Roaring Through the Rockies, Day 5, 6, 7

Continuing in Glenwood Springs, the hotel was just acceptable. The room was big enough, and at least there was a door separating us from the kids. However, the A/C was extremely loud, and the view from the bedroom window was of I-70.

After waking up, we went to the Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park. Overall, we had a good time. They have a "self-propelled" roller coaster called the Alpine Slide, we all had fun on that. They also have a human maze that if you complete it within a certain time limit, you get a crappy prize (think of something you might get out of a gumball machine), there is also laser tag, the cave tour, and the giant canyon swing. I was actually amazed that my son was willing to go on the swing with Brenda. The swing is one of those mechanical ones where you are sitting in a roller coaster type seat and it swings you out over the side of the mountain. I was not willing to do it. the only downside to the whole day was when we were on the cave tour and the tour guide basically kicked a couple off the tour because their two year-old daughter was talking. He said they could get a refund, but I don't think anyone was really bothered by it, and he could have handled the situation differently.

After the adventure park, we took the relatively short drive into Aspen. Once we got to the hotel, we were told we could park in the garage. We'll just say that trying to park a Tahoe in their garage is like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. I spoke with the guy at the desk, and he then told me that usually the bigger cars are parked on the street as long as you can find a spot. After we showered, we went to meet my Houston family for dinner. We got in the car (that took us a good 10-15 minutes to park in the garage), got out of the garage, and entered the address into the GPS. Well, it turned out the place was about two blocks away. I dropped Brenda and the kids off and went back to park the car in the designated section in the street. After dinner (a really good buffalo rib eye), we walked back, and the kids played in the park for a while.

We got up the next morning for our horseback riding adventure. Of course we had breakfast first. We went to a place that was recommended by the guy at the front desk. The place was called Poppycock's. They had good oatmeal pancakes, and that was about the extent of why this place was good. The omelet that I had was OK, but it just wasn't worth the $10.25 price, oh I forgot, + $2.00 because I got egg whites. When we asked if my daughter could have a refill for her chocolate milk, the waitress said "NO" almost in a tone that I thought she was joking, she wasn't. She said she would have to charge us for the refill. Well, with tip and everything, the breakfast came to $65. That is when I realized that Aspen was way too expensive for my tastes.

Our horseback ride was fun. However, the horse I was on had two speeds, slow and stop. Regardless, we all had a great time. After the ride, the kids went swimming for a little while, and then I took them to go see "Despicable Me." Brenda met us after the movie, and we had dinner.

This morning we got up and moving relatively early because we were heading into Colorado Springs. My whole goal of this trip was to make it past Independence Pass alive, and with no damage to the bike. Some of the corners looked familiar, but I was not able to pick out where I had dumped the bike before. The road going up out of Aspen was a little harrowing at times with it narrowing around corners, and multiple corners and S-turns. However, after making it to the top at 12,000 ft+, going down was easy. Oh, the bike and I made it in one piece. We stopped for an early lunch in Salida, then went to the Royal Gorge Bridge and Park. We took the tram across, walked back across the bridge, where the kids had a good time seeing all the state flags, and we went on the vertical train. We left the Royal Gorge around 3:00, and decided it was just best to follow the GPS to get to the hotel, instead of taking the scenic route through Cripple Creek and the mountains. We made it to the hotel, relaxed for about an hour, I showered, and we went to dinner.

Tomorrow is Pike's Peak, possibly Garden of the Gods, and Santa's workshop. Once again, I'm still working on posting pictures, I just keep doing these entries on my computer, and all the pictures are on Brenda's.

Roarin' Through the Rockies Day 1 & 2

I'm combining the first two days, because the technical first day was just the flight into Denver. During the flight, I was speaking to the guy next to me. I told him about the route I was going to take, and he made a suggestion to go through Boulder on the way up to Estes. I'm glad we did. To start off with, the flight was uneventful. We made it into Denver with no problem. After getting our luggage, we went to get the rental car. I had originally reserved a midsize car. When I went to the lot to get it, I asked which had the most trunk space, since we all had our own suitcase, and a couple of carry-ons. The person told me to get the Dodge Caliber, since it was a hatchback. Well, I pulled it around to put the stuff in there, and it couldn't even fit the two big suitcases. I then went inside to get a bigger car, well, we ended up with a Chevy Tahoe.

The hotel was just outside of the airport. We had dinner at Ted's Montana Grill. Brenda's steak was really good, and I entered the clean plate club with the Bison meatloaf. Needless to say, we may go back there when we get back to Denver next Saturday.

After we got up and had breakfast, we went to go pick up the bike. I knew I had to get new rain gear, which I did (and will probably pretty much guarantee it's not going to rain). I also got a new jacket. The jacket can be used in cold or warm weather as it has a removable liner. I got the bike, and headed out to Boulder. We stopped and went to the Pearl Street Mall, and had a really good sandwich at snarfs. After lunch we walked around the mall a bit, then took off towards Estes Park. We both enjoyed our first taste of mountain roads, and I'm really looking forward to tomorrow and beyond. In a way, it's sort of like being on a roller coaster that you control.

After getting into Estes and checking into the hotel, we went for a ride on the Estes Park Aerial Tramway, where we were able to feed chipmunks peanuts by hand. After the tramway, we had a B-B-Q dinner at Smokin' Dave's. The St. Louis ribs were really good, the Bison baby back ribs were a little tough and not very meaty. Although there is a rodeo in town, we decided to just come back to the room and relax.

I've had a headache today, and I'm not sure if it's from a lack of caffeine, or if it's the altitude. A couple of Tylenol seems to have helped.

Tomorrow it's a ghost tour at the Stanley Hotel, the ride into Winter Park, then "Kid's Night Out" where Brenda and I can have dinner together while the kids do activities and make S'mores.

Here are some pictures:

Vacation all I ever wanted

I guess the name of my blog should really be "Very Select Days in the Life of Evan." I tend to get caught up in every day life, such as working and getting my kids to whatever activity they need to be at, and forget for long stretches to actually post something on this blog. Well, once again, the best laid plans may or may not come true. We are going on vacation, as I think I may have put in an earlier post, the vacation is going to Colorado with me on a motorcycle, and the family following in a rental car. I am hoping that I can post a daily recount of what we did each day. We'll see how tired we are at the end of the day, and how much the kids will actually let me get on the computer at night. To begin with, here is the map of our trip.



As you can see, I am trying my best to avoid any major highways, and get some nice twisty, scenic mountain roads. I had some pointers on places to go from Brian Ibbott who has a podcast called Coverville, you should really check it out, he does a great job. I also got some last minute pointers from Ken Bingenheimer, who I found his blog about Motorcycle riding in Colorado. Ken said I had a good route picked, but let me know that the last leg between Royal Gorge and Colorado Springs looked boring, and I should try an alternate. Looking at the map, I think he definitely made the right call, and I'm glad that the last bit won't be boring.

We are planning on a ghost tour of the Stanley Hotel, which is where Stephen King got the inspiration for The Shining. We are also planning a horseback ride when we are in Aspen, and a cuckwagon dinner in Colorado Springs. Aside from that, the only other plan I had to make due to the possibility of it selling out was to get Brenda and the kids on the Pikes Peak Cog Railway so I could meet them at the top when I ride the bike up there.

Brenda did make it clear that she didn't want me making a lot of plans, and didn't want to be forced to be at a certain place at a certain time. Considering how I usually plan things, this is tame for me, and Brenda was agreeable.

Anyway, I'll do my best to blog from the road, and hopefully upload some pictures along the way.