stretch from Durango to Ouray justice; these old mining towns, surrounded by red rocks and jagged peaks, deserve pages and pictures on their own.)

If you have kids and go to Durango, then you know (or quickly learn) that the thing to do is take the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, built in 1882, to Silverton, a 45-mile trip that takes about three hours because the little old locomotive won’t chug any faster than about 18 mph. The problem is, the train loses its novelty and kids lose their patience on the return trip to Durango, but if you take it just one way, then you’re stuck in Silverton without transportation. We solved this problem by having Morgan take the kids on the train, and I drove to meet them in Silverton.

Morgan and the kids took the train to Silverton while I drove.

The Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad hasn't changed much since the Victorian era, though now it carries tourists instead of ore.

They loved the train, but I think I actually got the better end of the deal in terms of scenery by driving Highway 550, aka the San Juan Skyway. After we regrouped in Silverton and wandered around that delightfully authentic,  just-touristy-enough Old West town, we carefully drove over Red Mountain Pass, another precipitous stretch with hairpin turns revealing stunning views. A portion of this road between Silverton and Ouray is known as the Million Dollar Highway because millions worth of gold and other minerals have passed over it since the mining boom began in the late 1800s. We paused on the descent into Ouray to view the gaping tunnels and rusting trestles clinging to the mountainside, which mark some of the Idarado Mine remnants; then we made another impromptu stop to hike to the base of Ouray’s box canyon falls.The sheer walls of the rock amplified the roar of the water and left the kids speechless and entranced.

At the base of Ouray's breathtaking box canyon falls.

Of course, no visit to Ouray would be complete without a trip to the famous (and funky) hot springs pool. I used to go there with my family as a kid, and it hasn’t changed except for the addition of a water slide, which Colly and Kyle tested out at least twenty times.

View a slideshow from this trip.

Looking ahead: We leave Telluride this weekend and transition to ten days in Boulder, followed by a quick visit to the Grand Canyon and LA. Then it’s off to Buenos Aires — time to take the training wheels off our travel! More posts to come soon with updates on homeschooling, family dynamics during travel, and our destinations.

Related posts:

1. 36 Hours in Telluride, CO
2. Boulder For Real
3. 83 Places, 5 Continents, 10 Months

Subtle graffiti on this sign on the way into Telluride ("pricy" conditions may exist) signals locals' ambivalence toward the town's growth and gentrification.

This weekend, Sept. 4 – 7, Telluride’s annual film festival will transform the town. Its population of about 2200 will triple and its main street, Colorado Avenue, will be packed with visitors. I’ve never actually been to Film Fest but hear the scene is undeniably cool, and my family got a kick out of spotting Ken Burns outside of our favorite burrito place (La Cocina de Luz) the other night.

As a quasi-local lifelong lover of Telluride, I can’t help feel some reverse snobbery and sadness that a lot of these festival-goers — like a lot of skiers who briefly visit in winter — miss out on some of the more authentic, historic and out-of-the-way treasures that make Telluride what it is. For them, I offer this alternative weekend guide to Telluride, with apologies to The New York Times Travel Section for copping its “36 Hours” format. (The Times published its own “36 Hours in Telluride” in January of 2005, which was geared toward winter activities and dining and shopping downtown.)

Friday afternoon: Arrive in Telluride. Got that? TELLURIDE, not Mountain Village. I have heard dear misinformed friends say, “Oh, I love Telluride!” and then reveal that they spent a week in Mountain Village over Christmas break, as though the two towns were synonymous. They are not. Mountain Village is an oversized, overpriced and soulless master-planned golf and ski village-with-no-sense-of-community carved into the mountain above Telluride in 1987 and connected to town by a gondola. Its collection of hotel-sized homes, high-density condos and massive lodges senselessly thrown up around ski runs and fairways follows a disastrous design aesthetic that mixes Swiss Chalet, Italianate, Rocky Mountain Logs on Steroids and Disneyland California Craftsman. Most of these dwellings are vacation retreats and consequently sit empty, contributing to a spooky emptiness and “For Rent” signs on many Mountain Village storefronts. The weirdness of the place inspired the utterly brilliant mockumentary Lost People of Mountain Village, a must-see for any Telluride Film Festival-goer.

(In case you’re wondering why I dislike the place so much: I remember how that mountainside looked in its natural state because I took care of a horse there in the summer of ’86 and loved riding where the golf course now sits, and every time I drive to town on Last Dollar Road, the exquisite view of Telluride is marred by the The Peaks Resort dominating the landscape. ‘Nuff said.)

