Archiving throughout Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas

On Wednesday, 9/26, we drove from Bosque del Apache NWR to Ft Collins, CO (a 9-hour trip that took us from south to north in both NM and CO) where we spent the remainder of the week in training, learning more about the ServCat (Service Catalog) database system. This is the system that will house all of the files we will scan throughout the year and is currently "live" and active for use within the Parks Service. This system will ultimately be open for public access. We enjoyed our time in Ft. Collins and learned a lot. We were really impressed by the knowledge and passion of the crew that trained us (Richard, Rande, Sarah and Tiffany). We left Ft Collins on Friday evening and made our way to Estes Park, CO for a long weekend getaway in the Rocky Mountains (on our dime). This is in front of the Riverview Pines, our hotel along the Falls River, a great location in between Estes Park and the Rocky Mountain National Park.

The view from our room. The mountain air felt wonderful.

The second floor patio is ours!

Weekend warriors: we got up and out first thing Saturday morning to catch-up on EXERCISE! It felt SOOO good to get out and HIKE, and we spent over 6 hours doing just that! We hiked all around the Bear Lake area of the Rocky Mountain National Park and loved it. As you can see, the weather was perfect for hiking and the scenery was breath-taking. This was a far cry from both the conference room in Ft. Collins AND the beautiful desert scenery in Bosque.

Oliver at Bear Lake. It was about 9:15am at this point in the day.

Oliver at Nymph Lake - just a short hike from Bear Lake. We think it was named because of all the lily pads on the water's surface where the nymphs probably all live.

A few more angles of Nymph Lake.

We continued to climb with each lake that we added to our route. The trails were well maintained, easy to follow, and delivered indescribable beauty at every juncture. We absolutely loved our time out that morning.

Dream Lake.

The Aspens were in full golden color and were gorgeous.

Yes, there was snow on the higher elevations. It was hard for us to believe that it was that cold anywhere close to where we were hiking. The snow provided the perfect "!" to the natural beauty of the Park.

Lake Haiyaha - the highest point that we hiked and the greenest water and rockiest shoreline. We stayed for awhile, ate a few snacks, and took it all in.

Another angle of the golden Aspens trees.

After a very late lunch in Estes Park, we went back into the Park for more. By now, there was noticably increased traffic and people around, and also more wildlife. We spent several hours stumbling upon pockets of cars, people, cameras and Elk herds. It was as entertaining watching the people as it was watching the Elk. Traffic was backed-up at various locations in the Park while people fell over themselves to get the perfect photo. The Elk also put on quite a show - lots of trumpeting and movement. They were all unphased by the attention, which went on throughout the late-afternoon into the evening.

More Elk at dusk. We had to remind ourselves that we were in THEIR home.

Inside our room at the Riverview Pines.

Sunday we got up and started up into the Park enroute to Trail Ride Rd. and the west side of the RMNP.

As we climbed in elevation, the temps were noticably colder. We really did not appreciate the lack of guardrails along the road as we snaked around the mountains. This is not a drive for the faint-of-heart!

Lake Irene and the Continental Divide.

This is the headwater of the Colorado River. It was cool to see just how mild the river is at this point, knowing how large and rapid it gets as it carves its way down into the Grand Canyon.

More than 130,000 birds spend the winter at Bosque. The crew there works very hard to insure that the 57,000 acre refuge is prepared for their arrival by managing how the water is allocated and channeled into the various marshes. They also grow plants that will provide seeds and food for the birds. They are guaranteed to have water from the Rio Grande, based on plans and agreements with farmers upstream who close their water gates at the end of the summer to allow for water to flow downstream to Bosque in time for the winter migration.

There are numerous places throughout the refuge where visitors can get a "birds-eye" view of its natural beauty.

Although this must look like one giant vacation, we also did quite a lot of work during our time at Bosque. We scanned over 40 different reports that will be uploaded to a database (ServCat) for the Fish and Wildlife Dept. This means that these documents will be available for all staff to view and use, and ultimately these docs will also be available to the public online.

Most of these were annual reports or "narratives" which provide an overview of the important events and happenings at the refuge during the year, quarter, or whatever period of time the report covered. There were also docs that provided a history of annual bird counts and historical data for other wildlife that call the refuge home (mountain lions, prairie dogs, rattlesnakes, various spiders, raptors, etc). It was fascinating to learn more about this special place and we are glad that our work can make part of its history available to more people.

This is a view of the visitor's center, offices and residences from the two-lane road that connects Bosque to the rest of the world.

Just 8 miles from the refuge is the Buckhorn - home of the best green chile cheeseburger in southern NM! We have acquired a real taste for the NM green chiles, which are found everywhere. We even ate a green chile cheeseburger at McDonald's!

Oliver enjoyed the sauna at the refuge almost every night we were there.

We were so excited to spot these two coyotes at dusk - such a pretty time of day at the refuge.

We were a little ahead of the arrival of the birds, but did enjoy seeing hundreds of the early landers.

We would recommend southern NM as a great place for a winter vacation: Albuquerque, Las Cruces, Carlsbad National Park, White Sands National Monument, Bosque del Apache NWR, The Very Large Array - are just a few super-cool places to visit all within 3-4 hours of one another.