Be lucky for what you have.

We went down to Newport Beach. It was fun. There were a lot of people that took their race very seriously. The swim was cancelled due to high surf. We went and saw The Wedge breaking at around 15 feet. It was very impressive.

The Wedge. 

At Newport I got to meet Erica Davis. She is paralyzed from the waist down. Her story is incredible. Read about it here. I also recruited her to help with water patrol in Kona. She makes me want to work out. Her goal is to race in Kona. My goal is to not be lazy.

Me and Erica.

Then we drove back to Northern California. We stopped at Carpinteria State Park where if there are any spots available, we love to stay here. It is a cool town with a swimming pool and killer sunsets.

 

Carpinteria sunset.

Now we are back in Windsor, California for the Vineman triathlon. It is nice to be here. The weather is perfect. Tomorrow, the big plans are to fish and swim all day. Then we have a wine, beer, cheese, shindig put on by Vineman. Sounds like a good day before retiring to the van. If I am lucky the janitor will open the gym so that I can shower before going to bed. Be happy that you probably have a shower at your house. Life is good.

Leaving Nor Cal.

I got to finally meet The Lorpeedo at Vineman. He even agreed to do water patrol with us in Kona this year. I have stopped reading the news. Or watching it on TV. Not that I have a TV. I do wake up early to watch Le Tour when we are in a hotel. Now we are on our way South. Back to Newport Beach. I hope to get some more bike riding in. I did a couple of hours yesterday.

 

Here is my view from the bike yesterday.

My leg hurts from indoor soccer still. The limp is gone, but it is still tender. I even got a little swim in a the Vineman course. I can't wait to start racing again. It looks like our next race will be at the Santa Cruz sprint. Time to drive.

Going back to Cali.

I love road trips. I guess that is my life. Leaving Colorado was sad, but exciting. I can really see myself living there in the future. We drove North to Wyoming, turned left on I-80 and haven’t looked back. Wyoming was pretty and boring. Utah was the same. The mountains were very nice before we arrived in Salt Lake City. I would like to visit there in the winter. It has been pretty uneventful since then. We arrived in Reno and checked in to the Atlantis Casino. I am not a fan of casinos, but Reno sucks and we didn’t want to walk around the town. This place was within our budget and added some excitement to our road trip. Lots of people smoking cigarettes, drinking, and the constant clang clang clang of slot machines. It’s like I can see the life draining out of these people. Suck in the nicotine, wash it down with a beer, and throw more money away. Time to move one. I will admit, we put $20 on black at the Roulette table. We lost. Now we drive to California.
[update] After 3 days of driving, we made it to California. Vineman was hot. Looked like a fun race. A tree fell on a couple of triathletes while they were on the bike. Bad luck. Joe Gambles broke the course record which was exciting. The guys running Vineman are cool people. I got to hang out with Conrad Stotlz for a bit at the Avia booth. Turns out Avia doesn't hate us. After the race, we drove towards the coast. We had dinner in Guerneville. We were a couple of the few straight people there. Looking for a place to stay, a lot fo the places were "gay friendly, nudity allowed". Not that I am opposed to either one, but after a long day of work all I want to do is relax. We drove to the coast and we are loving it!

Last weekend in Boulder.

It has been a couple of weeks in one place. I am not sure if I am ready for the "normal" life. Sometimes the idea of having a place to live seems really nice. But the idea a car payment, rent/mortgage, insurance, and repetition are still further away in the future. I think it is the repetition that scares me the most. Although I think that my training would be much better if I had a "normal" job.
We are heading out West in a couple of days. We won't be back in CO until November. So it was time to get some deeply discounted gear for the winter.

I am ready.

The transition area at the race.

This weekend's race was the Boulder Peak olympic distance triathlon. It is a popular race in the U.S. It was cool to see Craig Alexander wandering around enthusiastically cheering on the people racing.

 

My banana bread.

I was also able to use the bread maker at the house where we are staying. It has been fun. Theresa is awesome. Craig shops at the bread discount store. I didn't know that it existed either until we went today.
One last thing. If you like fishing, check out the monster Brown Trout picture that I just put on Fishy Steve's website! Insane. www.FishySteve.com

Keystone Biking Video

New video from Keystone.

c

7 inches is better than 4.

