Vacationing Out West - 2004

(A continuation from 2003)



On the road again, just can't wait to get on the road again.......
(Thank you Willy Nelson)





Miles of flowers on a bright sunny day really get things started right.





Winding roads in a mountain pass between Loveland and Estes Park, CO makes
driving the GTI Turbo a blast!
(Even Zoe said I was having too much fun.)





"Another cable car?" says Zoe
"Would you rather walk up the mountain?" says dad.





Quite the view of Estes Park and into the Rockys.





Night falls at the edge of the Rocky Mountains.





Classic sign pose.
(We decided to do the classic sign pose at each of the parks we entered.)
(It's a pain in the butt at the time, but helps keep track of the trip in retrospect.)





Sunrise at 11,000 ft. and 40 mph winds.





A stop along Trail Ridge Road.





Zoe was sitting on the back of the car when this coyote came up along the far side
and stopped about 2 ft. away and looked her in the eye.
Not sure who was more surprised, the coyote or her.
Never her seen her dive into the car that fast from the back.






Time to do some hiking.
Hmmm...  Very short hike.  Climbing uphill at 12,000 ft. is serious work... gasp...






Remember - Don't feed the wildlife.





On to Aspen and, yep-
Another cable car.
At least these are private cars with nice seats.






A nice view of Aspen in the valley below.





Next morning we head towards Canon City.





Location of Royal Gorge.
Suck it up!  It's over 1,000 ft. down.




Since this thing bounces, swings and sways,
my fear of heights was keeping my attention.
(Zoe was hanging over the sides, looking through the cracks and generally loving it.)





Next stop was the Great Sand Dune National Monument.




Very strange place.  Distances are incredibly deceiving.
Hot, dry, tiring.  Takes three steps to move one.
Went through two bottles of water in an hour.
A trip to the top and down is an all day deal.





God Empress of Dune.
(You have to be a sci-fi reader to get it.)





To end the day we stayed at a motel/drive-in movie combo (weird or what?).
This picture is from the window of our room.
(You can barely see one of the beds at the bottom left of the picture.)
You can watch the movie of the night from any of the rooms.
Sound from the movie was piped into the room.
(All the rooms were named after movie stars.)
Actually it was pretty cool as there was also a supper club attached.








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