Sunday

Near perfect weather this morning and a walk on the beach. I'm not sure if the lake pool is a little low but there's a nice chunk of clean sandy shoreline west of the north-overlook beach.

It makes me a little anxious for a draw-down when the hydroelectric plant construction is in process. Then there will be miles of shore like this, and much much wider sections too.

In the afternoon we got out for a mountain-bike ride at Elk-Rock park. It was such a nice day that herds of horses were out. As is typical, half were pretty skittish even with us standing well of the side of the trial. 

Saw some nearly tame deer which were content to just watch a group of 5-6 horse riders go by and then just watch us as well.

Mushroom!

Some great clouds out today, they were stacking up really high.

August Fat-Tire Ride

Only a couple Fat-Tire rides to go this season, we'll see if we can hit a couple more yet.

Arriving in downtown Des Moines.

We arrived at El Baitshop a few minutes before the group was to leave so we sampled a couple things. I got a Rouge Brutal IPA and Corrine got a TommyKnocker Maple Nut.

Scott's beard got bigger.

Rolling out to the trail.

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Inside Rock Bottom Brewing. We filled up the bar/self-seat part of it pretty good.

I got a Evergreen IPA (noted that it used fresh spruce tips) and Corrine got an Ice-Pick?

This was supposed to be an appetizer...it was huge.

After Rock Bottom, we went over to Active Endeavors for a little shopping.

Saw this sweet wooden kayak outside.

Also noted that Pete picked up a new S4 recently and has already neglected wiping the soot off his exhaust tips.

Back to downtown.

Rode a little singletrack on the way back using our road bikes.

"Nothing Compares"

At least that's what my ticket said. We went with friends to the Iowa State Fair this evening. Crowd size was the absolute polar opposite of the last time Corrine and I were here. It was a sea of people in nearly every direction. Notable finds were the Iowa Craft Beer Tent and the Double Bacon Corn Dog (contained plastic chunks, thanks Cody).

Foot-long corn dog was legitimate.

Raise your hand if you can say: "I sprained my pinky toe at the Iowa State Fair." It's turning black and blue right now. 

Prius Crushing

We went to a wedding Friday night that was a fair distance away. In the evening, it finally got cool enough out to disable the A/C in the car so I thought we'd try and do a max. fuel mileage test on the way home. Last time I drove with the A/C off, the engine only had a thousand miles or so on it so I'm sure mechanical efficiency hadn't peaked yet. 

I put fuel in and reset the trip/mileage computer. Here we're 80.9 miles down the road and averaging 37.9mpg over that distance. It broke in to the 38s for a little while but couldn't hold there. Looks like A/C is worth at least a couple mpg, as we usually see 34-35 on this type of trip (100% highway).

The Real Deal

Finally we didn't have to settle for watching a storm go by on radar. Some pretty awesome shelf clouds went right overhead today while the temperature dropped fifteen degrees or so.

Sky Turnover

Sadly we missed out on the real t-storm tonight but there were some pretty decent views. All three of these pictures were taken within fifteen minutes of each other.

Saturday

We've been up extra early for work lately and there have been some great sunrises. Today was especially nice as there are clouds which is a rare commodity these days. 

Turned a bunch of fuel into smoke and noise, then headed home. 

We put in a five mile walk out to Big-Rock Park. This is the longest walk I've ever done on flip-flops, score Olukai.