Summer's Last Stand at Jazz Aspen Snowmass

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Summer 2011 has been the most fun and active summer I've EVER had! My partner in crime Becky and I played hard like big kids in an epic outdoor playground for 3 months straight.

Seems fitting that what many consider to be the last weekend of summer was a 4-day burst of recreation with a bit of relaxation mixed in! Summer went out with a roar of great weather and warmth in the Colorado Rocky Mountains!

The trip started with a bit of a SNAFU... the campsite we reserved was not open for tent camping on Labor Day weekend per bears lumbering into camper's tents looking for food in the late summer. One person even got their leg gnawed on by a bear in August while sleeping in his tent at a campground not too far from where we were supposed to be camping. I was happy not to take chances.

I think waking up to find a bear in our tent would be a serious downer. The thought of me trapped in a tent and screaming like a little girl while frantically and repeatedly smacking a 250 pound bear on its cranium with a tiny flashlight makes my pants tingle, and not in a good way.

Fortunately we were able to transfer our campsite reservation to the Little Maddie camp ground at Ruedi Reservoir near Basalt, CO. This is about 25 miles from Snowmass where the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Labor Day Music Festival, which we had 3 day passes to, was at. Fourteen of those miles are up a windy and dark-at-night drive along Frying Pan River Road. Not ideal for access to the music festival, but it was worth it to save $400+ for 3 nights lodging in Aspen or Snowmass, as well as to have an AMAZING spot to camp for many reasons!

Ruedi Reservoir is a scenic and relaxing spot that hangs surrounded by beautiful red mountains, a bit over a 30 mile drive from Aspen, Colorado. The Frying Pan river runs beneath the reservoir from Ruedi dam, and it is the best trout fly fishing stream in Colorado and the United States. Arguably it is the best trout fly fishing stream in the world.

***Lots of trout + big average size + lots of bugs hatching in the water = HERE FISHY FISHY!!!***

We arrived at our campsite on Friday afternoon and set our tent up quickly. It rained cats and dogs and pitchforks and babies soon after we set our tent up. We hustled to the nearby town of Basalt on the way to the music festival and had a bite to eat at The Brick Pony, a charming and fun pub with an upscale yet affordable menu.

It was cozy to sip wine and Coors Banquet Beer with our dinner while it poured rain and thundered outside. We dined on stellar braised-pork-and-pineapple pizza. Gotta love the Aspen area and its fine foods, big houses, neurotic rich people, fancy cars, and great outdoors!

Fortunately the thunderstorm passed by soon after we finished eating, and we made it to the venue in time to get a spot up close to the stage for Thievery Corporation and their "Outernational sound" at 7:30 PM. It drizzled just a bit during the show but not so much as to ruin the night, especially with our rain jackets handy!

**Music Fan Traveler's note: when in Colorado, if seeing live music at an outdoor venue ALWAYS bring a rain coat just in case. Trust me.***

Thievery Corporation put on a solid show and had the crowd grooving. The 9 PM show was a dance party with Girl Talk, the computer geek turned mash-up DJ. Becky summed up Girl Talk's performance nicely: "You can say what you want about the guy just jumping around on stage behind his computer, but he knows how to put stuff together to get people up out of their seats and having fun."

We had seen Girl Talk before at the Ogden Theater in Denver, so after a few songs we beat the crowd out, caught the shuttle to the parking lot, and headed back to the campsite.

A note about the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Labor Day Festival: it is not a jazz festival. Jazz Aspen Snowmass is the name of the group that organizes the festival each year. The events consist of many different kinds of music performances: rock, country, alternative, indie, jam band, etc, etc. They have amazing grounds, a ton of clean bathrooms (key for a music fest!), reasonably priced food and cold beverages, and a great parking and shuttle service set up. They don't hassle anyone at the gate and the line to get in moves super quickly! The festival attracted a fun and energetic yet laid back and friendly crowd as well. Nice job JAS!!!

We were tired and got to sleep quickly in our tent back at the campsite. It wasn't too cold when we wrapped up in our sleeping bags, but I woke up with my teeth chattering and curled up in a ball. The Rocky Mountains get cold at night in August! I made sure to bundle up more the rest of the weekend.

Our campsite was back in a cove away from the morning sun and the temperature was 33 degrees when we woke up on Saturday morning. BRRRRR!!! We hustled out of our sleeping bags in the cold shadow of the nearby cliff and found a sunny spot nearby overlooking Ruedi Reservoir. We set up shop and cooked breakfast burritos as the sun warmed our chilly bones. Cold Coors Banquet Beer worked nicely to wash it all down.

We then drove to the Frying Pan River and found a spot among the many fly fisherman peckerwoods. My rod snapped in half on my first cast. I somehow kept my cool and fought the quickly passing urge to break the fly rod into little pieces and launch it into the universe. I reflected instead that breaking delicate fly rods comes with the territory of fly fishing. Becky was sweet enough to let me use her fly rod, and I caught a feisty and nice size brown trout before we headed to the fly shop on the way to the show so I could buy a new fly fishing rod.

