The weekend of July 17-19, 2009 will be a prominent point of history in the lives of the Rutkowski family. We knew going into this weekend that it would be a whirlwind trip. Our plan was to go camping with the Webers and the Applequists. The Rutkowski’s were to arrive on Friday evening at Eleven Mile Reservoir’s luscious Backcountry campground, outside of Lake George, CO. The Webers were to arrive Saturday Morning; and the Applequists were to arrive Saturday afternoon. Alas, the Applequists were forced to take up residence in a citified RV park, as there was no room in the inn. (I guess if one expects to camp in Colorado, they have to plan far enough in advance to make reservations.) Still, though, the Applequists got to join us for the afternoon and evening, where CJ amazed us all with the “Fusion Stove”, which he claims will run on any given fuel. CJ considers this piece of “elegant design” to be the camper’s equivalent to the modified food processor on the Back to the Future Delorean. And Diane had us all salivating over their yummy Campfire Dutch Oven Pizza.


I wish we could say that this trip was made up entirely of such awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping moments. Instead, we can make claims to have dropped more than a few pounds hiking. Some of us even dropped so hard that we were left asking the question as to which was harder—the ground, or our heads.

It all started with a phone call to the campsite. Angi asked the ranger how far we would have to hike to get to these glorious backcountry campsites. The ranger responded that it was just a short quarter-mile hike. We later found out that the opinion held by this ranger told two separate stories. First, we found out that to the ranger, a hike that was well over a half-mile and included the scaling of large rock cliffs was really just the equivalent of an easy morning warm-up routine. Second, we realized that to the average lazy camper who happened to be carrying the largest ice chest ever created, a hike that exceeded a half-mile felt so much more like five miles than 0.5 miles!


This weekend was the first time I can say that I had a practical life experience that defined the law of supply and demand. The Rutkowski family easily had over five trips worth of supplies they needed to pack into this beautiful campsite. Avoiding packing our gear across this humongous hike was well worth the measly sixty-dollar charge the marina was going to stick us with for the round-trip taxi service our cargo was about to enjoy.

We had no idea that our next adventure would involve people getting hurt. Little five-year-old Madison is still trying to figure out which was worse—the old rusty fishhook that her foot stepped on, or the subsequent tetanus shot the doctor gave her. But Katie got the worse end of it, by far. She wasn’t strong enough to hold Toby back when he saw the chipmunk on the rocks by the lake. Katie’s hand got stuck in the leash, and next thing you know, she was being dragged along the granite rocks by the lake, taking a chunk out of her big toe; skinning the knuckles on her hand; and crashing her head so hard into the granite rock that her braces left a partially permanent impression on the inside of her cheek. Her eyeglasses certainly did not fair well either. One by one, many of the ladies of the campsite decided that they were determined to remember this trip, even if it required being injured to do so.


There’s still a question though, which was worse – the ladies getting hurt, or the “nasty” lady. Jen referred to the gal in the campsite across from us as a “mean nasty”. Truthfully, what kind of person is so hateful of other people that they reserve two separate but neighboring campsites all for themselves when there are only two people occupying the site? This boyfriend/girlfriend, or husband/wife only stayed in one of the two campsites, but if anyone else even stepped foot on their empty site for some innocent reason like, walking through to get to the lake to see the most beautiful sunset in the world, that person had better be wearing a helmet and a Kevlar vest. It’s guaranteed that the darts this girl spewed out of her mouth at a rate of fire equal to a machine gun were as powerful as a rocket launcher. We all felt like we needed more armor. Lucky for us, Brittanie was in the process of memorizing Ephesians 6, “putting on the whole armor of God”. Even so, this lady was mean enough to bring tears to Brittanie’s eyes…


Remember that huge ice chest? Well we figured we would turn the law of supply and demand in our favor. I certainly did not want to help Tom carry his huge ice chest back down that trail again. It was only smart that since we were demanding the taxi service from the local marina, we should also make sure we bountifully supplied the cargo. We were quite certain that the marina would agree with us that all in all, our cargo was less than it was when we started. After all, our starving stomachs felt extremely full.


Time was not on our side Sunday Morning. We had another adventure knocking at our door. Across the state, through multiple mountain ranges of mountain pine beetle infested forests, there was an honors camp for Awana waiting for our eager young daughter, Brittanie. We only had a few brief hours to travel across this state in order to get our daughter to camp on time. Oh bummer, we forgot—Adam had about 150 pages worth of reading to do in his Business Law & Ethics class, and we left the reading material in Adam’s truck! Praying for one last window of strong cell phone signal, we managed to reach Jen and Tom and they were only a few miles away. Tom would be happy to turn around and make sure Adam’s scenic view was filled with pages of nostalgic memories from Kant, Smith, and Hayek instead of the beautiful mountain ranges of Fairplay and Estes Park!

