We missed Joe Walsh (Eagles lead guitarist) by a week. He played around the corner from where she is standing. Oh well the story of my life, a week late and a whole lot of dollars short!

Rawlings, WY to Aspen, CO was not on our original agenda and I had not figured an extended visit into the time required to make Rawlings. Long story short, we were pulling into Rawlings at 10:15 P.M. and trying to catch up on some rest for the drive down to Aspen the next day. The most stressful thing about traveling at night up in these parts is the wildlife on the road. For about 50 miles out of Rawlings we had to deal with antelope on the highway on a very dark night. We dodged antelope until almost the city limits of Rawlings. Fortunately, we didn’t hit any but the stress of the activity just about did us in. I felt like I was in one of those video games trying to dodge things running in front of us.
Anyway, the next morning, still a little worn down from the long drive the day before, we got in the truck and headed to Aspen. Now, I had never been to Aspen before. I had lived down in Durango for three years as a young boy but I had not ventured into the northern part of the state except for Denver. I don’t know what I expected to find when we arrived but I guess I was a little surprised. Now I know the towns claim to fame comes from its winter time sports of skiing, etc. But somehow Aspen didn’t stop there. It transcended the normal glitzy ski resort and went for a more complete way of life that says, “If you have to ask what it costs, you can’t afford to live here”.
Before you ever really get into town you already get the feeling there’s something a little different about this little place. For one thing you pass by an airport that would look about right for a city of 250,000. There are rows of private jets (and I don’t mean the small variety) lined up in front of the hangers. I believe I’m correct when I say the highest priced real estate in the world is now Aspen, CO. They sell land here by the square foot.
Arriving at our friends John and Betty’s home here in Aspen, I was amazed at the beauty of the setting. Their “little” 4 bedroom sits right on this creek that rushes down-stream and all you hear from our bedroom and the living area is the moving of water over rocks. It is a beautiful sound. The bedroom we chose to stay in has a deck that overlooks the creek and I hope to get some shots of it in the post. There are actually no homes available here on the creek front any longer, they are all taken. There may be one kind of close for $5 million plus but without this awesome view. That is kind of in line with the real estate pages I was looking at in the little Aspen Times Weekly paper where there were homes basically from $2.5 million for a “fixer-upper” to $12.5 to $20 million for something a little nicer. Or, if you really wanted to go the “economy route”, you could buy 1/8 owner ship in a 690 sq. ft. third floor condo for only $554,000. What a deal!
I woke up this morning and went up to the kitchen to get my wakeup cup of coffee. Betty said the machine would make whatever I wanted, a half cup, a whole cup, espresso, latte, whatever. I didn’t pay any attention to the machine last night as she was explaining all this to Charlotte. When I tried to get a cup of coffee out of it this morning, I started looking for the operations manual for this monster!
After several attempts, I got a half cup of espresso then figured out how to put more hot water in the cup. A straight shot of the espresso would have probably pushed my heart out of my chest at this high altitude! ( over 8,000 feet) My old Bunn Coffee pot sure would have been welcome this morning. I’m sure the one in their kitchen is better but there is the question of technical know-how to get out of it what you want. That was the problem this morning.
Well, we’re going to go downtown here in a little bit and maybe some celebrity will get to see me! I don’t think I fit in here real well. But I need to give it a shot. The real test as to whether a man would want to live here or not has to be determined in the local watering hole. If a tap beer is more than $3.00, don’t unpack your suitcase!