We usually get the big snow storms in March or April, but the Tuesday before Thanksgiving a quick 24 hour storm dumped 3 feet of snow here. My relatives in Maryland saw my town of Drake mentioned as the snowiest. The wind didn't blow during the storm, so there wasn't any drifting, but when I went from my house to the barn to get out the bobcat (type of tractor), it was waist deep.

I scooped snow and drove through it to pack it down in my yard for an hour, but couldn't bring myself to start on the 650 feet to the highway.

Brown Palace:


My house after moving some snow:


This is the lane 3 feet deep in snow:



My neighbor around the corner offered to plow it, and I took him up on it. When he came to do it, there was a vehicle blocking the top of the drive up by the highway. I called the sheriff's non-emergency number, and we had a "Who's on First" type conversation because an hour earlier one of the deputies and a park ranger had helped dig out a car that was high-centered at the top of my drive (turned out to have been the renter's car), so the dispatcher was trying to make sure that I was calling in a new incident.

Plowed Out:


Unfortunately, I was far from the highway where I couldn't see the blocking vehicle, and the plow guy had a typo in his description - said it was 'a sub' when he meant SUV. I didn't think of SUV, thought maybe he meant Subaru so that's what I told the sheriffs.

And when the plow guy finally got down off the highway, he saw the dry spot where the renter's Mercedes had been during the snowstorm and was convinced that was left by the black SUV. Nobody down here owns a black SUV, but I'll never convince him of that.

Here is the Neighborhood Crime Report email received the next day. The only "Crimes" within 5 miles of my house that day were at my gate. The first one was the renter, the second one was when the guy came to plow the road.



The snow is beautiful and romantic. We're glad it came and went quickly. That's one of the best things about Colorado: the sun comes out the next day so we can clear the roads and get back to our routines.