Brittanie wound up finishing her coin operated shower just about the time that Tom pulled up. (It would have been a shame for this dirty little girl to show up at the honors camp looking like Orphan Annie). Brittanie proudly flashed Adam’s filthy dirty toothbrush through the sky telling her Daddy what a great job the toothbrush did cleaning the dirt from under her toenails! Adam’s not sure he will ever brush his teeth again…

With a quick sweep of the wind and turn of the steering wheel, we were off on our next adventure. We needed to get Brittanie to the Awana Honors camp in Estes Park, fast! After only a few turns, we realized we were lost. Our sole guidance was a text-based printout from maps.google. In order to save space, Angi printed the directions as text only, with no maps. We weren’t too bad off, though. The guy in Hartsel, CO was kind enough to show us a picture of his road atlas, and after giving us a gentle ribbing for being crazy enough to take the back roads to Estes Park, he chimed in on what he felt would be the most scenic of the two different potential routes.

We fell in love with the drive from Fairplay to Breckenridge. Our only disappointment rested with the fact that we were in much too much of a hurry to be able to stop and see the sights. It was also more than a little disappointing to see the forests partially devastated by the pine beetle. But big adventures were yet to come. A word to the wise—if you are looking to have maps.google give you directions, you may want to think twice before clicking on one of the “alternate suggested routes”. Angi’s selection of an alternate route had us exiting in Idaho Springs, and heading North through Russell Gulch on Two Brothers Road. There were more than a few times that we were certain we were lost. This all gravel road had so many washboards on it, we felt as if we were being pummeled by a jackhammer. Sure it was nostalgic to see all of the extremely small mining tunnels immediately off the side of the road—but we couldn’t shake the disconcerting feeling that someone was about to pop out of the side of the road with a shotgun—and I for one was preoccupied with trying to figure out whether I was seeing a variety of mirages, or if there really were signs that read, “TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT COLD!!”

Eventually, by luck of an internal compass of sorts, we came out at the bottom of this windy, bumpy road, smack center in the middle of the town of Mayberry! Feeling completely lost, Adam urged Angi to stop right away and let him out. This was a very good decision. Adam’s focus centered on a bench on the sidewalk where Barney Fife and the town’s Barber, Floyd, were sitting a spell.

Adam quickly interviewed the odd couple, trying desperately to get some directions on how to get to their destination. The clock was ticking, and Brittanie was irritatingly worried. Barney and Floyd asked where we were going. Then they asked where we came from. When Adam pointed up the hill, and confirmed that we really did come from up there, the odd couple looked at each other with bulging eyes, and said, “You came down ‘Oh my God road’?” “Huh?” was all the more that Adam could mutter.” Floyd quickly pointed out that “Oh my God road” was the old wagon trail, and was also the original road into Central City, CO. The two couldn’t believe that we had just come down that crazy road.

Well, we were given directions through Nederland and Peaceful Valley, and we soon arrived at Estes Park. Brittanie was the last arrival at this week-long Christian camp, and we were on our journey home through Boulder, and down to Colorado Springs. After feeding the remaining Rutkowski clan dinner for $15 at a local Estes Park Hamburger stand, and grabbing some amazingly awesome ice cream cones down the street for $9, we decided to resist the urge to grab a hotel, and headed for home. Pinewood Springs had its own interesting sights. Over the course of that one single day, we had already encountered over a hundred bicycles on the road, some that were clearly on a short journey, and some that were packed for cross-country travel. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise to see another bike on the road, but it was… We stopped for gas and saw a man and a woman pull in on a Harley. The truth is, we saw a man and a woman, AND their South-American Parrot pulling into the gas station on their Harley! We never though a parrot could fly as a fast as an eagle, but that day we realized that given a chance, a parrot could drive as fast as an eagle could fly. What a crazy day! Shortly thereafter, we marveled at the small pieces of a beautiful rainbow we could see in the sky. Following the path of the rainbow to the other side of landscape, our eyes marveled at our next amazing sight—a woman on the paved roadway, cross-country skiing!
This gal had skis with wheels on them, and she was racing the Harley down the roadway—you know, the one with the parrot on it? Almost immediately thereafter, we realized that we were only about five minutes outside of Boulder. Suddenly these strange sights began to make a little more sense.

And from the back of the van, we started hearing noises that made us think we were watching The Wizard of Oz. Madison was chanting with growing volume, “I want to go home. I want to go home. I want to go home, now, now, now.” In chorus, Nathaniel was chanting, “I’ve got to go poop. I’ve got to go poop. I’ve got to go poop, now, now, now.” Angi and Adam found themselves wishing that they were still in Kansas, but feeling like they spent the day in the land of Oz…