For the first time in 8 years, my husband and I ventured out, on our own, sans kids, for more than one evening! We had airline tickets/vouchers we needed to use so we waited around for a year to do something with them...and then scrambled in April to turn them into a vacation. The vacation we used them for was a trip to Colorado for the 4th of July. Woo hoo!
So we handed over our offspring to family around noon on Thursday...finished working out the day...ate a leisure dinner of veggie & steaks on the grill (no complaints about "no burgers? no french fries? I want the [insert special description] glass!!!")...then we went to bed early because we had to get up at 3AM to pack & catch a 6AM flight (I know, I know, why didn't we pack on Thursday night? well, cuz we didn't wanna!).
Damn 3:30AM comes around fast! (I know, I said 3AM, but at my house, we always hit the snooze button for at least a half hour before rising).
Okay, pack all the weekend essentials & out the door....oops, feed the cat and out the door.....oops, check that all the windows & doors are locked and then out the door....oops, left the bedroom light on, damn it, back into the house, turn off the light, lock the door & on our way!
Drive to long term parking. Missed the tram by 1 minute (damn bedroom light). Monitors say Gate C23...no problem, plenty of time to go to the FAR AWAY gate. Read all advertising in tram station waiting for train. 20 minutes later.... .... board tram for Terminal 2.
Leisurely walk to gate C23. Hey, where is everyone? Jeez, always check the monitors AFTER you get off the tram as well, gate's been moved to B6 (oh for pity's sake, back to the other concourse). On the plane...and on our way! Well, not quite...apparently the maintenance crew "forgot" to load the new software into the airplane flight system. "Sorry folks, that will take 30 to 45 minutes to load..then we'll be on our way." hour later...and we're off! (for real this time.)
Colorado is B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L (that is not easy to type let me tell ya, but its a perfect description).
We rent a car & head for the mountains (literally). We decide to first go West to Breckenridge - want to see what the ski hills look like without snow. Boy has it changed! We got stuck driving sloooowly through town (4th of July parade) and got to really see how much it had changed. We saw the old brew pub that was brand spanking new when we were there about 10 years ago...it was built way out of town and was a bit of a hike...and now it's completely surrounded by shops. We barely recognized the place!
Next stop - Keystone and A Basin. Turns out if we had come 3 weeks earlier - we might have been able to go skiing at A Basin - but they're closed now. At Keystone we parked and walked around. I don't remember it looking like a little town so I'm guessing everything we saw was new there too. They were having a street fest kind of thing which was cool...we had just missed the bike parade. We walked over to the ski hill and saw all the crazy extreme mountain bikers riding the lift up to go biking down the ski runs. Looks like fun (but not the kind of fun I'm interested in - looks way to dangerous for me!). We took a few photos and hopefully can return again sometime to ski and take photos in those same places...but with snow.
After the ski hills we decided to take the scenic route OVER the mountain to get to our friend Rich's place in Longmont. And when I say scenic, I mean scenic!
Thank goodness for Garmin - we couldn't have done it w/out a GPS (only because I would've chickened out & made My Man turn around & go on the highway). We were barely out of town (don't remember what town it was, some old mining town) and the pavement ended. And then there were signs to let us know that there is no maintenance beyond this point (oh fun!). So a bouncing we did go up a dirt road. Then another dirt road. Then a very rocky dirt road...okay, we turned around to find a better dirt road - no need getting a flat tire just for the sake of an adventure! Next time we'll rent a Hummer and take the rocky scenic route!
I don't take too kindly to scary heights..and these scenic back roads definitely had them. Mountain on one side...tree tops on the other. But we got some great views!
Once we were on the other side, the pavement started again and we began our descent. More beautiful views of snowy mountain peaks, motorcyclers, lots of bicyclers and the occasional hiker (or rather, the car they left behind on the side of the road). As we got closer to Boulder we followed the fast moving water coming down the mountain along the side of the road. Brrr, it looked cold! And when we got to Boulder, we actually saw people swimming in it! yikes!
Boulder is beautiful and had I known about it years ago...I would've planned to go to college there instead of po-dunk Texas! LOL
Not long after we found our way to Longmont and our friend Rich's house. After a nap, a few drinks (and some really good North New Mexican food) and some fireworks (it was the 4th of July still), we called it a night.
