A day chasing llamas.

Life...

Been feeling pretty discouraged lately with no creative inspiration. Although, I have been working, slowly, on my fat lady sculpture...Goddess sculpture...I'm trying to embrace myself and come to terms with my own body. She, and I both are works in progress.

We have been out to our land a few times, trying to avoid the mud days, but racing through the bad spots in the road. The mud on our pallet shed has held up well to the weather, considering it was only the first coat. There is some signs of weather hitting it. The snow and wind come from the southwest.

And back at the Earthship, the llamas got out one morning, or at least when Richard went out to feed them, they were gone. Panic!! Where do you even start? We bundled up the kids and warmed up the car. I think it was around 10 F that morning. I  stood outside calling "Llama, llama, llama, llama," at the top of my lungs. Yeah, like here kitty, kitty, kitty, but the boys will usually come in from the field when I do that. No llamas to be seen, anywhere. Richard got out the binoculars...nothing. For miles around. Just sage. So, where do you start looking for seven wayward llamas in miles and miles of sage?

I put a post on Facebook, hoping some one in neighboring communities might have seen them. Richard started to call the neighbors. I rounded up leads and grain to entice them with, loaded the kids in the car, and then Richard told me one of the neighbors called and the llamas were at his house, on the very edge of our development.

We drove about three miles to get to the escapees. There they were, Turbo standing on a little hill being the proud guardian of his herd. I rolled down the window and started my here "llama, llama, llama..." call and they all turned to look at me, ears perked up. But no one came running. The neighbors came out and basically just stood there, not knowing what to do or how to help. Richard got out the pans of grain, and then they came running. Yippee. But getting leads on them...nope.

They were lead shy and balked at the sight of the leads. Richard managed to wrestle Vader and keep his arm around his neck while I snapped on a lead. Thankfully they had halters on. One boy caught, but no one else wanted anything to do with any of it and in fact were beginning to wander away. So I took Vader and began walking. Turbo started to follow, and then Frosty. My boys. The brat girls followed for a minute, and I thought I'd have to walk that llama the three miles home, in the cold, while the rest followed.

But no, the girls got spooked by Richard waving the grain at them and they turned around and began to wander off into the sage. Now Turbo looked at them, looked at me and Vader, looked back at the girls and took off...for the girls. And Frosty decided to follow him. And Richard was following them with his pan of grain. I was left with one lone llama, some frozen toes and two little kids in the car, yelling "here llama, llama, llama."

So, what now? The llamas and Richard were headed into the sage, and the road didn't go that way. But I could cut them off via Renegade road (the road around Two Peaks that our development has tried and tried--to no avail-- to keep the people on the other side of the hill from using).

But I still had a llama and two kids in the car. So I tied that llama to the bumper and drove real slow down the road. So slow, it was painful, as I wondered where the llamas had gone, and if Richard was getting frostbite. Eventually the neighbor where the llamas ended up was behind me in his fancy Mercedes, and I thought, oh good, he's coming to help. Maybe he can find Richard and get him in the car before his fingers and toes fall off. So I pulled over at another road and got out to wait for him to drive up, and on he went, right on by, with a little wave, speeding up as he passed me and my slow walking llama. Okay, fine. I stood in the door to the car and searched the horizon with the binoculars. Nothing.

So, I got back in and drove my walking llama to the crossroads, wondering if I should just take him home and tie him up. I decided to tie him to a post at the crossroads. He was panting from his walk/run behind the car. I gave him a pan of grain and left him there in the sage, hoping if the other llamas saw him, they'd head that way.

And we were off, four wheelin' it down the Renegade road, but I could not see the llamas or Richard anywhere. So I headed off road and through the sage, hoping the ground was still frozen enough to not be mud. It was all good. I love that Kia. I was swerving around sage and big rocks until I reached the end of the clearing. Unless I wanted to drive over the sagebrush, I was done, so I stood in the door way of the Kia and looked again, and they they were! And then they were gone. Over a small rise. The flat landscape around me was sure full of hills and valleys...enough to hide seven llamas and a six foot four inch man.

But, for the second I saw them, I could see Richard herding them with his bowl of grain back toward the road. I didn't know it then, but they were following the fence line of our development. So I headed back through the sage, aiming for the road, bumping along on the icy dirt. I caught up to them, but Richard was waving me on, telling me to go home (really he was telling me to cut them off so they didn't go in another direction).

So, I took off, hoping to get to my tied up llama before the rest of the herd did. I planned on using him as bait to get the others to go home.

And we were back to driving slow, walking Vader behind the car to the road behind our house. When I got back on our property, I couldn't figure out what to do, so I left the kids in the car and the llama tied up and went to inspect the electric fence lines. How was I going to get the llamas back in when they showed up? Richard was still herding them down the road, chasing them with his grain (reminded me of another day, in Colorado, of escaped llamas as Richard ran behind our two boys, waving grain at their butts).

