Sunday, June 26, 2011

West

Golden Eagle
Giant Salmonfly
Brown Capped Rosy-Finch
The Band of Heathens
Susan and I are in our third week of our Western experiment, and as planned we have made our way back to Arkansas to work and take care of loose ends that got left undone earlier. When not working in Colorado we have spent our time hiking, fishing, bike riding and enjoying some great restaurants. Last Saturday we made our way to Salida, Colorado,  for the FIBArk festival. The headliner was The Band of Heathens. They really performed great.  The crowd of around thirty-five hundred people got to see one the best group of musicians that that are out working hard on the road today. Go download some of their music.  We promise you won't be disappointed. Our conversation with Colin Brooks (one of the three front men) turned from music to fly fishing. He said their travels in the west usually mean several fishing trips for him, but this year most of the rivers are  "blown out"because of the huge snowpack.  It has also been a pretty steep learning curve for Susan and I on these rivers and streams, but we seem to be getting a little better. We have fished creeks the size of Arkansas rice irrigation ditches to some pretty big rivers. We just experienced the beginning of the giant Salmon Fly hatch on one of the larger rivers - damn big bugs - kind of like fishing with butterflies for a fly.
The wildflowers are just now starting to appear so we are looking forward to seeing them and taking lots of pictures.  Two really nice craft beers stand out so far -  Russian River Damnation Golden Ale and Durango Dark Lager.  Give them a try if you can find them.Birding has also been fun, we have I D several that we don't  see in the Delta.We look forward to doing a full artical on western birds when we get enough pictures. We head west again in a few days for the balance of the summer. More cycling is on the agenda.   Hotter N Hell in Texas is just around the corner. The sampling of craft beers and great restaurants has slowed our training a bit! Also the tour of Colorado passes though our town in late August. Its not the tour of France but it is damn close and we look forward to this big event in our backyard.

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