Colorado

So, I haven't been blogging in case you didn't notice. Partly because I've been on vacation and partly because I was getting ready to go on vacation. :-) So, I'll put anything else on hold and try to focus on just telling you 'bout our trip right now.


First of all, we left the kiddos at Mom's so she's exhausted now. They had an amazing time and got to do much more fun stuff than they would have gotten to do with us. Like, play in the corn bin. Not kidding. Feed the fish. Campfire and smores. Yep, they didn't miss us at all.


Thursday we drove to North Platte, NE. Which, apparently is the home of the largest railyard in the world. So we toured the railyard when we got into town. This picture is of the west hump. The cars are pushed from the hill and then roll of their own accord down the hump. There are 64 differed rails the cars can be directed down. This was only a small part of the yard. My Man could probably tell you about each part from memory. He's smart like that. But, I'll stop here.


Here we are on the 7th floor of the Golden Spike overlooking the railyard. As you can see, I'm still in my 'traveling clothes'.

We got checked in and went out for dinner. Then, out for ice cream :-) Just between you and me, I was already missing the kids. Not enough to come home yet though.

The next day, we traveled from North Platte, NE to Frisco, CO. Not as long on the road as the day before but still a pretty good trip. We got settled in and headed out to dinner. Then did some hand in hand walking up and down the touristy part of town. Cute shops. Coffee. Pizza places. So relaxing. Have I told you how long it's been since I've been on vacation? Let's just say, I only had one kid at the time.

And then early to bed to prepare for our mountain climb!

Here we are at the trailhead at the base of Mount Quandary. If I had known My Man had brought me these gloves I would have packed my own. Do you see the unsuspecting look on my face? I had no idea what I was in for. Sure, I knew it would be long and challenging but that does not begin to cover it.

You'll notice that I basically just took pictures toward the very beginning of the trip. We're still in the treeline here. It was a beautiful morning. I just couldn't catch my breath long enough to stop and look at it!

Here, yep we're still in the treeline. My Man is insisting that I take a picture. I'm too tired to do much better than this smirk.
Again. He won't stop. But, I'm not turning around.

Aaaaand.... the summit. No pictures in between. I was beyond overwhelmed. It wasn't happening. Plus, it snowed on us and tried to beat us off the mountain with wind gusts. I would have fallen off if I'd tried to take a picture. Here, let me see if I can find a few in-between pictures to fill in the gaps for you....

This is about 1/3 of the way up the mountain. And we planned to take a break and have a snack when we got to the top of this first 'hill' that you can see. Now, this isn't my picture. It was foggier and and there was more snow on the summit when we were there. And, well, I thought the summit that you can see? WAS ANOTHER MOUNTAIN. It was years away! And if I had known then what I know now I would have been very disheartened. So, I suppose it's all well and good that it happened the way that it did.

So when we got to what I thought had to be near the top, there was this. And let me tell you, the people that were on their way up this ridge? THEY LOOKED LIKE ANTS!!! The only reason people climb mountains is because once they get this far they cannot turn back without reaching the summit. The 2 miles of constant climbing would not allow me to stop at this point.

On the narrowest part of this ridge is when the snow started stinging our cheeks as it slapped at us from the side. The wind tried to knock me down over and over again. It was at that moment when I wasn't sure if I was going to make it. We were climbing on snow and I was scared. I knew the wind wouldn't actually knock me off the mountain, but I also knew if it knocked me over it was going to stinking hurt!

So here we are. I still can't believe we made it. I'm still sore and my feet are bruised and blistered, but I am so glad that I went. My Man asked me if I was going to this with him again (he wants to climb all the CO 14ers) and I told him not to ask me that just yet.

This pose was My Man's idea. I'm not proud of it, so don't circulate it...

Doesn't My Man look right at home on top of a mountain?

This is later that night at DOMO in Denver. Wonderful country style sushi. I think I'm in love.

After this, we hit the road, managed to make it to Limon and check in. Sunday we spent the whole day on the road accept for a stop at Cozy's in Salina, KS for their awesome tiny burgers. And a gas station 'incident' that I'll tell you about if you remember to ask me later. WOW.

All I'm saying is, I am not going to wait years and years to take a vacation again!