So I found a spot in the fence that was pretty broken down. It looked like a herd of buffalo went through the fence. I disconnected the remaining lower lines and ran back to Vader. Now Richard and the llamas were headed down our back road. I had to get Vader back on the right side of the fence before the rest got there.

It was timing. I almost didn't make it. I got around the fence when Turbo saw Vader and started running, the girls, and Frosty following him. I tied Vader to the barn and snuck back through the fence line. And they all came running, reunited with Vader, but not interested in the pans of grain I had put down around the barn. And they all headed right back out through the downed lines, in the other direction. Crap, I'm thinking! But Richard tells me it's okay, at least they are in the area now, and he grabs a bale of alfalfa.

I jump in the car and drive around the house to the other side to herd them back into the yard. It's just those pesky girls. The boys are eating from the alfalfa bale in the pen. Vader is still tied up at the barn. I scare the girls into turning around, or maybe they were headed back to the alfalfa anyway, and park the car at the fence line, thinking I can get the wire back up while they are distracted. I have my daughter get out and stand in the hole behind the car. The car is the fence at this point. The llamas are only interested in their alfalfa.

We get the lines back up, in spite of the fact that I had parked the car on one of the lines. The llamas were all back in. We decided to herd them into the corral panels and contain them while Richard checked the fence line. But instead we spent the afternoon going down to our land to get the other four corral panes we had stored out there so we could keep the brat llamas fenced in for a while.

It turns out we have to move (another story) and we don't want to chase llamas around the countryside anymore. We picked up our unused roll of field fence from our land too, thinking we could make a more sturdy pen. I am not a fan of electric fence.

No one lost their fingers or toes. It was a day of adventure--and comedy-- indeed. I wish I had thought to grab the camera in my haste to get out the door and find those llamas. I sure did have fun driving through the sage (I rarely get to drive anymore), and almost felt like the cowgirl I used to pretend I was when I was a little girl. Yeehah!

Fencing, shade, gardens and Nature

Catching up. Gardens getting planted, more sage being cleared and lots more to do.

shade in the sage

The past two weeks out on our new land have been about clearing more sage and trying to get ready to put up the fence on the west border. I'm getting accustomed to wielding the heavy axe. It didn't take long for us to realize how incredibly hot it is out there in the unforgiving sun, so we have decided to make a shade structure one of our priorities, although the umbrella works in a pinch. It blows away on occasion and looks like a rainbow kite skimming across the sage. Richard has devised a great way to tie it down, weighted with the post pounders and tied to a sage bush.

cleared for shade structure

After we put up our shade structure, we can build a cistern to catch the water off the roof! In this desert place, any water we can get and store is a wonderful thing, so every single structure we build will have a water catchment system of some variety.

northwest corner h-brace

Richard finished the corner H-brace on the northwest side of the property and finally we even got the fence posts up. Next is the unrolling and hanging of the fence. Great fun to come.

strawbale compost bin

Our compost bin is growing quickly and with a neighbor's added horse and goat poop, by the time we finally move out there, we should have the beginning of some kind of useable compost.





We found and bought a generator online (free delivery) to give us power to work. Bonus: now we can use the generator to boost the batteries at our off grid rental house when the cloudy days build up.We are thinking of holding off on installing our wind generator and just putting it up on the new land.

prickly pear

not a rattler....bull snake maybe

Even though we only get out to the land once a week, our work is fulfilling and we seem to accomplish a lot in a short time, considering. This last week I was rewarded with a little bit of nature on the way home...a pretty cactus in bloom and a snake crossing the road.

Little ones plant potatoes

And at home, at the other end of the valley, we have been getting the gardens in. Richard and the kids planted potatoes, and this week we hope to get our tomatoes out...sooner rather than later.

nest with baby peeking out

There is also some wildlife around the homestead...this morning a huge raven woke us. He was on the roof and we thought for sure some kind of four-legged creature was running across the Earthship roof. And, the nest of baby birds above one of the outside lights has been taking flight. They leave early in the mornings and return at dusk. There were five at first, but now I only see three babies, when I see them. I hope they are out there finding their freedom and didn't become prey for some critters.

Cicada

Also the Cicadas are singing, crazy loud, and scary thing, they sound like the rattle snake I saw on an early morning walk with Honey. Or the snake sounded like them. Who knows. I don't walk the tracks through the sage anymore. I stick to the wide gravel road that gives me room to see and avoid any snakes!

So this next week is about fencing and shade out on the land and planting tomatoes and peppers here at home. Still so much to do in so many places.

We are so thankful for the work share of produce Richard gets every week form Cerro Vista Farm, seeing how our gardens are slow going in, and much smaller than we had hoped they would be.

