Saturday and Sunday

The weather is perfect - in the evening low 60's with the nights a little cooler. Last night we laid on our blow-up mattress with our heads by the rear window and the window open - it was like being at a drive in movie - watching the movie on our DVD with the head phones on. Great!

Saturday morning - our battery is sooo dead. We got one of the other campers with a truck and cables to get us started. We then headed straight to Wal Mart to buy a new battery just in case. However, the car has been starting fine all day. That movie last night was just a little too much...

We picked up our bikes around 9:30 and headed to the trail. We had to ride through town, but it wasn't an issue. The streets are wide enough that there is room for a biker to stay to the right and cars can easily pass. Most streets have a bike lane marked. The Colorado River trail reminds me a lot of the LR bike trail. However, it is more than just one trail down the river - it is a system of trails - both paved and gravel. A series of small lakes is on one section with trail all around it. We diverted from the river trail and went on the Audubon trail which was lined with trees (the shade was a welcome cover from the sun). Although the temperatures are only around 76-78, with the sun bearing down it gets quite warm. We rode bikes for about 3 hours and then returned them and headed to Mesa Verde National Park.




I love to travel - you never know when you are going to find a little spot that you'll always remember, or witness something that you won't soon forget. Today was one of those days...we were driving down the highway and had slowed down to go through the town of Dolores, Colorado. I went over a small hill and right in front of me the road was TOTALLY blocked with cows - lots of them - around 50! They were being herded to another pasture by a group of young girls. There was probably 7 girls and most looked to be in their teens, with one a little older and one that looked to be about Jayden's age. The youngest girl was so cute up on her horse - totally comfortable riding alongside these cows. One of the girls had a whip which she cracked in the air. Several of the cows looked to be ready to deliver and there were lots of babies. It was so funny to see the momma cows fussing at her calves to hurry up. I was driving and my camera was in back, and we were trying to dig out the camera, so these pictures just don't do the situation justice. At one point, my car was totally surrounded by cows!







We arrived at Mesa Verde National Park in time to set up camp and cook dinner. On Sunday morning we visited some ruins at the Mesa Verde National Park. We've been here before, but it was in March and the ruins that were off the road were closed. We really enjoyed seeing where the Indians lived hundreds of years ago. It is amazing that the ruins survived this long...





We've had a great vacation, but we are ready to get home - plan to arrive Monday night!

Friday

I'm sitting outside at a picnic table with a nice breeze blowing and blogging....isn't technology great?

We got a late start today (great bed). We headed to Grand Junction via I-70. Between the Copper Mountain exit and the exit for Aspen is Glenwood Canyon. We stopped because Phillip needed to change out his contact. We thought we were just stopping at a rest stop, but instead found an oasis! The Colorado River runs through Glenwood Canyon and at the point where we stopped, Grizzly River feeds into the Colorado. The power of both rivers at this point is amazing. There is a bike trail that follows the river. Website with information is found at (http://www.coloradobicyclerides.com/rides/glenwoodCanyonTrail/glenwoodCanyonTrail.html). I asked one of the bikers for info and he said that the trail is about 18 miles along the river and then feeds into another trail system that will take you all the way to Summitt County (another 140 miles). We have not traveled this section of I-70 between Vail and Grand Junction, and it has been an enjoyable ride.

After arriving in Grand Junction we explored the town, had dinner and reserved bikes for tomorrow. There is a trail running along side the Colorado River and we plan to follow the trail and have a picnic.

Wednesday/Thursday

Our campsite
The view of Fall River from our campsite
Me and Phillip at the top of Alberta Falls
View from the summit of Deer Mountain
View from Alpine Ridge on Trail Ridge Road

Wednesday - drove into the Rocky Mountain National Park by the southwest entrance via Hwy 34. This highway was closed on Tuesday because of snow, but our timing was just right and we were able to go over the pass. Unbelievable! We were above the tree line and the views were great. We made several short hikes (Colorado River Trail, Alluvial Fan, Alberta Falls and Bear Lake) today and camped at Aspenglen campground. Just for the record, site 44 is the best and we were lucky enough to get this site right on the Fall River. We used Mom's blow-up mattress and it worked great. However, we are not prepared for the cold weather - not enough long-sleeve shirts, fleece tops, blankets, etc. We spent most of the night shivering. At sunrise we started the car and warmed up (we couldn’t during the night because the headlights are always on with my car and the lights would disturb other campers).

Thursday – as Phillip and I sat in Outback eating a steak dinner we both decided that we’ve not been this tired since we hiked into the Havasupai Canyon. We hiked up Deer Mountain. According to the map it is 6.2 miles roundtrip….but going up it sure seemed like it was further than 3.1 miles up! The cool thing about this trail is that it has great views all the way up and at the summit all around. On the way up the mountain the sun was shining and we stripped down to short sleeve shirts. On the way down, it clouded over, thundered (yes, I was scared to death because we were at 10,000 feet), sleeted and then snowed. Tonight we are in a hotel – we both need a good night sleep.