I fretted a bit as I walked into Frying Pan Anglers and asked about their fly rods for sale. If you're in the Aspen area you're likely to pay 10 - 20% markup just for being there! They didn't have much of what I was looking for. I settled on a $475 Orvis after looking at several other rods that just weren't the right fit for my fly fishing style. For those of you that don't know, Orvis fly rods are the shizzle.

The guy at the fly shop helping me seemed to take sympathy on me and refused to let me drop almost $500 on a fly rod, God bless him!

"Hold on" he walked to the back store room and said as I tried to buy the Orvis rod.

He came back with a rod case.

"This is an Echo, designed by a multi-champion fly caster. We've only got this one left. It's on sale for $179."

"Thanks for saving my fly fishing trip this weekend!" I said with a smile after paying.

Saturday at the music festival was very sunny and warm - up in the mid-80s which is hot for Snowmass on a Labor Day weekend.

Ryan Bingham and the Dead Horses brought their brand of country music to the stage at 3 PM and wowed the crowd. At 5 PM Rodrigo y Gabriela made the awesome and thumping sounds of a four person band with their two guitars. Steely Dan started the last show of the night with mellow tunes that could've been straight out of a Manhattan jazz club. After five songs without playing any of their well-known hits that we were hoping to hear, we decided to call it a night.

Before the Sunday afternoon show we stole a couple of hours of fly fishing on the "Gold Medal" waters of the Frying Pan. The wily trout in the Frying Pan see A TON of fly fisherman throwing every trick in the book at them. If you can catch trout on the Frying Pan you've got to bring your A-game, especially with typically 5 - 10 fly fisherman within site at most times fishing nearby. We each hooked and netted some fesity trout. Yee haw!

Sunday at the music festival consisted of Fitz and the Tantrums at 3 PM (old school rockers complete with a saxophonist), Michael Franti and Spearhead at 5:00 PM (fun music and a band that knows how to play with the crowd), and finally at 7 PM the headliner and festival closer Zac Brown Band (a mix of 40 years worth of country and classic rock influences mixed in with jams). We saw 10 different bands and a few DJs at the "JAS electronica stage" over 3 days, and we found something to enjoy about them all. I'd say we got our money's worth!

Monday morning we woke up and got out of the cold morning shade into the warmth of our sunny and new favorite breakfast spot overlooking the waters of the reservoir. Ski boats and sail boats were out early making the most of the holiday. We fly fished on the river for a couple of more hours and both caught more trout. As the fish decided to quit biting and take a nap after their morning meal, the wind picked up. It was the perfect time to return to the campsite, break down the tent, pack it up, and hit the road for Denver.

I look back at the summer of 2011 fondly... it included:

- five camping trips
- two white water rafting trips;
- tubing on the Clear Creek whitewater park in Golden;
- mountain biking;
- several fly fishing trips and lots of trout landed;
- seven Red Rocks concerts with one more before the season is over;
- several other concerts in Denver and Boulder;
- three trips to hot springs pools.

It's wonderful to have in our backyard what many people travel from around the country and the world to experience. Quite the blessing to live in this place that works great for a "staycation".

As we packed up our tent we were the last campers out of the campground at about 1:45 PM, with the closing for the season at 2:00 PM that day. I looked around at the deep woods of the campground and realized that in just a few weeks this place would be inaccessible by car and covered with snow.

Back in Denver the weather had shifted from the 90s to the low 70s. Weeks of sunny skies had been replaced with overcast weather and a cool breeze. Like someone had turned off a switch, suddenly summer in Colorado was gone. Just like that. That's the way it goes here in the Rocky Mountains.

As I put away the camping gear in the garage for the last time of the summer, I glanced at my skis and the thought of snow skiing in the winter comforted me amidst a hint of end-of-summer blues.

Here's looking forward to more fly fishing and football season this Fall... and some fresh powder turns on the slopes this Winter!!!

A trip to Thailand and Cambodia is on the radar for Spring 2012. Hope to write more then! (if not sooner)

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Photos

Jazz Aspen Snowmass
Double rainbows on night #1 of the music festival are a sign of good things ahead for the weekend!

View from breakfast spot
Overlooking Ruedi Reservoir

Zac Brown Band on the Main Stage
Country music has discovered the jam band thang

Frying Pan River Brown Trout
This big fella put up a fight!

Frying Pan River Rainbow
Becky showed this Rainbow who is boss!

Ryan Bingham and Dead Horses
One of the best performances of the festival. Amazing that this guy co-wrote in his 20s the music for the movie Crazy Heart that Jeff Bridges won his oscar for.

Reggae Band on Side Stage
A touch of Jamaica in the mountains

Michael Franti and Spearhead
Huge Aspen Jazz beach balls being vollied continually by the crowd!

Campsite
We were only here for sleeping at night but quite an uncrowded and beautiful spot!

Michael Franti
He spent a good bit of the show running around playing the guitar and singing among the crowd

Comments

[Linda Labbo]

Fantastic!
Fantastic post. Fantastic write-up. Enjoyed the literary descriptions of the fishing, weather, and fun. A perfect end to a great \"staycation\" summer.