Rocky Mountain High!

The third week in July, the four of us boarded a Frontier flight out of Memphis to Denver for our first family trip to Colorado!  We stayed in downtown Denver the first night.  Saturday morning, we made a quick stop at REI on the Platte River.  Winn and I rock climbed in the store together! We then headed over to Golden to visit with Sare, Conor and Willow.  We went down to the creek that runs through town and watched all the folks tubing down the cold creek.  The current was strong (Daddy was very nervous)!  That night, Mary Elizabeth came up to Golden to keep the children at Sare's while we ventured downtown to celebrate Sare's 40th birthday.  We ate at a hip korean restaurant, then headed over to a karaoke bar.  The next day, we went to Red Rocks Amphitheatre in the morning and then hung out in downtown Golden in the afternoon (watched more tubers) then ate dinner at Sare's - I went to Whole Foods and picked up salmon and vegetables. After supper, Conor made a fire outside and we made s'more's. The air felt so good, no humidity. The next day, we went back to the dinosaur museum right outstide of Red Rocks and then to Eldorado Canyon State Park.  I had forgotten how spectacular the canyon is back there.  We did a nice hike and played in the creek and then we headed to Southern Sun for lunch in Boulder.  Then down to Pearl Street Mall.  The kids played in the fountains and I took lots of pictures of them exploring the Mall.  So much to see and do in Colorado!  We rode around for a bit looking at houses, happy to have our kids stationary for a minute.  We ended the day at Chataqua Park in front of the Flat Irons, then checked into the Millenium Hotel for a night and had a pizza delivered for supper. The Millenium House old run down hotel mind the Safeway on 28th St and Arapahoe. The next morning, I snuck out while they were sleeping to do an early morning hike and picked up breakfast at Alfalfa's to bring back to the room.  We checked out and went down to the Boulder Creek to play.  We went for a short hike at the Red Rocks in Boulder down from Sanitas. Roberts kept freaking out whenever Winn or Meredith would pick up a piece of trash thinking it might be contaminated with fentanyl. Then starving, we headed to Snarf's for lunch.  After lunch, we paid George a visit on Walnut St.  He gave Winn one of his alien figurines (a Gray).  George is selling his house and moving to New Mexico, because he can't afford Boulder property taxes:( After seeing George, we headed to Sallie Wright and Will's to get settled in to spend the night. Nannie and Uncle Jimma were there too with a big U-haul of furniture from Mississippi.  We had a fun night meeting my old friend Celanie and her girls, Sophie and Charlotte, at the Rayback Collective, a food truck park and bar.  The next day we got the unfortunate news that Rob Dawkins had died from an overdose, so Nannie and Jimma would have to cut their trip short to get back to Mississippi for the funeral.  Will and Sallie Wright live right next to open space and Winn and I got to walk Wyatt around the lake that is dog friendly open space. We packed up and headed up to Estes Park, stopping to eat at a hip Mexican restaurant in Lyons. We checked into the Coyote Mountain Lodge and headed up to Rocky Mountain National Park to get the lay of the land. We learned from a ranger that we needed to get up early to beat the crowds to the parking lot at Bear Lake.  The next morning we set off early.  We got a little off track, but got to see a Bull Moose in the distance at Sheep Meadows. We made it to the Bear Lake parking lot just in time for Meredith to throw up all the milk she had drunk for breakfast.  Thank goodness she made it outside of the car! She recovered quickly and we had a lovely stroll around the perimeter of Bear Lake.  Perfect hike with young children.  We then headed up to the tundra communities and got out the car to hike around and take lots of pics above treeline.  We ate late lunch on the other side of the park in Grand Lake at Sloopy's.  They had good little hamburgers, fries and milkshakes which made for some happy campers!  We checked into the hotel in Grandlake for the night.  They had a fun dining room to hang out in with lots of games.  Winn became obsessed with chess:) Before supper we went out for a ride back into the park to see if we could see any elk, but we found a mother moose and her baby at very close range. The next day we did a short hike to Adams Fall. We, of course, had to carry them back down the hike. I think all of our moving around was making them tired. We did an early lunch back at Sloopy's and headed back into the Park to drive back down to Boulder.  We saw lots of Elk on the tundra. Beautiful, dramatic scenery of mountain peaks at the top. Our ride back to Boulder was uneventful and they both napped. For our last night in Colorado, we met back up with the Merrigans and Mary Elizabeth Keith drove up from Denver with her boyfriend.  We were going to eat at Avery's Brewing Company but the wait was over an hour, so we headed back down to Table Mesa shopping center to the Southern Sun.  We had a fun dinner and then ate Sweet Cow ice-cream for dessert.  We spent one last night at Sallie Wright's (she was gone to Mississippi to Rob's funeral). The next morning our last stop was the Farmer's Market in Boulder. We toured around tasting all the free samples of granola, tomatoes, peaches, gluten free coffee cake. Meredith went to the potty 3 times at the Teahouse. I ate some dumplings and Roberts got some tamales. Colin Tomb came and met us right before we had to leave, so she got to meet the kids and Roberts and catch up after 10 years! As we were leaving Boulder, we had fun getting Meredith to point out her favorite Boulder landmark "Devil's Thumb!" We drove back to Denver and turned in our rental car and caught our flight back to Mississippi.  This trip was highly anticipated and throughly enjoyed by everyone. Winn loved playing in all the cool, clear creeks. They both loved climbing all over the rocks. They were so excited to find snow in the mountains in July! Roberts and I loved being able to show them all the places we loved when we lived out here and can't wait for our next Colorado adventure!