The Rockies

We've been in Vail, Colorado for the last week, having a wonderful time. We decided to trade our timeshare in Hilton Head for one in Colorado so we could see Don's sister and brother-in-law, who live outside of Denver. We submitted our vacation request last summer and RCI (Resort Condominiums International) found a match for us while we were in London after Christmas. Delta was able to hook us up with frequent flier tickets, so it seemed like all the doors were opening.

We flew out last Saturday - early morning - and arrived in Denver around lunchtime (their time). We picked up our rental car and headed to the mountains. Don's brother-in-law has recently started a new job and doesn't have any vacation time accrued, so they rented a condo at the same place we were staying for the weekend. We got to spend Saturday afternoon with them and most of the day on Sunday. We had dinner together Saturday night and they took Don grocery shopping while I unpacked some. We had a wonderful time and the boys fell in love with their Uncle Brian. Deanna was very attracted to her Aunt Sue and almost wore Sue's poor ears off.

On Tuesday, we drove down to Colorado Springs to visit Focus on the Family's campus. We had a wonderful time, riding the 3-story corkscrew slide called "A-bend-ago" and eating ice cream at Whit's End (from the radio program, "Adventures in Odyssey"). We hit the bookstore and they had some great sales. Then we took off north to meet Brian and Sue for dinner outside of Denver.

The following day, we went White Water Rafting on the Colorado River. Sue drove up and met us to go with us. Daelyn had whined and complained, saying he was too scared to go, but we reassured him that the Colorado was a very easy river, and he had nothing to be worried about.

We had been in the raft about 5 minutes, headed downstream, when Daelyn pronounced "this is boring!" Hah! That was only minutes before we hit the first rapids.

By the time we had been through a few rapids and two people flipped their ducky and we had to perform a rescue in the middle of rapids, he changed his mind and decided white water rafting was pretty cool. Dane (my daredevil) felt it was a little too mild for him. He wanted rougher rapids with a little more excitement, so he'll be well-positioned for future rafting trips with Mom.

We were amazed by the road we took to the Colorado River. The Rockies are amazing, in that the side of the mountain that faces away from the sun is green and lush due to snow covering the ground for numerous months out of the year, then melting nicely to produce green, lush undergrowth. The other side of the mountains, the side facing full sun, is like a desert. The ground was rocky and the only thing that grew was sagebrush. It was a drastic change in environment from one side of the mountain to the other.

Some of the highlights of our trip were: walking through the B-17 bomber that's used as the Clubhouse in the Last Chance Detectives, another radio series from Focus; seeing the stagecoach road cut into the side of the mountain as we floated down the Colorado River; taking pictures of the chipmunk on the top of the mountain when we took the gondola ski lift to the summit to look around; visiting Buffalo Bill's grave and realizing that the old West really did exist - and right where we were at! Of course, the best part of our trip was spending time with Brian and Sue.

I'll post some pictures later in the week. We got home after midnight last night, so I have lots of unpacking and laundry to tend to, but I ought to be able to fit in a Post or two.