thin air and Aons mile high office

Aon Denver employees. A top bunch of friendly people. A pleasure to meet.
Pete and simon outside Aon Denver
Denver is Colorado`s state capital city. Aon has an office there. 4100 e.mississippi ave. Its an address i have been seeing and wondering about for years. Working in the postroom at Dev sq, i have sent many a courier via transworld couriers over to that office. The place i imagined, to be a large office, due to the fact that i have mentioned about sending a lot of items over there. I wasn`t suprised to see a tall dark , glassy building and a large sign along side, showing Aon inside. The office isn`t situated in the downtown Denver area, where the main clump of denvers financial towers are. The Aon building is sat in the lovely named cherry creek area. The sun was shining as myself and Pete found the office. Pete knew where Misssissippi avenue was , but hadn`t heard of a company called Aon before, until i mentioned i work for them. Aon has 4 floors in the building and around 150 employees. We were greeted warmly and curiously as we asked to meet a marketing person. All where unavailable, So i was very happily suprised to finally be greeted by the executive vice president, Terri Brown. She took us under her wing and introduced us to a number of Aon staff, who all asked questions about our trip and Fragile X Syndrome. We took some photos and chatted, laughed for some time, till eventually saying goodbye and good luck. A great bunch of people, very friendly and unskeptical. mmmmmm, not like the london lot aye !!!!! (only kidding)...... lets hope that on this quest , the Aon peeps we find are as warm and helpful........... next stop Aon pheonix.

I got to Leadville a couple of days ago now. Pete has been great. The perfect host, with freshly cooked cookies made by his mate , Amy, a tasty delight indeed, large as ya like choco lumps ! I expected to see pete, twitching the curtains anxiously itching to get on the road, after a year of talk. He is ready and red hot to go ! he`s done mods to his bike. Changed the tyres, to those well reported dual sport tyres, Avon Distanzias. Reputed to take on any kind of unforgiving dirt track and carry on doing that for 10000 miles. Changed his oil and filters. Set the bike up for the haul. I am chuffed to bits to see and hear that he is on th eroad for longer than i thought. 2 months hes out there for. I`ll have to see if myself and the adventure can seduce him into rolling as far south as possible. Looks like he might be able to make it into Colombia and maybe Ecuador. I have been carrying a new chain and front sprocket, that i got from AKRIDERS in anchorage,. and it was time to change them. i didnt have a front sprocket, but pete had found one for me. This was gonna be a test for me. A part of me was hoping pete and his house mate jerry would kick me aside and say "leave it out, we`ll fit the stuff for ya", but most of me wanted to sort this out, coz i have to get my hands filthy with mechanical experience, coz as the trip goes on i will need to utillise at least some sort experience as the bike start to go into demensure. Got the old chain off easy, to find the clip that holds the master link together, not letting the chain come apart, was missing. I am definatly a lucky man. I have been carrying a stone from the Arctic coast. A black stone with a thin white line on. A stone the Inuits say brings long life and luck ! .. the clipless chain could`ve totaly destroyed the bikes motor and maybe my left calf muscle. Followed the manuals instructions, but after meeting Jay at Signe & jeffs gaff in philipsburg earlier in the trip i ended up using the feeling and knowing approach, that he showed me. It works. I always do it by the book if im new to it. Jay showed me how to feel ya way around it. In this case the chain. After all its all a case of this joins that, that makes this do that etc. It went well. the new chain and sprockets are on. the oil changed. A new filter and we are ready to rock as they say over here. The past 2 nights have been spent following pete around saying TaTa to his friends. A top lot. We had steaks in town with Randy. jd, marny and terri. A great night of laughs a stuffed bellies. Last night was spent with John, Joyce and there daughter Emily, jerry & alyssa. sat out in the pines at 10000feet up, 2 miles high, by turqiouse lake. A great night of bbq`d munch and stories to laugh to until the night came in, the milky way came out in total view from south horizon to north horizon, making realise how earth sits amongst it all. We could see the spiral of the Milky Way. So thats it phase 2 begins today.
Bizzare views from the top of the world Leadville, Colorado. A fierce cloud comes from behind the rockies