So, back to Telluride midday on a Friday. Start on the corner of Oak and Colorado Ave., in between two famous historic buildings: the San Miguel County Courthouse and the Sheridan Opera House. Buy a crepe or falafel from one of the food carts if you’re hungry, and cross the street to soak in the scene at a grassy square called Elks Park. There, mounted on some boulders in the park’s garden and at other points around town, are plaques describing Telluride’s past. Reading about these milestone moments — involving the mines, the railroad, and the flip of a switch that lit up the town and successfully demonstrated alternating current for the first time — gives visitors an appreciation for the town’s colorful history, which has been shaped by forward-thinkers, risk-takers and boom-and-bust cycles.

Hungry for more info on the region, walk down the block to Between the Covers bookstore and cafe, a beloved local institution since 1974. Be sure to buy a copy of The Telluride Story: A Tale of Two Towns by David S. Lavender (shameless plug — it’s written by my grandfather, with an update by my dad). Then, walk one more block down to Fir, hang a left, and up two more to the Telluride Historical Museum.

My kids in front of the Telluride Historical Museum.

I simply love this place. It’s in the town’s old hospital, built in 1896, and takes an hour or less to tour. My favorite room there replicates the house and lifestyle of Harriet Fish Backus, author of the memoir Tomboy Bride, about living in the Tomboy Mines community above Telluride at the turn of the century.

Stretch your legs in the afternoon with an easy walk to and around Town Park (follow either Colorado or Pacific avenues east to reach it) — a place our family visits nearly every day because the kids love the fishing pond, play structure, public pool and ice rink. Here, on the field that stretches out below Bear Creek Canyon, big-name bands rock the park under blue skies or stars, making an unforgettable concert experience.

Morgan's snapshot of The Grateful Dead playing Telluride Town Park in 1987.

(I still consider seeing the Grateful Dead there in ’87, on a weekend of trippy planetary alignment known as the Harmonic Convergence, a highlight of my college days.)

Where was I? The Dead, ’87 … oh yes, Town Park. From there, take an easy walk, just under 2 miles, east on the San Miguel River trail (toward the end of town) and you’ll be on a path toward Bridal Veil Falls called the Idarado Legacy Trail, basically a bike path but a beautiful place to stroll, with more plaques about the area’s history along the way. If you’re up for a real run, hike, bike or 4-wheel-drive excursion, keep going where the pavement ends at the old Pandora Mill and continue up, up, up 1,200 feet of switchbacks to Bridal Veil Falls, where a 105-year-old, fully restored hydroelectric powerhouse sits perched at the top of falls that tumble almost 400 feet. (“That looks like the house from Up!” my daughter exclaimed when she first glimpsed the powerhouse). It’s about a mile and a quarter from the end of the Idarado Legacy Trail to the bottom of Bridal Veil falls, with spectacular views of town along the way.

Life is sweet on Telluride's main street! Here our family -- including my parents, brother, and sister-in-law -- eats ice cream from The Sweet Life on Colorado Ave.

Friday dinner: Telluride’s copious dining choices are too diverse to detail here, so I’ll mention just one favorite: Hongas Lotus Petal, an eclectic menu with a great atmosphere (upscale but relaxed) that bills itself as Pan Asian and mostly organic. I love being able to get inventive salads, Thai curries and high-quality sushi all in one sitting, and they have an appealing kids’ menu. Afterward, indulge in ice cream at The Sweet Life on Colorado Avenue near the corner of Pine.

Saturday morning: Get an early start because two of the best runs or hikes from town — Tomboy Mine and Bear Creek Falls — can get relatively crowded with weekend trekkers. Fuel up on bagels at Baked In Telluride on Fir Street, the best local bakery.

Morgan and the kids stop by Baked In Telluride for bagels and muffins.

Then choose either Tomboy or Bear Creek for a morning-long outing.

Tomboy: harder (5 miles one way and 2650 elevation gain), glorious views of town and the mountains, and you’re rewarded by arriving at the ghost town of the old mining camp (read about some Tomboy history and my experience running up there on an earlier blog post). You can go two miles farther up to reach the 13,114-foot Imogene Pass. The downside is you’ll encounter Jeeps and dirtbikes on this road since it’s open to 4-wheel-drive high-clearance vehicles. The trailhead is at the north end of Oak Street.

