We enjoyed our two week tour of Colorado immensely: the mountains, the beer and the friends. We can safely say that we’ll be back, if not at the end of this trip, then sometime in the future.
A special ‘mil gracias’ goes out to our friend Glenn, who was an awesome host while we were in Denver and our CO trip planning guide.
Our last Colorado adventure was a day trip up to Rocky Mountain National Park. We had been throwing around the idea of climbing Longs Peak, but both times we started to plan the trip it was thwarted by weather. In the end, we took a day trip up to the park and played tourist.
After our grand hiking adventure in SW Colorado, we drove back to Denver and opted to do Colorado Springs as a day trip.
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| From SRTE – Colorado Springs |
Fresh from the Black Canyon we headed straight for some big “hills” with only a resupply in between. Glenn had suggested that we climb the highest 14er in the San Juan range but we were wary because of the first snow of the year. After asking a few Park Rangers, they suggested trekking the Blue Lakes trail, which coincidentally leads to the base of Mt. Sneffels. We started the trek knowing we would spend the night, but left the summit as a weather dependent option.
True to her past performance, Liz was barely able to walk after transitioning from pedal pusher to advanced pedestrian. We started walking very slowly, which worked out well for admiring the views.
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| From SRTE – Blue Lakes Trail and Mount Sneffels |
We had time for one longer trip in Colorado, so based on some recommendations (thanks Fish, Sue and Glenn!) we headed southwest to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park to do a little hiking.
We headed out of Denver last week to take a look at the famed Red Rocks Amphitheater and Park. I have to admit, I was a bit more impressed by the venue than I thought I’d be. They say it’s an artist favorite because of the acoustics, and I can see how it would be really cool to see a show there.
As a free city park, it’s pretty cool too. We walked around the main “hiking” loop and saw all sorts of nifty rocks.
Click on the photo to see more of our shots on Picasa, including a great Ben moment.
We spent Tuesday walking around downtown Denver and then most of Wednesday doing a little shopping. A few random impressions of Denver:
Downtown is quite nice. Very clean and seemed like there was a lot to do. The rest of Denver is quite sprawling and the city really feels like it is growing quickly.
Denver loves its Starbucks. We counted no fewer than 9 locations along the 12 block 16th St. pedestrian mall downtown, including one corner with two cafes across the street from one another. There are also a ton everywhere else you look.
The REI Denver Flagship store is huge, large enough that we got turned around a few times. They had a little mountain bike testing trail, which is a pretty sweet idea, but it was kind of laughably small. It also had a Starbucks.
We went out to dinner with Glenn to CB & Potts, the restaurant of the Big Horn micro-brewery. They had quite good food and the beer was excellent. Best of all, it was a 5 minute walk from Glenn’s apartment. Can’t get much more local than that. We had a great evening swapping travel stories and planning our Colorado adventure.
We are loving the mountains. We drove up to Red Rocks, the famous amphitheater/park and were pretty impressed. I’ll post some photos next time we have wifi.
What to say about the drive from St Louis to Denver? Well, it was long (15 hours), partly interesting (until eastern Kansas) and partially boring (after eastern Kansas). We passed through Missouri,
Kansas,
and finally made it to Colorado.
In Kansas, we saw many wind turbines…
and passed the 1,000 mile mark of our trip.
We did arrive safe and sound, if a little frazzled and tired. We’re staying with Glenn of Restless Adventure fame, who I met in Ecuador back in 2004. Can’t wait to get out and explore!
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