Raible Designs

Summer 2023: Colorado, Montana, and Cape Cod

I've been remiss in writing about my month-long summer vacation. Mostly because life moves pretty fast with Jack heading off to college, things getting busy at work, and lots of wonderful weekends along the way. I'm finally looking around and sitting down to write this post at the end of October. Now is better than never!

This year, I took a month off from mid-June to mid-August. How did I take so much time off? Okta has a magnificent unlimited vacation policy.

The adventure started with a birthday golf tournament that Saturday to celebrate my 49th.

We had a nice family dinner at Sushi Den on Sunday.

Summer 2022: Family Adventures in Alaska, Montana, and Colorado

For the third year in a row, I took a long summer vacation thanks to Okta's unlimited vacation policy.

We started by traveling to Alaska with my sister and parents. My parents are celebrating 50 years of marriage this year and chose Anchorage as the celebratory destination.

Summer 2021: Family Fun in Washington, Montana, and Cape Cod

July is one of my favorite months. It starts off with a national celebration, always has nice weather, and my birthday is smack dab in the middle of it. I have a habit of taking summer vacation for the month and this year was no exception.

We kicked things off with a journey to Chelan, Washington for the 4th of July. My sister-in-law, Mya, helps run Tildio Winery and we figured it was about time we did some wine tasting there. My parents joined us and we had a blast!

From there, we returned to Colorado and I journeyed to golf with my buddy Cletus in Nebraska. We played 36 holes in 24 hours and enjoyed each other's company thoroughly. I polished up Hefe for a birthday cruise on the 16th.

July 2020: Rafting, Riding, and Relaxing

As an American, have you ever wanted to take a month off like the European's do? I'm guessing you have! For the majority of my career, I've been an independent consultant, with unlimited vacation. Vacation as a consultant means you're not getting paid — so it's not exactly unlimited.

A few years ago, I doubled-down and went full-time. The company was called Stormpath and it quickly morphed into Okta. Okta has an unlimited vacation policy. I felt it was my duty to try to make my kick-ass full-time job as cool as my independent consulting gig. Therefore, I asked my boss to take July 2020 off. I requested this vacation in October 2019. He approved! Randall, you're the best!!

If you'd like to read about our April-June 2002 adventures, see 2019-2020 Ski Season, Quarantining for COVID, and a Graduation.

My month-off adventures started with a family raft trip through Desolation Canyon in Utah. We floated down the Green River with 20 members of our rafting family and had a wonderful adventure.

Life Update: Thanksgiving in Montana, RWX2018, Devoxx4Kids, DJUG, and Trish's Birthday

For the first time in many years, we flew to Montana for the holidays. We typically drive, and it takes around 14 hours. It was quite nice to take off and land in just a couple of hours.

Driving, Rafting, Hiking, and Enjoying Life in Montana

I wanted to spend our summer vacation driving our VWs up the California coast, on a mammoth 3500-mile road trip over two weeks. However, when a landslide happened near Big Sur, I knew it was probably best to move this road trip from my yearly goals to my bucket list. Instead, we opted to drive to Montana and spend a couple of weeks vacationing in my childhood playground.

Our journey began with a bit of work involved. Trish's company was sponsoring a family movie night event in Sandy, Utah. We found out that my company was sponsoring as well, so we decided to take the scenic route to Montana. We left Denver at 9 pm on Thursday, June 29, and arrived in Grand Junction, CO at 2 am. Trish needed to be in Sandy for a lunch meeting, so we woke up promptly at 6 am and got back on the road.

The event in Sandy was super-fun. We enjoyed talking to customers, handing out swag, and watching the Despicable Me 3 premiere with everyone.

We high-tailed it to Montana after that, spending two days driving along scenic I-15 through Utah, Idaho, and Montana. We arrived at the Raible Homestead on Sunday afternoon.

Life Update: The Bus Project, New Gigs, New House and More

I've written a few Life Update blog posts in the past and it seems appropriate to write another one today. A lot has happened since I wrote about our trip to Syncro Solstice 2015 in Moab. First of all, let's talk about the most exciting one: The Bus Project.

The Bus Project
The last time I wrote about The Bus, it'd just arrived at Sewfine to have the interior installed. From the get-go, I knew this was going to be a good experience. I've been talking with the owners (Carol and Mike) for years about the project. Seeing the knowledge they had about VWs and knowing it was in good hands brought a sense of calmness over me. They estimated it'd take 4-8 weeks to finish and it ended up taking 12. I'm proud to say it left Sewfine yesterday with a completed interior.