Bear Creek: easier than Tomboy (just under 2.5 miles, 1040 feet elevation gain and less rocky of a road) and in some ways nicer than Tomboy because the road is closed to vehicles and winds through a forest. You’re rewarded by reaching the gushing Bear Creek falls. The downside is you miss the view of town that Tomboy offers, but the view from the top of this canyon offers more than enough payoff to make the hike worth it. The trailhead is at the end of South Pine Street.

Saturday lunch: If you’re famished from several hours of high-altitude exercise, I’d recommend the Floradora Saloon on main street near the corner of Pine. The Floradora used to be a funkier local’s spot — a Western saloon version of Cheers — back in the day when a gregarious New York transplant named Howie ran it and my oldest sister’s friend’s stained-glass creations hung from all the walls.  Like the town, the Floradora’s vibe and menu have changed — it’s as much Californian as Coloradan, with cosmopolitan twists (e.g. chipolte aioli and roasted veggies) on burger-and-fries standards — but being a Californian in Colorado, I can’t say I don’t like it.

Saturday afternoon: Carve out a couple of hours to read and browse at the fabulous Wilkinson Public Library, a 20,000-square-foot brick building at the corner of Pine and Pacific, which opened in 2000 after a referendum that passed by only two votes. With a calendar full of free movies and events, the place feels as much like a community center as a library. My kids spend hours in the children’s room there, reading in a treehouse-type structure or playing on the computer terminals. The upstairs Telluride Room is dedicated to regional history.

If you consider shopping a recreational activity and feel the need to spend money on Colorado Ave., then spend it at two venerable shops: Telluride Trappings & Toggery, and Zia Sun. The Toggery has been around forever (or at least 30-plus years) and still has the best selection of clothing and jewelry for women, men and kids — truly wearable, long-lasting, good-looking stuff. Zia Sun has a distinctive collection of toys, knick-knacks and cards and has always been more practical than touristy.

Whenever you’re shopping downtown Telluride, stop by and pay homage to The Free Box, an iconic institution at the corner of North Pine and Colorado. The “box” is actually a collection of cubbies full of free clothing and household items that people swap. Its proudly grassroots, good-karma tradition was tarnished in recent years when the corner became a dumping ground for unsightly bulky items like rotting sofas and broken appliances, but local leaders enacted some regulation to restore the balance and The Free Box lives on. (Read a lovely article about it by fiction writer Antonya Nelson, a Telluride native, in this month’s Smithsonian.)

Saturday night: As mentioned above, the fine-dining and bar-hopping options are plentiful, but after such a full day I’m ready to turn in early.  A night at home with a take-and-bake from Brown Dog Pizza (110 W Colorado Ave.) and a six-pack of my favorite regional brew, Dale’s Pale Ale, bought across the street at Telluride Liquors, suits me just fine.

Bonus content if you have an extra half-day to spend. (Leave it to me to write the section below before realizing that would add up to approx 48 hours, not 36. Oh, well!)

Sunday morning: Drive down Highway 145 to explore the area known as Down Valley. The red-rock-rimmed canyon carved by the San Miguel River travels through the homey communities of Sawpit and Placerville. Stop at the Sawpit Store, 12 miles west of Telluride, for essential fishing and picnic supplies. Then, if you have kids, go a bit farther down the highway until just before you reach the town of Placerville, and on the left by the river sits Down Valley Park. A fishing pond, play structure, river trail and sports field satisfy everyone’s desires for outdoor fun.

Morgan helps Colly and Kyle catch and release a trout from Down Valley Park near Placerville.

Finally, a trip to Telluride wouldn’t feel complete to me without a picnic at Woods Lake, about a 9-mile drive from Highway 145 up Fall Creek Road. It’s hard to say what makes this lake so special — our family’s tradition of camping there no doubt influences my recommendation — but virtualy anyone would appreciate the serenity of the glassy water ringed by mountains among the aspen groves.

(Thanks to my parents, David G. and Val Lavender, who used to live in Telluride; and my brother and sister-in-law, David W. and Karen Lavender, who currently live in Telluride and teach at the local high school, for their input.)

Related posts:

1. Magic at Mesa Verde and Along the San Juan Skyway
2. Transitioning in Telluride
3. Boulder For Real

Then I lay back in bed and studied the swirls and knots in the cedar log walls, seeing patterns and faces in them just as I did as a kid, and contemplated what we’re doing here.

