It was a great summer here in Salida.  Although spring/summer got off to a cold and cloudy start, the weather most of the summer has been fantastic... gorgeous mornings, with a few thunderstorms in the afternoon.  Highs range from 70 - 90 depending on cloud cover... but even when it is 90, there's little humidity, and it's cool in the shade.  Some people complain about the heat, but being from Atlanta, I simply don't mind it! 

This summer, we finally started to enjoy the many reasons we moved to this mountain locale.  I can easily see how someone can become an adrenaline junkie here.  I've been out biking, hiking or running 2-3 times a week.  I've gotten into the habit of tackling large hills on my road bike and mountain bike.  Being in rural Colorado, there is little traffic on the county roads, and most of the "major" highways have wide shoulders.  With flexible work schedules, I generally headed out in the rain-free mornings.  While not great for the pocket book, this summer has been a total blast.  The lifestyle is simply perfect for us.  Assuming we can make our work continue to "work" for us, we could easily see ourselves living here the rest of our lives.  For our lifestyle, this is simply paradise!

Speaking of work... Teresa is now Station Coordinator for KHEN, the community radio station that we've become involved with.  It's part time 10am - 2pm weekdays, it doesn't pay much, but it's better than nothing when the drafting work falls flat (which has been happening recently).  As for me, I help out with their tech stuff, but I'm also now on the board of directors for KHEN.  So we both get the help out the organization we've become pretty tied into.  I've come to realize the huge value that community radio brings to a small community.  We really are the voice of the people... far more so than even public radio could ever dream to be.  All programming comes from members of the community.  It's a haven where DJs can play almost whatever they want, without commercial interruption... try to find that on commercial radio now-a-days!  I'm excited to see where we can take this organization.

On my end, I'm still working with Nexidia.  I've taken on some local work, but I'm considering throwing my hat into the local IT support market.  I know it's something I'll be good at, but I hope I don't get bored with it.  It feels as though it may help us stabilize ourselves in this community, which would be a good thing.  I have lots of lines tossed out into the pond right now.  We'll have to see what bites!

We also started some interesting projects this year.  With gas prices as they are, we decided to purchase... well... this:

But the kicker?  We are converting this beautiful VW bug to electric with the help of a local company which is now getting some national attention:  Salida Conversions.  As I write this, the VW electric bug car is nearly complete.  Basically, it's just waiting for gauges, which are actually pretty important.  The gauges allow the Salida Conversions staff to monitor the battery and engine performance and discover any problems.  It will also allow us to monitor the systems more carefully.  We can't wait to go for a test drive!  Supposedly, we'll get about a 45 mile range on a single charge.  We'll have to see how well it does in reality though.  For example, we want to know... will it make it 15 miles with a 2000 ft climb up to the top of Poncha pass?  (Altitude is ~9000ft)?   We are free to experiment since I own a generator to charge the batteries if we run into a problem.  When the car's batteries die, we can upgrade the batteries and go probably 2-3 times as far.  In the mean time, we all hope cost on the better batteries will plummet as manufacturers ramp up production.  Time will tell!

With Salida Conversion's help, we also took Teresa's old KHS mountain bike and converted it to electric.  The bicycle electric conversion kits came from Wilderness Energy.  Pete with Salida Conversions did the KHS conversion.  Unfortunately, he didn't read the directions in full where it said DO NOT mount to an aluminum fork.  The torqe that the front hub brushed motor produced knocked the stays out... IE the fork hit the ground, and so did Pete... and the wheel kept on going!  Oops!  Thankfully, Pete was ok.  After a few weeks waiting for new more sturdy parts we finally had it working.  Teresa's now riding it every day in to work and all around town.

After the success on her bike, I decided to do some research before converting my $20 garage sale score, a "salmon" colored Raleigh mountain bike (it is NOT pink darn-it!)  I wanted to see if I could reduce the battery weight, and eventually went with a brushless Wilderness Energy kit from BatterySpace.com.  I ended up with Lithium Polymer batteries about doubled the cost, but what a difference in weight!  My bike probably weighs half of Teresa's.  On the other hand, if you read all the warnings about charging/discharging LiPO batteries, you'd think they will catch fire just by looking at them the wrong way.  So far, no fires thankfully.  I did run into a few challenges piecing things together... for example, I learned the hard way that you have to apply max torque to both wheel nuts simultaneously to firmly attach the wheel to the frame.  Otherwise, the high torque from the motorized wheel just spins itself right out of the stays during accelleration.  I nearly shredded my motor's wires more than once.

Anyhow, the bikes are alot of fun.  The strange looks we get, and ensuing discussions are fun too.  I don't mind pedalling, but it's nice to know that we can now tool around town, and enjoy a beer in the evening without worrying about throwing up as we climb 400 ft up the incline to our house.  :-)   (PS I just came across this article in Wired.)

On the home front, unfortunately, we've managed to put off some house projects this year so far.  We would have liked to put in a rock wall and a wood stove, but instead, we did get a little bit of landscaping done.  Compost is happening, and we are in the middle of putting a swing gate we can drive through so we can start up some larger projects next year.  I did manage to get some outdoor speakers set up above our back deck, so we can enjoy tunes on our back patio.  I also gotta figure out where we're gonna put the sauna!  :-)

That's about it from T&A's Sandbox here in Salida, Colorado.  I finish writing this as the aspen leaves are starting to turn a beautiful shade of yellow and orange.  We hope the warm weather continues while we wait for snow and ski season.  :-)  I hope y'all had a great summer as well.

PS We look forward to seeing our Atlanta/Birmingham friends and family in November for our yearly Thanksgiving pilgrimage.