In mid-May, we took The Bus to its first show: VWs on the Green in Littleton. Sewfine had completed the driver's seat and ragtop. I got license plates and insurance and was planning on driving it to the show. However, Mike pointed out that the engine compartment wasn't sealed and the engine might get really hot on the 10-mile drive (because it's an air-cooled engine). I agreed to trailer it instead and rented a car hauler from U-Haul.

The House

A few months after starting this blog, I wrote about The Cabin. I grew up in a cabin in the backwoods of Montana, with no electricity and no running water. I lived there for 16 years before moving to Oregon for my last two years of high school. As you can imagine, this makes for a good story now that I'm a programmer by trade.

Since I'm between clients right now, I decided to head back to the cabin to see my parents for a bit. My Dad retired in 2009 and my Mom in 2010. They started building their retirement home just up the hill from the cabin in 2004. My parents moved in two years ago and completed enough of it to show it off at a big party before Trish and my wedding last year.

The House is a majestic building, hand-built and beautifully crafted. Both the interior and exterior are amazing, with gorgeous trim and a wonderful attention to detail. The porch is possibly the best in the world, high and mighty with a great view of the cabin and garden below.

Matrimony in Montana

On July 27, 2013, in the late afternoon, Trish McGinity and I were married at the Holland Lake Lodge, in the town I grew up in. The Lodge was a favorite childhood place and getting married there, to the awesomest woman ever, was a glorious experience. There were several planned activities (e.g. horseback riding, rafting, golfing) the week before our wedding day, and many of our friends and family joined the fun. While we couldn't capture every smile, giggle, or loving moment, this is an endeavor to document our matrimony month, our wedding week, and the day we sealed the deal.

We started our month in Montana on Sunday, June 30th. We're officially calling it Raible Road Trip #18. We packed up our pets, raft and golf clubs and left Denver around happy hour.

To read more about our rafting adventures, our wedding week festivities and our delightful wedding day, please click the link below. You can also skip directly to the wedding week or wedding day.

Summer Vacation 2012 in Montana and Maui

I started writing about my summer vacations in Montana as soon as this blog gave me an opportunity: July 2003. In July 2004, I didn't travel to the cabin for the 4th, but I did in 2005. Then, 5 years ago, I started writing longer blog posts about our trips. 2008 was Raible Road Trip #12. In 2009, I spent a whole month in Montana. In 2010, I visited after my parents moved there full-time. Last year, I took Trish for the first time.

I don't know what Raible Road Trip number this year's trip was, but I'm going to go ahead and assume #17. This year wasn't exactly a vacation for me. It was what I like to call a workation. I tried to take the whole month off, but my current client needed my services. As a compromise, they agreed to let me work 20 hours per week during July. While I didn't get a chance to fully unplug, I did enjoy the reduced workload and time to spend with friends and family. And the views from The Cabin and Sugar Beach weren't bad either.

Below is our trip itinerary in condensed form, complete with photos from my incredibly talented fiancé.

We embarked on our drive to Montana on June 30th, stopped for fireworks in Wyoming and spent the night in Yellowstone park. Arrived at the cabin, got to sleep in the new house for the first time, built a cabin float, drove it in the parade, went boating at Holland Lake, played golf. Journeyed to West Glacier to celebrate Dr. Barton's PhD at his sister's house. Rafted the Middlefork of the Flathead all weekend. Played some more golf and went waterskiing.

→ Trish's Montana Summer 2012 Album

On July 14th, we flew to Maui and continued to explore. Our good friend's parents have a timeshare on Sugar Beach and got us a screaming deal on lodging. We had beachfront accommodations with a pool, hot tub and sauna. We played golf on my birthday (July 16th). Visited the Old Lahaina Luau, Maui Aquarium and Coconut Festival at Grand Wailea. Drove to the summit of Haleakala. Sipped cold handcrafted ales while watched the kids boogie board. Embarked on a sunset cruise, hiked in Iao Valley, did some horseback riding along the beach, sea kayaked and snorkeled with sea turtles. Savored Shawn's excellent cooking. Flew back to Missoula (Montana), slept for 6 hours and drove 12.5 hours back to Denver on July 27th.

→ Trish's Maui Summer 2012 Album

Mahalo Montana and Maui. Thank you to our awesome friends: Mom, Dad, Owen, Jason, Ryan and Shawn. It was an incredible adventure.