It’s been one week since we left home, and we’ll be here another three weeks. We’re living with my brother and sister-in-law here on Last Dollar Road, where I spent every summer of my childhood. Morgan started coming here with me when he was my boyfriend in high school, so it feels like a second home to him, too.

Morgan and me on the back deck of the cabin in the summer of '85.

Some people have wondered why we’re starting a round-the-world sabbatical in a place so familiar and not exactly adventurous. Let’s see if I can explain.

We gave a lot of thought to making the transition away from regular routines  — from a well-off, large-scale, high-speed way of life — into a simpler, more transient lifestyle. We felt the need to unplug, decompress, and adjust to a more flexible and natural way of life. So we came here, to a place where the weather sets the agenda and water from the well is never taken for granted; where laundry is hand washed or taken three towns away to the nearest Laundromat.

The cabin, now home to my brother, David, and his wife, Karen, promised to take us in and help us recalibrate. They did not disappoint.

On Day One, we had only one worry, one job: Figure out how to lift a half-ton wood-burning stove up the porch and through the front door.

Day One: Morgan, Karen and David wrestle with the new stove.

Day Two: Our task was to help pack for a river trip, drive three hours to Moab and learn to raft on the Colorado River. All that mattered was missing rocks in the rapids and setting up camp on a beach.

Day Two: The beach on the Colorado River where we camped.

Day Two: Morgan and the kids on the Colorado River near Moab.

Day Three: Our mission was to wake early to hike in Arches National Park, trying to beat the heat and coax the kids to scale steep slickrock while learning about the geology of the landforms.

Day Three: Kyle under Delicate Arch

We came here for other reasons as well. We wanted to reconnect with family roots and feel a bit like a kid again; to spend time with David and Karen and glean their homeschooling expertise; to acclimate and prepare to run the September 12 Imogene Pass Trail Run; and to prompt the kids to play board games and explore Deep Creek Mesa instead of watching TV.

This all may sound a bit corny, or granola-ish, or perhaps irresponsibly self-centered, but that’s basically it.

Visiting the Bedrock General Store and learning a bit about Grandpa

There have magic moments throughout this first week, such as when we pulled over to the 19th-century Bedrock General Store near Paradox Valley, by the Colorado-Utah border. I told Colly and Kyle that this is where their great-grandfather David S. Lavender would have sometimes shopped while working as a cattle rancher in the valley during the Depression, and maybe he heated his hands over that same pot-bellied stove, and right there on the shelf was his autobiography One Man’s West
for sale, showing pictures of him and my then-toddler father hiking in the nearby hills.

Or the magic moment right now, as my brother plays a Grateful Dead tune on his mandolin while my sister-in-law teaches the kids how to make pizza dough.  They take a break to pull porcupine quills from their poor dog’s muzzle. Such is life on Last Dollar Road.

It’s only been a week, and yet already I sense we’ve changed in small but noticeable ways. Morgan is cooking more. The kids are reading more. The three of them all laugh more. And me? The “normal” me is trying to get out of the way to let the “other” me step forward, the one with broken nails and bushy eyebrows who doesn’t mind sharing small spaces. The version of me who does less but notices and appreciates more. The person I hope will be better suited to the long, strange trip ahead.

Ahhhh...

View more snapshots on facebook.

Related posts:

1. 36 Hours in Telluride, CO
2. Magic at Mesa Verde and Along the San Juan Skyway
3. The Sappy Departure

We took time to stop at parks, like this one in Fallon, NV. The kids were delighted to find rusting and not-entirely-safe playground equipment from a previous generation. Colly forgot the word for "merry-go-round," since she so rarely sees one, and said, "They have one of those tables that spins!"

The four of us plus the dog just drove 1100 miles from Northern California to Southwestern Colorado, and along the way we avoided family feuds and never resorted to Happy Meal bribery (as in, “If you can be patient until the next town, then we’ll stop at McDonald’s”). The kids agreed it was one of the “funnest” long car trips in recent memory, and they didn’t seem to mind that we had no DVDs, no video games and limited personal space in the tightly packed Subaru Outback wagon. Here’s what I learned or was reminded of regarding car travel with kids as we passed the miles:

