Overview of the Trip

I am blessed.  The past month has been an experience about which most people only dream.  I feel invigorated about heading into my classroom and about my career as a teacher.  I am excited to begin work editing photographs, writing lesson plans, outlining a plan for the year, and putting together a presentation for the Mathematical Association of America’s 2011 MathFest.  Thank you to all of those have supported me and those I know will continue to do so.

I am going to continue to blog, though I’ll admit it may be more hit and miss than I’d like as the school year begins.  Maybe I’ll surprise myself and be regular!  In the meantime, keep an eye out for the math around you and don’t underestimate your math skills (or how much you’re using them and need them)!

Monday, July 11, 2011

Stats for the day:

·         Daily miles: 546.3

·         Total trip miles: 4629.2

·         Temperature on the side of the I-70 tollway: 102°F

·         Tow trucks needed: 1

·         Miles I was from making it home with no drama: 81

After saying goodbye to the Brooke and the kids, I started my trip across Colorado and the state of Kansas to make it back to Weston.  Most of the drive was uneventful.  Kansas raising the speed limit to 75 on I-70 helped a bit, and the weather was great (just super hot!).

And then, I reached the Kansas Tollway on I-70, just east of Topeka.  I grabbed my ticket, tried to accelerate, sawing my RPM needle drop to zero, and lost any engine power.  I pulled to the side of the road and had a car that wouldn’t start.  Seriously?!?!?!?

So, after talking with the rental company, there were a couple of options. 1) I could be towed to the closed location in Topeka and have a family member pick me up from there.  OR, 2) I could be towed to a location that was still open and be put in a new car, but it’d be a much longer tow.  Because I have a wonderful family, I voted for option 1.  I was supposed to turn in the car early tomorrow morning, anyway. 

I’m thankful the tow truck company arrived quickly and that overall it was the best scenario for a car breaking down that I could imagine.  I’d traveled 4,500 miles over 4 weeks and was only an hour and a half from home.  The best part is that when I arrived at the rental car location and the tow truck driver, Sam, tried to start the car (he said he always tries before and after towing), it started!!! He shrugged his shoulders and said I’d be surprised how often it happened.  But advised me to take the ride with my family and not risk it!

Math thoughts for today:

·         A higher speed limit (or even driving faster) always makes people think they’re going to get somewhere so much faster.  But, it’s impact, and whether or not it really makes one, really depends on how far you are traveling.  My students can do some simple calculations to determine the amount of impact. I happen to know of someone who got a speeding ticket when he first got his license – the faster speed would have saved him less than 5 minutes if he hadn’t been caught.  But, he was.  And it therefore took him longer, and cost him more!

Shout-outs:

·         Happy Birthday, Alexia Norris!!!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Matt flew back to Boston today.  After getting to spend 3 weeks with him, it’s going to take me a little bit to adjust to not being in the same state as him.  He seemed to think that driving across the state of Kansas wouldn’t be all that interesting.

I headed to the home of a childhood friend, Brooke, and spent the evening meeting her husband, Frank, and their wonderful children (Blase, Caroline, Michael).  I haven’t seen Brooke in well over a decade, but our moms get together once a year with two other “babes.”  I’ve stayed updated on what she’s doing because of our moms, and it was such a blessing to get to spend time with her.  And to eat the wonderful meal Frank prepared.  And to play with the kids!  They all made me feel so at home, and I’m hoping I don’t have to wait a decade to see them again!  Thanks for welcoming me!

After our walk home from the park in the rain.

And then the silly pictures began!

Saturday, July 9, 2011

The drive to Denver included a quick stop at a casino so Matt could play a few hands of Blackjack.  After grabbing a meal in the late afternoon with a restaurant full of 70 year-olds, we headed to Red Rocks Amphitheatre for The Avett Brothers concert.  I’ve not been to Red Rocks, but I’ve heard wonderful things about the venue, AND it’s an amazing band.  The thunderstorms rolled in and out before the show was in full swing, and it was a perfect evening to listen to a band I love with the man I’m going to marry.

Math thoughts for today:

·         I’m determined to write some lessons that connect music notes and fractions.  I know a lot of students who are great with music but struggle with fractions.  It’s a natural connection, and one I can hopefully work with my fine art colleagues to reinforce!

·         It may be a bit beyond my junior high students, but how matrix work can be used for traffic flow (input and output) is a very real application.

Shout-outs:

·         The first time I saw The Avett Brothers was with Brian and Angie (both siblings). My mom was out of town for the weekend with her “babes,” and I thought I could talk my dad (a former sound and lighting guy for a band now in the Iowa Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame) into coming, too.  He loved it.  And we had such a great time bringing him out with us!

·         Brother Simon Baker (aka Carl Baker): I love that you told me about The Avett Brothers so long ago when we were in grad school. 

Friday, July 8, 2011

Stats for the day:

·         Daily miles: 70.6

·         Number of cyclists on the road: too many to count!

Today, we headed to Boulder.  After spotting The Avett Brothers (specifically Joe Kwon) and making an additional walk-by to see if we could run into them again, we continued to explore downtown Boulder.  At this point, I think we’re both a bit worn.  I haven’t totaled the miles hiked in the past month, but I’d estimate it to be 75-100  miles.  And it’s been hot.  And it’s been wonderful.  And I’ve collected more photographs and data than I’d even dreamed.  And we’re now headed into a few days of vacation.

Our exploration of Boulder continued outside of downtown, where we drove on a road that had a 16% gradient.  Crazy steep!  I’m still trying to figure out exactly how people who live on this road are able to travel to work in the winter.  But, boy, do they have a view!  We’re also not convinced that people work in Denver.  There are always too many cyclists on the road to think they have time to work!  I wish more places had bike lanes.