We anticipate the space we will have to put in greenhouses and huge gardens at our new place, and look forward to the days when we can hold classes on homesteading on our own land.

A spiritual quest for potatoes

So much catching up to do. With Richard on vacation from work, we have been going nonstop.

On Monday we loaded up the family in the big old truck, hooked up Lucky, the handy trailer, and headed over the pass to the San Luis Valley to pick up potatoes for the Canon Co-op at an organic farm. I was excited. I hadn't been to Salida since we went to their big art festival when I was pregnant with my three year old daughter. I enjoyed the little town then, with its art-friendly attitude, and we had recently been reading about the local food movement that was occurring there as well. A town after my own heart. Was this a place we could ultimately relocate? (I'm always keeping my eyes open for my own personal Shangra-la or Cicely, Alaska, for us Northern Exposure fans.)

Let me tell you, it is hard, so very hard, living life on the fringe and being looked at by the mainstream like you have two heads. Wouldn't it be nice to be welcomed into a community that was already established as spiritual, environmentally conscious, art friendly, educated, open-minded, healthy, etcetera, etcetera...? I have dreams. Not that anyone has thrown stones...not in this decade anyway (when I was young and sported a mohawk, someone once threw a tennis ball at me from a passing car), but I am always leery about telling anyone too much about myself and my belief system for fear of being persecuted or ostracized. I am an outsider in my own family and it is a rare day indeed when I can  meet someone who gets it, someone on the path to enlightenment, someone with whom I feel safe enough with to finally let down my guard.

Isn't it an odd thing to be looked down upon for not eating red meat, or not following the established rituals of a mindless religion? Wouldn't it be wonderful to find the Utopia where everyone was equal and lived a life based on enlightenment and healing the planet and saving humanity from its current course of extinction, a place where the community understood the importance of raising our children not as capitalistic sheep to be led to the next mini-mall, but as stewards of our planet, including the soil, air, water and creatures who share it. Where is this mythical place? For a while I thought it was Taos, and Taos is getting closer, but how could I reconcile myself with the fact that the Taos mountain kicked me out? Anyway, I keep looking, trying to decipher the spiritual clues to the location of my heaven on earth ( I know, I know, it isn't a place) and I had been wondering recently if Salida might be it, at least for me?

Also on this trip, we were going into the massive alpine valley of San Luis, where I knew some sort of spiritual movement was taking place. There is Crestone of course, which we did visit a few years back, and turned out not to be my spot to permanently move, although some would swear it is the spiritual place to be. Maybe it is for them, and they are definitely doing some good work there, but with the freezing winter temperatures, and the "feelings" or lack of, really, that I had when we visited, I knew Crestone would not be the place I spent the rest of my life.

But could I have been wrong? Maybe just somewhere in the San Luis Valley was my little piece of high desert heaven. If the aliens found it interesting enough to make frequent stops, there must be some valuable energy floating between the two mountain ranges that I was missing.

So a trip to the Valley via Salida was welcome, but never justified in expense and fuel use, until now, when we could run a worthwhile errand, which we made even more productive by responding to an ad on Craigslist that was selling really cheap straw bales in the San Luis Valley. Potatoes and straw. That was our main focus, with a little bit of spiritual journeying on the side for myself.

So Monday, we ended up driving through the canon to Salida. The roads had a bit of snow and ice around the curves of the highway that were hidden from the sun, and I was struck by how much the drive reminded me of the trip from Taos to Santa Fe, with the river snaking along beside the twisting road. Well, that was okay then, and except for the dusting of snow and the looming dark clouds ahead, I was in a great mood. We stopped at a little store a Co-op friend had recommended on the outskirts of Salida. It was a bizarre place with really cheap food and items, kind of like a bargain store with dinged up cans and day old discounts, but this place had flour and sugar in bags made of printed cotton material. Where did this stuff come from?

It was freezing when we left the warm cab of the pick-up, and I couldn't think straight. I couldn't focus on spiritual feelings when I was trying to keep myself and two toddlers from getting frostbite on the five yard dash to the front door of the tiny little store. I didn't find anything I needed to have, but Richard found a few bargains when I left him alone and returned the kids to the warm truck to eat our prepared lunch of homemade peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I also had the two chihuahuas on this trip and had to take them out to the potty, at which time, which they glared at me and shivered because I had forgotten their winter coats.


We drove through Salida a bit, into the historic downtown, still full of art galleries and outdoor shops, but nothing really grabbed me and we didn't stop. I was still angry at being cold. I hate being cold more than anything. I just wanted to be on our way. The clouds were looking ominous and I wanted to make it back to the other side of the mountains before the snow started to fly. I hate driving on icy roads about as much as I hate being cold, and now I was ready to go home and be warm with a nice cup of hot cocoa flavored coffee. Forget this trip, forget the potatoes. My mood was getting as dark as the clouds, and I just closed my eyes as we headed out of town, trying to eliminate snow packed sections of the highway from my view, from my reality.