• Take time to get there. We divided the trip into 3 days and 2 nights, even though it can be done pretty easily with just one overnight. Arriving at our midway destinations with time to spare allowed the kids to swim in the motel pool and play at local parks.
• Share the music and listen together. We all have our own IPods and could have driven with earbuds firmly implanted, in our own little worlds. Not that there’s anything wrong with that for some of the time, but we chose to listen to one IPod at a time (trading off between the kids’ playlists and ours) and played it through the car stereo for all to hear. The upside: the conversation kept going, and the kids were happy that we were willing to listen to their music.
• Let the kids pack easy reading that they truly want to read. Colly indulged in magazines like Tiger Beat and QuizFest, while Kyle devoured the Bone graphic novel series. They ended up reading magazines and comics together for literally hours, quizzing one another on topics such as “Are you a JoBro genius?” and “Who would you be at Hogwarts?”
• Let them be bored. My impulse is to hand kids things to do and offer suggestions upon hearing the first complaint.  That might be necessary with toddlers and little kids, but for school-age kids, it’s worth holding back to see what the silence and squirminess produce. Their imaginations kicked in, as when one asked the other, “Wanna play half-and-half?” “Half-and-half” is a game they made up by drawing an outline of something, such as a person or house, then folding the paper in half down the middle of the drawing and taking turns decorating half the picture without knowing how the other person was decorating the other half.
• When kids ask questions about the surroundings, answer with, “What do you think?” or “Why do you think it’s that way?” When we were on a stretch of Highway 50, for example, we pointed out a sign indicating it was part of the old Pony Express, and they both asked, “What’s the Pony Express?” (I couldn’t believe they didn’t know or had forgotten.) We had them guess as to what it might be and then stopped for lunch at a diner filled with Pony Express memorabilia so they could figure it out.
• Don’t assume kids have to have DVDs or video games to fill the time on long trips. We didn’t even pack audio books this time (though in the past we’ve enjoyed listening to audio books together).
  

  Limited laptop time: Here, the kids were messing around with the Mac's Photo Booth.

  The only electronic games the kids played, for short periods of time, were chess and Photo Booth on my laptop or on Morgan’s IPhone.

• Get in the back and play with the kids. I sometimes squeezed into the middle back seat, in between them, so the three of us could play Hangman and Thumb Wars.
• Anticipate and accept moodiness and arguments. Trying to mediate sibling rivalry is a no-win prospect — a simple “I trust you both can work it out” works almost every time — since 9 times out of 10 the fight is at least in part a competition for parental attention. When one person seems distant or grumpy, don’t try to reel them in by repeatedly asking what’s wrong or demanding to know what they’re thinking. Let them start talking if they feel like it.  I was reminded on this road trip that moods change like the landscape and are best simply observed.
• Pack a “last resort” toy or book for each kid that can be pulled out as a surprise if the going gets really rough. Anything by Klutz is a good bet. I tucked away two Klutz books in my backpack but never had to pull them out. When we got to Colorado and the car trip was over, I gave them to the kids as surprise thank-you gifts for being good travelers.

Got any other ideas for happy family car trips? Please share them in the comments below. And enjoy this sampling of the dozens of Photo Booth creations from our back seat:

Related posts:

1. The Sappy Departure
2. Home on the Road: A Q&A With the BodesWell Bunch
3. One Year Later: The Time-Capsule Travel Letters and the ‘Eat Pray Love’ Backlash

All packed up and ready to go. Goodbye, home!

“Why are you crying, Mom?” Kyle asked this morning as I pulled away from my next-door neighbor’s hug. “Are you sad or happy?”

I thought about what had unleashed the tears: the final walk through our bedroom, where the hardwood floors echoed from emptiness because nearly everything is in storage. Then the last good-byes. It hit me that I will miss our home and neighborhood terribly. It also hit me that everything we had planned during the past six months had come down to this moment, and all the work and difficult decisions had made us ready to go — and we really, finally were ready to go — so I was crying tears of relief. And also, I was indeed happy that at this crossroads in our lives, when a great deal is transitioning personally and professionally, we had chosen to go in a direction that Morgan and I believe will keep changing us for the better even after the trip is over.

“Both,” I finally answered.

“Well,” Kyle said, “if you’re sad and happy, that makes you sappy.”

I am sappy, so much so that the family began mocking my sentimentality last week. “This is the last time we’re going to Crogan’s,” I said the other night as we approached a favorite pub. “Awww,” said Colly, her voice dripping with pity, “and this is the last time we’re touching this crosswalk button!”

“The last time” became a running joke until Morgan got the last word on our final morning at home. He marched to the bathroom after coffee and Cheerios and proclaimed, “This is the last dump!”

Over PB&Js on paper plates, Morgan and I held a meeting in our kitchen to determine how to pare down and securely pack essential items such as passports, credit cards, cords and plugs.