The evening was an early one as we settled into the comfort of a hotel room, watched Inception, and tried to catch up with family and friends.

Math thoughts for today:

·         The steepness (slope) of roads is communicated with different verbiage than what is typically used in math classrooms.  Slope goes by lots of different names and formulas.  This adds just one more to share with the students!

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Stats for the day:

·          65°F at 9am at 7600 feet (Mary’s Lake Campground, Estes Park, CO)

·         Total trip miles to date: 3836.3

·         Mid-afternoon thunderstorms avoided: 1

·         Giant holes ripped in shorts without knowing: 1

When my mom speaks of Estes Park there is one story that sticks out in my mind: the Coleman campstove blowing off of the table because the wind was so strong.  I now know what she meant.  so strong it sounded like a train (just like how people describe the approach of tornados)!

Our campsite in Estes was just outside of the park (our late arrival the evening before made us make a conjecture that all of the first come, first serve campsites in the park would be taken), and we really liked it (right next to Mary’s Lake), so we decided to stay at the same campsite and simply drive into the park for the day. 

We drove to the Continental Divide and on the way down from the Divide stopped to hike the Tundra Trail.  Upon getting out of the car, Matt immediately laughing, trying to get my attention, and calling me to stop and come back to the car.  I thought he was just trying to give me a hard time and make me paranoid, but then I reached down to touch my behind and realized the entire back of my shorts had ripped!  There was no sudden movement to cause it, no loud rip to alert me, not anything!  After a quick wardrobe change, we headed to the tundra.  If I wanted to give him an excuse to not ever have to do it again, I’d say that Matt’s laundering skills must have caused the rip. BUT, I like that he helps, so I’ll blame the rip on the fact that I’ve been doing so much rock climbing and hard hiking that it just wore out the fabric.

Note my navy shorts.

And now they're khaki.

The Tundra Trail had lots of fun facts along the way and on top of the rocks at the summit (I use that word loosely), there was a cool compass rose that included info on various features in each direction, many of them beyond the state of Colorado. 

After some elk watching, we headed to do the hike from Bear Lake to Emerald Lake, passing through Nymph Lake and then Dream Lake.  There was a small delay because of Matt’s feet.  He’s been quite the trooper dealing with some extreme blisters and cracked heels.  (We’ve been through quite a bit of moleskin and liquid bandage.) But I love him so much, I hiked back to the vehicle to get some medicine and then back to where he was (it was only an extra mile, but a mile with quite the elevation change), and he powered through the hike.  And I’m glad he made it because we saw some beautiful lakes and hiked the last mile on snow!  Quite the change from the sand and dust of the desert!  Emerald Lake was still pretty full because of the late snow melt, and you could still see snowboarding tracks on the mountain beside the lake.

Dream Lake

On the way back to our campsite.

We finished the hike just in time for the raindrops to start falling.  So, the evening consisted of hunkering down in the tent with wedding magazines and notepads to start brainstorming! 

Math thoughts for today:

·         The tundra and its specimens really impressed me.  There were lots of facts about how long it takes for organisms (and maybe even micro organisms) to grow.  I think growth/decay models about populations for these organisms would be great to compare to those of organisms that grow a bit more quickly.

·         The reflections in the lakes were just what I had been hoping to find!

Shout-outs:

·         I took a picture of a great family from Des Moines (Iowa shout-out!!!), AND they had family who’d graduated from Briar Cliff in Sioux City.  Briar Cliff is where my parents (and LOTS of my aunts, uncles, pseudo-aunts and uncles) went and have worked. 

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Stats for the day:

·          9370 steps (on pedometer)

·         Daily miles driven: 455

·         88°F at 12noon in Arches National Park and 94°F by 1pm

·         57°F at 9pm in Estes Park, CO

·         Complicated, windy roads taken: 1 (beautiful, but made it a long evening)

After packing up camp at the Moab KOA, Matt and I headed into Arches to hike to Landscape Arch.  This is the arch that had a large section suddenly fall in 1991 (and it’s not far from the rumbles of Wall Arch which collapsed in 2008).  Because of this, you can’t get very close to the arch anymore, but it’s still a pretty commanding view.  And, it’s in an area that’s filled with a number of arches.  It was amazing to me how many people were on these trails.  I think some of it is because it was a pretty easy trail, but also I can tell we’re getting further into the summer and vacations are in full swing!

Landscape Arch ~ Look to the right part of the arch and notice how thin it is.

Before the true heat of the day came, we started the drive to Colorado.  We’re headed to Rocky Mountain National Park which will be a quite a contrast to the parks in Arizona and Utah!  It was a long drive, ending with us taking the scenic (and therefore most complicated) way to Estes Park.  By the time we got to our campsite, we were ready to relax and head to bed!

The Ring and the Road ~ Don't worry, Matt took this picture.  My focus was on the road.  You can see how busy and curvy it was; but in all seriousness, it was insanely windy!

Math thoughts for today:

·         Landscape Arch is 306 feet from base to base, which will be fun to use to do some comparisons with distances and estimating (what would fit between the bases).

·         We experienced quite the change in temperatures today – perfect examples for working percent change problems in class.

·         There are a number of ways to get into Rocky Mountain National Park.  I think this could be an excellent park to have students do map work (routes, distances, rates, scale factors).

Shout-outs:

·         Estes Park makes me think of some specific people.  I remember Cindy Bond (my high school coach, mentor, and now, colleague) spending lots of her summers traveling here. 

·         Also, Kim and Edie Hays are huge fans of Rocky Mountain National Park, and my mom has made multiple trips with one or both of them.  I hope I can bring back some fun memories to share with them!