Kobae and I are out hiking and a guy pulls up in a truck and says "You should have a bucket of water with you to pour on him." I said "It's 55 degrees. He can hardly move when it gets to 45 degrees. He doesn't need a bucket of water." Guy drives off. An hour or so later we run into the same guy coming from the other direction and he says "I'd still pour a bucket of water on him." I say "He's still fine." Guy drives off.
The next day some people pull up asking about Kobae and the lodge. One lady walks down to the river. As they are loading up to leave the river lady says "There is a rose in Spanish Harlem." She smiles, waves, they leave. I walk down to the river.
It's cold. The temps are falling fast. 20 degrees below normal. It's in the high 40s. Kobae wants out of the laundry room. I know he's going to walk outside, find there's no sun, it's cold, and come back in. I open the outside door and the phone rings. Michelle and Jax are missing. It's been four days so I go inside to answer the phone, it's not her. I walk back outside and Kobae is gone. It's going to get down to 18 degrees. I only have a few hours to find him. I head to the beach, creek, and the road. The places he can get in trouble the fastest. I can't find a track. At the bottom of the driveway three guys pull up on dirt bikes and atvs. I ask them to help look for Kobae and send them up the hill while I cover the other three sides where danger lurks. I get walkie updates and nobody has seen anything. I head up the hill pass the hogans and pick up a single track, then another 20 feet away. Finally a solid track going over the hill. I ask one of the volunteers to follow the track and call me when he catches him. I go back down to get the truck and when he describes where Kobae is I head off to herd him to the truck, pick him up, and drive him back. Thanks to the volunteers that helped me find him.
Last Thursday after posting how wonderful everything had been going this year I woke up to a loud noise under the lodge. When I cleared out the storage room and was able to crawl under the lodge I could see a water break flooding the whole place. I got the water and pump shut off and called every plumbing company in town. They were all deer hunting but maybe in a week or two. A couple of disc golfers go under to see if they can fix it but say they don't have the proper tools and replacement parts. So for four days there's no water in the lodge and I move guests next door. Two days ago, Monday, one company calls and says probably tomorrow. I tell them I will make a run to town for supplies and they can follow me back. While one guy is under the lodge working the other guy says "What's the name of that stream?" I say "Colorado River." He says "It's kind of skinny isn't it?" The other guy calls on the walkie and says he "sees movement." I tell him the skunks and ringtails are living under there but they're cool." The disc golfers said they saw large poop so hope there's no raccoons but maybe. He calls again to say he just saw a big skunk walk by. I again tell him I feed them and there's no danger. They fix the leak and leave and ten minutes later the skunk lets one go under the lodge and I can barely breath above the lodge.
It's cold today. Kobae came out on the porch to 34 degree weather, huddled up for a couple minutes and went back under the heat lamp in the laundry room. Maybe I should have taken him back last week but temps get into the 50's and 60s by the weekend and I want to spend as much time hiking with him knowing it will be four months or so before he gets to do it again.
I'm sitting on the front porch putting lotion on, everything is chapped. Two ravens fly over and they are talking up a storm. It's as if there's a hawk here but I haven't seen a hawk in a long time. About the only hawk I don't think they can kill is a male sharp shinned who is too fast and can turn so quickly. With the though a male sharp shinned blows around the corner chasing a pinon jay. The ravens are complaining up a storm and take off in flight after it.
I got an email from Michelle last week saying she'd be here Thursday with Jax, then Friday, and then again on Sunday all saying she'd be here on those days. I tried to call her on Sunday and her cell phone is disconnected. She emailed me to tell me her new number and said she was on her way but didn't feel good so was pulling over in a small town a couple hours from here. I got the email at 3:30 am Sunday morning. I've called and emailed a bunch since then and no response. I called the Sheriff of the small town this afternoon and he said he'd look around and give me a call back if he saw the Jeep anywhere. Before Michelle brought Jax here and two weeks later about four years ago.
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