Exploring possibilities – Kevin and Lotte Roache, Explorer Club Members

You don’t have to be a scientist to be an Explorer — a member of RMBL’s Explorer Club. Curiosity helps, though, because Explorers learn plenty about science that’s critically important, science that helps us understand and adapt to our changing Earth.

Explorers support RMBL with an annual gift that says science matters. Kevin and Lotte Roache are prime examples. Kevin grew up in New York and started college at the University of Colorado Boulder. Lotte grew up in a small town in southern Germany. Both share a lifelong love of the outdoors.

After two years at U.C. Boulder, Kevin graduated from the University of California Santa Barbara. While there, he got his pilot license and ended up with a career as an airline pilot. He retired from United a few years ago. After his first trip to Crested Butte in the 1980s, Kevin visited RMBL a few times. In 1990, he bought a house and sold it some years later. After missing the mountains, he returned in the early 2000s and bought another home.

Lotte was equally enchanted with the area. “As a girl, I spent most of my free time outdoors. We swam in rivers and lakes in summer, hunted mushrooms in fall, skied and sledded in winter, and picked bouquets in spring,” she says. “When I came to Crested Butte, all my childhood memories came rushing back.”

In 2015, Kevin and Lotte moved once more and now live up the road to the Slate River. With a deck overlooking wetlands, they hosted a Sips and Science event where members got to observe heron nests in the wetlands.

Explorers also take field trips with RMBL scientists. Over the past couple of summers, they listened to billy barr talk about his 50-year observations of snowfall and weather. They interacted with the marmots, which Dan Blumstein, PhD, tracks in the world’s second-longest wild-mammal study. They watched David Inouye, PhD, band hummingbirds. They dove into the work of Ken Williams, PhD, studying the movement of water through the valley’s watershed.

Explorers absorb the progress of RMBL scientists in intimate, casual settings. They have a first-row seat to science’s latest discoveries.

For Kevin, it’s a matter of writing a check because he and Lotte believe that it will make a difference now and tomorrow. “It comes down to a love of nature, genuine interest in science, and wanting to help these people as much as I feel they’re helping me,” he says.

Kevin Roache was born in upstate New York and moved many times before starting college at University of Colorado Boulder. He graduated from the University of California Santa Barbara with a degree in history. Having obtained his pilot’s license during college, he became a bush pilot in Alaska, commuter pilot in the western U.S., and international pilot with Continental and United. Now retired, he is curious about most everything and loves the intricacy, complexity, and mystery of nature. Lotte grew up in the foothills of the Bavarian Alps and spent most of her childhood outdoors. She emigrated to the U.S. as a young woman and settled in California. Kevin and Lotte split their time between Santa Barbara and Crested Butte.