When we got through the pass at Poncha Springs and headed south into the Valley, things got better. As the sun came out and the roads cleared and the sagebrush began to pop up on the prairie outside my window, my bad mood eased and I began to enjoy the scenery. Now it was better, kind of like the drive to Taos from Ft Garland, and I began to feel a sense of peace come over me. I enjoyed the warmth of the sun and envisioned a passive solar house in sage where I could just sit and soak up the winter rays without having to step out into the reality of freezing temperatures. Based upon my feelings on leaving the higher mountain passes and cold, cold environment, Salida does not seem like my next Utopia.

We came into Mosca without incident and pulled up to the gas station where we would meet the farmer (?) who was selling the organic potatoes. Some man loaded a couple of bags of Quinoa grain into the back of the truck and then we were driving back across the highway to the farm where potatoes were being cleaned and loaded into bags and boxes. Lots of potatoes. 

There was a huge truck full of potatoes just from the field and a strange hopper/conveyor thing that loaded the potatoes, and moved them inside the building. I'm not sure where or how they were cleaned and sorted, but they were. Our potatoes came in 50 pound bags and 50 pound boxes, which went into the horse trailer. Now I was concerned that with the cold weather, the potatoes would freeze. Good thing our next stop was for lots of straw that we could insulate the potatoes with.

I asked the lady that we did our potato business with how cold the temperatures really got in the Valley. She said there is usually at least one solid month where night time temps fall from -20 to -40 degrees F in the winter. But of course the sunny days could get up to 40 or 50 degrees F, like so many other high desert Colorado or New Mexico places. Sure, great. Nights are too cold. Even if I built an awesome passive solar house, it was still too cold for me to function. Maybe I better keep searching for my special place.

Mt Blanca

We continued south and then east into Blanca, the town named for the snow covered mountain that was the backdrop to almost everything in the valley. Richard likes to take pictures of this mountain. he says it is one of the most photogenic mountains in Colorado. Being from Texas, I think he is awestruck by this mountain as it seems to be a stereotype of the perfect Colorado mountain. It is a pretty mountain, as long as I can stay far enough away from the cold snow I see piled on its peaks.

We found our straw at a farm south of town and on the way there we noticed a field full of birds. "Geese," said Richard. But I looked a little closer and noticed they weren't geese at all, but a field full of about three hundred Sandhill Cranes. Amazing.I'd never seen more than two Sandhill Cranes in any given place, at any given time. As we loaded straw into the pickup bed and trailer, I could hear the cranes talking amongst themselves, and it sounded like there was a wild bird refuge in this man's backyard.

I could feel a palpable excitement building within me and as soon as we were finished with the straw, I had to sneak as close as I could to the field of birds to snap a few photos. Unfortunately, I haven't had access to an SLR camera for years and I couldn't get close enough to the cranes to get a decent shot. They were incredible, raising their wings and flapping, bumping chests like my guineas at play. Richard tried his hand at pictures from the truck, and then, the birds took off. They all started to fly. I felt like I was in a nature program in Africa, watching the birds take off, perfectly orchestrated.

That old homestead in Blanca

I was having a moment of pure natural joy, just watching those birds, and when I saw the old, abandoned homestead at the end of the road, my first thought was I could live there. There was an old adobe house, outbuildings, including an old grain silo I could turn into an art studio (see Mother Earth News for ideas on how to turn silos into houses.) And, there were the birds, the glorious birds. There was Mt Blanca to look at and the sage surrounding this small farm. I could live there, I thought again. But it's not for sale and the temperatures are probably just as cold in Blanca as they are in most of the San Luis Valley.

We headed back up to Canon city the long way, over La Veta pass, trying to avoid any snow or impending storms. We drove through La Veta, another burgeoning art community, which has grown significantly since the last time I was there maybe seven years ago. It is still quaint, but I imagine the prices for property are rising as it becomes the new trendy spot. The coolest part of that drive was passing a herd of cows heading back to their barn for the night, and when I thought they were going to walk into the road just as we pulled up, I was surprised to see them disappear entirely. They were crossing from one pasture to another, under the road through an enormous culvert. Ingenious!


We got home after dark, dropped off the potatoes and got the little kids into bed. Overall, I was pretty happy to be home, back in my warm little house where the outside temperatures never fall to -40 degrees. Sure, it isn't exactly where I want to end up, but if we do end up staying here forever, I'll be okay with it, and I can  take an occasional drive into the sage filled lands of New Mexico every now and then to feed my soul. Here, we are building community and the people we are meeting are wonderful, and it turns out, maybe not so different from me after all.