Dave Foley, 52, is retiring from private practice to ski, hike, camp — do all the things he hasn’t had time for.

“My body’s strong, I can still do a lot of fun things,” Foley said.

Foley is the founder of Foley Associates, the area’s largest surveying business, which has been involved with practically all the big building and development projects for the past 20 years. He’s stepping away from that job.

There’s a party for Foley’s retirement from private practice Friday evening at 4 p.m. in Swede-Finn Hall. The Mountain Mystics and Sean McNamara are providing the music, and the party goes ‘til 7 p.m.

Foley is also the elected county surveyor, a position he’s held since the early 1990s. He’s run unopposed every year since then. He’ll continue to work for the county, a job that only takes up about three days a month of his time.

He’s leaving his company in the hands of three partners — Dave Bulson and Jeff Haskell will handle the work of land surveying, and Gregg Anderson will do the work of civil engineering.

“I feel like I’m leaving the company in the hands of some real competent people,” said the self-effacing Foley. “They’re really experienced and they have more energy than me. They’re better than me, really. It’s great.”

Foley said he’s proudest of his work straightening out some of the property lines in San Miguel County, which were much more confused and jumbled when Foley started surveying here 20 years ago.

“It was a mess when I got here,” Foley said. “I know there’s reliability to the property lines now.”

He shares credit for that with all the developers, lawyers, and real estate agents he’s worked with over the years.

“I’m thankful for, and appreciative of, all the people that have supported me over the years” Foley said.

He’s surveyed county roads, property lines, mining claims, and everything else, and helped support geographic information survey systems.

Though he could move somewhere more exotic — Tahiti, Verbier, Paris — Foley plans to stay in San Miguel County.

“I think Telluride is the greatest place around,” he said. “Every time I go somewhere really fantastic in the world I come back and think Telluride is as cool as any of those.”