More still to come...on another post.
So we handed over our offspring to family around noon on Thursday...finished working out the day...ate a leisure dinner of veggie & steaks on the grill (no complaints about "no burgers? no french fries? I want the [insert special description] glass!!!")...then we went to bed early because we had to get up at 3AM to pack & catch a 6AM flight (I know, I know, why didn't we pack on Thursday night? well, cuz we didn't wanna!).
Damn 3:30AM comes around fast! (I know, I said 3AM, but at my house, we always hit the snooze button for at least a half hour before rising).
Okay, pack all the weekend essentials & out the door....oops, feed the cat and out the door.....oops, check that all the windows & doors are locked and then out the door....oops, left the bedroom light on, damn it, back into the house, turn off the light, lock the door & on our way!
Drive to long term parking. Missed the tram by 1 minute (damn bedroom light). Monitors say Gate C23...no problem, plenty of time to go to the FAR AWAY gate. Read all advertising in tram station waiting for train. 20 minutes later.... .... board tram for Terminal 2.
Leisurely walk to gate C23. Hey, where is everyone? Jeez, always check the monitors AFTER you get off the tram as well, gate's been moved to B6 (oh for pity's sake, back to the other concourse). On the plane...and on our way! Well, not quite...apparently the maintenance crew "forgot" to load the new software into the airplane flight system. "Sorry folks, that will take 30 to 45 minutes to load..then we'll be on our way." hour later...and we're off! (for real this time.)
Colorado is B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L (that is not easy to type let me tell ya, but its a perfect description).
We rent a car & head for the mountains (literally). We decide to first go West to Breckenridge - want to see what the ski hills look like without snow. Boy has it changed! We got stuck driving sloooowly through town (4th of July parade) and got to really see how much it had changed. We saw the old brew pub that was brand spanking new when we were there about 10 years ago...it was built way out of town and was a bit of a hike...and now it's completely surrounded by shops. We barely recognized the place!
Next stop - Keystone and A Basin. Turns out if we had come 3 weeks earlier - we might have been able to go skiing at A Basin - but they're closed now. At Keystone we parked and walked around. I don't remember it looking like a little town so I'm guessing everything we saw was new there too. They were having a street fest kind of thing which was cool...we had just missed the bike parade. We walked over to the ski hill and saw all the crazy extreme mountain bikers riding the lift up to go biking down the ski runs. Looks like fun (but not the kind of fun I'm interested in - looks way to dangerous for me!). We took a few photos and hopefully can return again sometime to ski and take photos in those same places...but with snow.
After the ski hills we decided to take the scenic route OVER the mountain to get to our friend Rich's place in Longmont. And when I say scenic, I mean scenic!
Thank goodness for Garmin - we couldn't have done it w/out a GPS (only because I would've chickened out & made My Man turn around & go on the highway). We were barely out of town (don't remember what town it was, some old mining town) and the pavement ended. And then there were signs to let us know that there is no maintenance beyond this point (oh fun!). So a bouncing we did go up a dirt road. Then another dirt road. Then a very rocky dirt road...okay, we turned around to find a better dirt road - no need getting a flat tire just for the sake of an adventure! Next time we'll rent a Hummer and take the rocky scenic route!I don't take too kindly to scary heights..and these scenic back roads definitely had them. Mountain on one side...tree tops on the other. But we got some great views!
Once we were on the other side, the pavement started again and we began our descent. More beautiful views of snowy mountain peaks, motorcyclers, lots of bicyclers and the occasional hiker (or rather, the car they left behind on the side of the road). As we got closer to Boulder we followed the fast moving water coming down the mountain along the side of the road. Brrr, it looked cold! And when we got to Boulder, we actually saw people swimming in it! yikes!
Boulder is beautiful and had I known about it years ago...I would've planned to go to college there instead of po-dunk Texas! LOLNot long after we found our way to Longmont and our friend Rich's house. After a nap, a few drinks (and some really good North New Mexican food) and some fireworks (it was the 4th of July still), we called it a night.
More still to come...on another post.
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