 

My new guide.

Heading back to the river after the rain subsided Mojdeh caught a fish! We were on a roll. The next day (4th of July) we went downhill mountain biking at Keystone. I had 7 inches of travel in my fork Moj went for the safe option and has 4 inches of travel.

Nice view.

I didn't go very fast.

The video will be coming out soon. Well, whenever we get around to it. That night, we drove to Glenwood Springs and slept in the parking lot of a bike store. We watched the fireworks from the van. It was nice. The next morning, we got up and I rode my bike to Aspen. It is about 50 miles and all uphill. I hit a thunderstorm about 8 miles from town. I showed up to a bike store soaking wet and very glad that they were open on a Sunday.

My view headed to Aspen.

Everyone like to chat about Lance Armstrong as he trains there for a couple of weeks before this weeks TdF. In Aspen, we admired all the fancy cars and things that make Aspen a great place to just sit and watch. Then of course we headed to a fly fishing shop to get more flies and some advice. Guess what happened next.

 Moj gets another!

We were starting to feel like we knew what we were doing. That night we had a real dinner (in a restaurant) and went to sleep in the parking lot of Buttermilk Mountain. 4 nights without paying for accommodation and utilising our van was great. Not showering was gross. Oh well. We got up and left Aspen early heading back to Frisco to see if we could see a friend at Podium Sports. Not wanting to leave the mountains, we hit the Blue River in Breckenridge one more time.

Luck was on my side.

I nailed another Brook Trout (this one a little bigger than the last). I used a pink worm this time. It was my first time using a fake worm as a fly. The young kid that worked at the store in Breck gave me some great advice (and flies). Off to indoor soccer.

My first time.

Beautiful Breckenridge.

We left Boulder yesterday after going for a bike ride with David of BimBamBoo. We slept in the Wal Mart parking lot in Frisco with no problems. It was our first time just pulling up to a place and going to sleep. This morning I got to get up and ride to Vail Pass. It was raining, but I didn't want to let anything stop me. The rain was intermittent and after being wet and cold for an hour, I made it to Copper Mountain. The weather looked worse ahead so I decided to turn around early.

Here is the path up to Vail Pass.

It was stunning. I followed a stream (with I-70 on the other side) uphill for a long time. I was in awe of the views every minute. There are great paved paths all around Frisco to all of the small towns nearby.

Copper Mountain from a bike.

We left Frisco and headed for Breckenridge. Walking around cute mountain town #2 (Breck) was fun. Busy, but fun. There are lots of tourists here in the mountains. We expect a lot more over the next couple of days. We were looking for a place to have lunch when we saw a fly fishing shop (Breckenridge Outfitters) giving away free Bratwurst. That enticed us in. We bought some flies, got some advice, and were on our way. The Blue River goes right through town here in Breck. We drove 5 minutes out of town and walked past a dozen other people fishing. We saw lots of fish and I thought that I was going to have to name this blog "If another fish spits out my flies...". Happily I don't. I caught my first fish today. Well I have caught lots of fish while fly fishing, but always with a guide. So this is my first fish without a guide. Mojdeh nailed one before we left Taupo. I hooked one, but never landed any. Today was my day. We even had a camera.

The walk along the river.

Hanapa'a!

Brook Trout.

 

The release.

In the rain.

The rain absolutely POURS when it rains here. We tried to stick it out, but the weather got the best of us. We will be going out later to try and hook a few more this evening. Thanks to Fishy Steve for teaching me so much during our trip to New Zealand. For those that care, we saw the fish becoming airborne trying to eat their food. They might have been going for some emergers, but the technique to mimic the emergers sounded difficult. I caught this Brook Trout using a #20 cannon bunny dun.

Mt. Evans

Mt. Evans 14,258 ft. We drove to Summit Lake at about 12,800 ft. Then we walked around the lake, up to Mt. Spalding, along a ridge and to the summit of Mt. Evans. The highest paved road in the US goea above 14,000 ft. to Mt. Evans. There were lots of people, cyclists, mountain goats, and a few other hikers. Next time I want to ride my bike up it. Tomorrow, we are off to the mountains again...