I cleaned out every closet and drawer, handled the logistics of turning the house over to tenants, and made final decisions about what to pack and how to make it fit. The kids bounced around friends’ homes and perhaps wondered why Mom was letting them eat so much ice cream, watch so much TV and play so much Wii (on their friends’ Wiis, that is. We don’t have one. My philosophy last week: Let them enjoy time with friends to the fullest, and the more they can take care of themselves, the better.)

Stuff in storage.

We’re planning to go away for just 11 months, more or less, and yet … who knows? Anything can happen, which is why tears of anxiety contributed to the crying. Allow me to linger and prolong this goodbye once more by digressing to something that might seem a tad off topic. Let’s talk about the subjunctive tense in Spanish, okay? I like the subjunctive because it acknowledges the inherent uncertainty of circumstances. If you use the subjunctive when you’re supposed to (as is the case when you ask someone to do something, or you express a hope or desire), then you’re essentially admitting that you don’t have control over a situation. You’d like it to be a certain way, and you think it might likely happen that way, but you really can’t say for sure. Cuando ( “when”) triggers the use of the subjunctive, as in, Cuando volvamos a Piedmont … ( “When we return to Piedmont …”). Changing just one vowel (volvamos instead of volvemos) speaks volumes. It means we can’t be sure of our return.

All the stuff we're taking. (It includes extra stuff for the dog and Colorado. We'll lighten the load when we go abroad.)

So we pulled out of the driveway and headed toward Colorado (first to my brother’s in Telluride, then to Boulder), where we’ll be until we go abroad in early October. I had anticipated a potentially awkward silence in the car, as the four of us worked through feelings. (Perhaps I should say “five of us” since Teddy the dog, who’s traveling with us until we go to Argentina, seemed extra clingy and concerned). I purposely held back from trying to fill the silence, and I refrained from suggesting that the kids do anything in particular. I vowed, starting today, to be more of an equal and less of a manager in our foursome.

Teddy didn't want to be left behind!

We had gone scarcely a half hour, over the Benicia Bridge, when Kyle asked how far we had to go. I stopped myself from telling him the answer, passed a map to the back seat and said, “Here, see if you can find where we are now, and then find Highway 80 to 50.” Colly and Kyle unfolded the paper and became confused but started laughing, as if they couldn’t fathom the inefficiency and antiquity of tangled lines on folded paper in an age of Google maps. Again, I stopped myself from “helping.” I listened to them work together to figure it out, and as I closed my eyes while Morgan drove, I thought, “This is going to be good.”

I knew our first stop could set the tone for the first leg of the trip by virtue of it being the first stop. The old debate re-emerged: Taco Bell or McDonald’s? I didn’t chime in because to object would make them want it more. Kyle said he felt carsick. Morgan said he’d pull off at the next exit. We got off in Newcastle (just south of Auburn) and hung a left at a tricky intersection, inadvertently passing the cluster of gas stations and fast food. We got on a side street headed who knows where. And then we arrived on Main Street, where a line of 19th-century fruit packing sheds stood near the railroad tracks. The long rectangular buildings looked like giant boarded-up chicken coops with weathered wooden sidewalks. There was a junk emporium (its sign really advertised “Junk!”) that conveyed unwarranted cheerfulness, and a shuttered gelato stand that expressed dashed optimism. In between them stood the Newcastle Cheese Shop & Deli, “Home of the Rat Trap Sandwich.” Eat there? Hell, yes!

Colly at our first stop: The Newcastle Cheese Shop & Deli, "Home of The Rat Trap Sandwich."

We did not order The Rat Trap (a sandwich with a sampling of every kind of meat and cheese). But we did get some of the freshest, largest, most satisfying deli sandwiches on crusty bread that I have tasted in recent memory. I closed my eyes again as Morgan drove and thought once more, “This is going to be good.”

Now we’re in Fallon, Nevada, at a dog-friendly Holiday Inn Express. We didn’t want to drive very far the first day because nobody felt up for it. We plan to take Hwy 50 to Colorado and arrive in Telluride on Monday.

One final thought: What helped make the past couple of weeks manageable and so memorable were certain friends who took time out of their routines to cook us dinner, have us over for lunch, watch our kids and run favorite trails with me. You know who you are, and I’ll miss you!

Related posts:

1. Eat, Run, Love
2. What A Long, Strange Homecoming It’s Been
3. 83 Places, 5 Continents, 10 Months