I was afraid to look at Dad this morning—he looked to NOT have moved a single muscle since I rolled him onto his “off” side last night. He was indeed still breathing. I removed his underpants for the first time in about 12 hours; they were absolutely dry! Huh, that’s a first! His skin looked perfect; the pink areas from last night had cleared up, ‘whew. I had been afraid he was developing bedsores at last.

Susan, the hospice chaplain, arrived for her second visit. She looked in on Dad before and after talking with me–and with David joining us later, adding his shocked perspective from not seeing Dad for three months. I lost my train of thought a few times; Susan nodded understandingly. I thought it was my usual ADD; however I gather that grieving people typically lose concentration when their loved ones are dying.

David standing behind a standard memorial bench farther north along the old railway.

Today was centered around both enjoyable outdoor exercise and Dad’s estate business. Our family wants to install a memorial bench along the historic Switzerland Trail railway. Boulder County Parks and Open Space had already approved a site at the Caribou Ranch Open Space. We are arranging with Stan, the County’s landscape architect, to procure that spot for Dad’s bench.

When my father retired from map-making for the Sacramento County’s Assessor’s Office, he moved to Nederland and, for fun, began mapping the old rail bed of the historic, small-gage Switzerland Trail railroad from Boulder up to and among the mines in the foothills. He finished the map in 1996.

Dad’s 1996 map of the Switzerland Trail railway.

David and I put on boots and dark glasses and set off on an enchanted adventure, in fresh snow on a spectacular day with brilliant blue skies. The trail is an easy “lollipop,” with a 2-way access trail to and from a big loop. The 4.2-mile walk took us 2.5 hours, with all our breaks to “ooh” and “aah” and take pictures. Dad’s bench site is at the very end of the lollipop “stick,” right before the loop around the so-scenic DeLonde Homestead meadows.

View north from Dad’s bench site across the DeLonde Homestead.

The ironic thing, though, is that David and I found the wrong site, by a different rock wall! I had Stan’s email texts and park map, but his photographs did not electronically forward from my sister to me. The rock wall he mentioned, to define the site, was still under snow when David and I trooped around the trail. We found a fabulous, long, low rock wall below the old Blue Bird Mine. The area had no view of the ranch buildings as Stan mentioned, but was a particularly beautiful forested area that my father, lifelong cross-country mountain hiker, would love. Hmm, WHERE is the bench site Stan specified?

David and I in the forest below the old Blue Bird Mine above and behind the DeLonde Homestead.

Kathy’s husband, Kevin, soon solved the mystery by forwarding Stan’s photos from her emails to me. Stan had also included a perfectly clear map with the bench site well marked. AHA! We knew exactly where the pre-approved site is! We even had a picture from there. Okay! We had fallen in love with the forested area, but the actual site is directly ON the Switzerland Trail railway, overlooking the old cattle ranch that later became famed for its Arabian horses. Talk about PERFECT for my one-time cowboy father who had a lifelong fascination with steam-powered trains and had mapped this particular railroad!