Colorado Trip, September 2 - 7, 2018

My sister-in-law has a cabin near Estes Park, Colorado, and she and my brother invited us to come for a visit.  They also invited my sister and her daughter.  On Sunday, September 2, at about 8:45 a.m., we loaded up in an airplane and headed to Denver.  My brother picked us up at the airport.

Garden of the Gods

My lovely, frugal niece had bought an airplane ticket to Colorado Springs because (for some reason) it was cheaper, even though she was on the same plane as us.  The deal was that the plane stopped in Denver, then went on to Colorado Springs.  Unfortunately, so did the niece's luggage.  No problem, my brother said, he'd wanted to see Colorado Springs, anyway.  So there we all went.  On the way, we drove through the Garden of the Gods, but it was really crowded, so we didn't linger.  We stopped for lunch at a Mexican place - I don't even remember the name of the town, but the food was good and so was the margarita.  (Don't judge me; I was on vacation.)  After lunch, we took the backroads all the way to Boulder, where we laid in some groceries for the week, then we drove on to the cabin.  It was dusk when we arrived.  We were all stiff from all the sitting we'd done, and in no mood to cook dinner, so my brother opened a bottle of wine and passed around cheese, crackers, and olives, and soon we were all just as happy as could be.  ;)

One thing about my siblings is that they are early-to-bed folks.  They drop like flies when the sun goes down, and get up with the chickens.  When I got up at 5:00 Monday morning, my sister had been up for an hour.  She'd already made the coffee.  Good girl!  When the rest of the crew got up, my brother made us pancakes for breakfast, and then he drove us down to Estes Park.  He dropped us off in the touristy part of the town (it's all rather touristy) and had ice cream on a park bench while we visitors poked our heads in the shops.  The weather was a little chilly, and I had to buy a pair of wool socks to keep my toes from snapping off.  There were street vendors in a little plaza, and we took a slow stroll past the booths.  They had some neat stuff.  We had another Mexican lunch, then headed back to the cabin.  We'd made crock pot lasagna before we went to Estes Park, and it was ready by the time we came home.  We had an early dinner, and everybody hit the sack.

Us, at Rocky Mountain National Forest

Tuesday morning, we're up at the crack of dawn again.  After breakfast, we drove up to the Rocky Mountain National Forest.  Such beautiful scenery.  It was about 45 degrees up there, near 14,000 feet.  We stopped at a few vistas, hit the gift shop, then took the long way home.  On our way down the mountain, we saw a rainbow BELOW us.  (I guess you could say that we were "over the rainbow."  Heh..."way up high.")  ;)  In a country field, we saw prairie dogs scampering all over the place.  That evening, we had steaks (grilled to perfection, I might add), baked sweet potatoes, roasted brussels sprouts, and more wine.  My sister made a coconut pie.  It was all very, very tasty.

Over the rainbow...look closely.

Us, in the rocky clearing.

Wednesday, we delivered the niece to meet a shuttle to go back to the airport, for she had to go back to work.  When the shuttle left, we went down to Estes Park to shop at a yarn store (my hands were needing some work to do).  On our way back to the cabin, we saw a guy pulling his trash can down his driveway.  His dog was with him, and I was looking at the dog when I heard my husband say, "Damn, dude!" and I looked at the guy, and HE WAS NOT WEARING ANY PANTS.  He had on a flannel shirt and tennis shoes.  That's it.  One wonders what the urgency was in returning the garbage can to the house.  Or maybe he just never wears pants.    Back at the cabin, my brother suggested a picnic lunch up on a mountain.  We had to go off-road to get there, which delighted the menfolk.  (I kinda dug it, myself, to be honest.)  It was a rocky clearing, and on a clear day we could have seen forever, but a cool mist had rolled in, and we were enveloped in a haze.  Still, it was fun.  More wine, cheese, and olives, with caramel popcorn for dessert.  Who couldn't like that?  

Sprague Lake

Thursday, we drove around again.  On the way through Estes Park, we saw a herd of elk right at the edge of the town.  We went up to Sprague Lake.  Absolutely beautiful.  When we left the lake, the sun was shining bright.  A few minutes later, back in Estes Park, it started to rain, then sleet pelted down so hard that it was heaped up at gutter downspouts.  Back the cabin, it had hardly rained at all, but it was chilly.  We warmed up some blackeyed peas and stirred up some cornbread for supper, and called it a night fairly early.

The next day was going-home day, so we got up early, made breakfast, cleaned the cabin, battened down the hatches.  By 9:30, we were on the road to the airport.  We stopped at a grocery store in Boulder for coffee and doughnuts.  In the store, I slipped on some liquid and bent my arthritic right leg further behind me than it had bent in years.  Had to fill out an "incident report" for the store.  Thankfully, that didn't take too long, and we made it to the airport on time.  It was not raining when we landed, but by the time we shuttled to our car, rain was coming down in buckets, right there at rush hour.  Land sakes!  Happily, we made it through the city traffic without any trouble.  It was dinner time by the time we crossed into our county, and we were able to have our usual Friday night Mexican dinner with my husband's sister and her husband.  Made it home about 8:30 that night.  I put on my pajamas and went straight to bed.

We thoroughly enjoyed our trip, but, as always, it was good to get home.  :)