Colorado 2

We awoke to lite snowflakes and temperatures around 30 degrees. Silverton has really grown since we were here 29 years ago :) There are outlet shopping centers everywhere you look - and yes, girls, I did pick up a little something for ya'll at the Coach outlet!

After shopping and lunch at the Log Cabin Cafe (delicious), we headed out Hwy 40 towards Winter Park and then on to the Rocky Mountain National Park. Girls, do you remember the year we went to Winter Park to Ski? The Jansens, Speights, Basses, Hankins and Cowarts all went and we had a great time. The lodge where we stayed is still there. It snowed on us as we were going into Winter Park - huge flakes. We are in Grand Lake, Colorado tonight. The road through the park is open (it was closed this morning because of snow) and should be open tomorrow. We plan to take a leisurely drive through the park, hiking along the way tomorrow.

Spent the evening walking around Grand Lakes - the small town is on the largest natural lake in Colorado, surrounded by snowcapped mountains - beautiful.

Colorado

I got home from my Shreveport trip around 12:30 am so I was a little tired Sunday morning. Although I had not packed a thing for the trip before I left, we were able to get our stuff together and leave around 11:00 AM. We made it to Wichita Kansas before stopping.

Monday morning – we slept late today and then headed out. We’re going north to I-70 and then heading west into Silverton, Colorado. We were planning to stay in Boulder, but found out that they are having a big Memorial Day celebration and expecting 80,000 people to participate. We did not want to fight crowds in a strange town. Silverton is where we spent our Honeymoon – we skied in Keystone. We are actually staying in the same hotel. I didn’t realize when I made the reservation – too funny.

About 50 miles outside of Salina, Kansas we started seeing a windmill farm. It continued for about 20 miles - amazing! I know that some people object to windmill farms, but they provide clean energy and I think that they are pretty. Some of these are painted a pale blue-gray and blend into the skyline very well.

We stopped for dinner in Denver and arrived in Silverthorne around 8:00 pm. There is still snow on the ground around here and several of the ski runs are still open. It is 32 degrees with a light snow falling right now! We may have to buy a couple of sweatshirts. Girls, there is an outlet mall here with a Coach outlet - I should have waited before buying ya'lls wristlets :)

Playing Ball

It is great to watch my little cuties having fun - and they have fun on the ball field! Phillip and I came up this weekend so that we could see both of the boys - Jayden on Monday night and Kyler on Tuesday night. On Monday, Melissa was in Farmington with Kyler and Evan since Kyler had a game at the same time as Jayden's. Jayden's was in West Fork and Kerry was with him. Tuesday night the entire family was at one place. I don't know how they're going to keep up once Evan starts playing...
This next set of pictures shows Kyler playing his game. Below he is running into home base!


Kyler is on the right below - hanging out and waiting for a ball to come his way....


Kyler is the Catcher below:
The next set of pictures is from Jayden's game.

Fun Times

Melissa and Kerry hosted a fish-fry to celebrate my tenure and promotion. Kerry fired up the Breaux's to Go machine and cooked the BEST fish ever. Actually, everything he serves is delicious! Fish seasoned to perfection, fried shrimp and sweet Potato fries - yummm.



Kerry in front of the Braux's to Go Machine.







The boys were having a blast with my new camera. They loved seeing the action shots. In fact they kept saying "Cici, take a picture of this.." Normally they avoid pictures.

Tenure and Promotion

I received my tenure letter last week and my promotion letter yesterday - Associate Professor! I am so glad to have this process over with. To celebrate, I bought myself a new camera. It is huge - not the kind of camera you want to lug down into the Havasupa Canyon - but I'm going to get some great pictures of my grandbabies! It is super fast - a requirement when taking pictures of the Pitts boys.

Our backyard - green and lush from all of the rain

Phillip laughing on the phone with Larry....

Notice anything different?

It's Evan's turn!

Today it was Evan's turn for a little shopping with Cici and Pop. We went to Petco and looked around. Evan was fascinated by the snakes! He kept wanting to go back and look at them. After that we went to Toy's R Us and bought him a Lightning McQueen 3-wheeler. It took a little while to put it together, but Evan thought it was worth the wait. He was so funny riding around the house on his new wheels (my camera batteries went dead and I didn't get any pictures of him riding on the 3-wheeler). It has been great to have a little one-on-one time with each of our little cuties this weekend.

Jayden's here!

Jayden cozied up by the fire and reading one of his new animal books. Yes, it is May and we have a fire going - it has been raining all weekend and it is cold!

Jayden is spending the night with us tonight. We made a chocolate cake for dessert and had steak for dinner...yummmm. We went to the bookstore and Wal Mart and came home with spy gadgets and animal books. Jayden's hair is wet in the picture above - he's ready for bed and storytime.

Kyler's here!

Kyler is spending the night with us at the lakehouse tonight. We made a stop at Toys 'R us and he is having a great time playing with his Ben 10 action figures. According to Kyler "I was born for this!" We'll switch out tomorrow and Jayden will spend the night.