While the boys were safe with Tutus in Idaho, mom and dad decided to take a little vacation to Colorado.
Our first order of business was to deliver 36 boxes of grandpa tutu's book Joseph Janse - The Apostle of Chiropractic Education to a warehouse in Greeley. Our 2006 Ford F-150 had never seen that much weight in her bed - she sagged a bit on the drive but was happy when we unloaded the books the next morning. Having delivered the books, we were free to enjoy the week.
What's the first thing every non-drinker does when visiting near Fort Collins? That's right, we went straight to the Budweiser Brewery. Wow, that place was huge! We'd never seen anything like that in our lives. The size of the operation was unbelievable. It was amazing to see how the beer is made. The various steps in the process of making beer were explained as we watched millions of miles of pipes, robots working the equipment, conveyor belts with bottles and cans shooting all around, holding tank after holding tank - hundreds (each like the size of our house), trains coming in and going out, a long line of diesel trucks waiting to be loaded one after the other. We decided people drink too much beer! It was great fun. We actually went to see the Clydesdales but they were out on duty in California that week - bummer. But we did see the stables where they live.
Next we went shopping. We each got some clothes, but the joy of it was that we could take our sweet time and try things on without a two-year-old and a four-year-old screaming at us to go somewhere else. It was great.
Then we went to dinner at On the Boarder. While there, Ricky stepped on a glob of guacamole on the floor and went flying. He smashed down on his hands and knees on the cement floor and his Oakleys flew from his head and landed somewhere else. We learned when we went back outside after dinner that the lenses got scratched pretty good on impact. On the Boarder is working on getting us replacements. (I haven't slipped in years. Guacamole - really?)
We enjoyed shopping so much that we did a little more the next day and supplemented it with a massage. Ricky got the hour-long massage slot and Eden got the half hour slot. (I learned when I emerged that giving me the longer slot was a tactical plan by Eden so that she could go buy more clothes without me or the boys disrupting the process!)
Next we headed south into downtown Denver. We went to the Wings Over the Rockies Museum. They had a number of older fighter planes and bombers on display inside a huge hangar. They also had a 3/4 size X-Wing starfighter on display! Very cool. But the best part of the Museum by far was the short movie in their little theater. It was done by Harrison Ford with music composed by James Newton Howard. The quality of the picture was sharper than anything I had ever seen and the music was some of the most beautiful music I have ever heard. I wanted to buy the movie for the music, but they don't sell it. I looked for the music online and I have not been able to find it anywhere. We actually went back in and saw the movie a second time and I attempted to record it, but my phone got turned off without me knowing - I'm still soooooo sad about that. I want that music. Anybody help! The museum was cool.
On a side note, we were only a few miles from where the tragic shooting took place in Aurora just a couple of days before. Having worked in a movie theater for over ten years this shooting hit close to home mentally for me. So sad, so terrible, so unnecessary. Hans Zimmer wrote a special piece this very week (while we were visiting Colorado) immediately following the shooting. He was connected to the event in that he had composed the music for the Batman film which was playing for that showing. As the greatest film composer of all time and in an effort to ease the pain he wrote one of his masterpieces "Aurora." He is donating all of the money to a victims charity fund. My take on the piece, I've only been emotionally capable of listening to it five times. Not ashamed to say that I balled all five times. A divinely transcendent piece a midst an awful tragedy.
Next we went right downtown and had dinner on the street mall before we went and saw the musical "Jersey Boys." It was fun to sit together and enjoy a musical - again no kids, and we enjoyed the show. I don't think either of us would watch it again because it has some pretty foul language which is disruptive to an otherwise already so-so show. But it was still fun for us.
Next morning we drove into the Rocky mountains to the town of Breckenridge. We stayed at a nice lodge overlooking the valley. While in Breckenridge we had all kinds of fun. Apart from eating good food (which is my favorite part of any trip) we went half-a-mile into an old gold mine, panned for gold, rode a gondola, drove down an alpine slide in the same cart (I controlled the high rate of speed causing Eden to scream and scream and almost cuss), rode a paddle boat on a lake (Eden did most of the paddling), and did I mention good food.
After a few days in the Breckenridge area we went on to Rifle where we went to one of the most beautiful waterfalls in the world. There we hiked around and Eden even went in a few little caves.
Before leaving Rifle we found some tennis courts and played a little tennis. Eden thinks she's pretty good, so I thought I should humble her a bit. . . Well, she asked me if she could try one of her "hard" serves. I said, "Bring it on." Ahh, I barely had time to jump out of the way and scream as the ball flew by me. I'm just glad it didn't hit me. How do people return that stuff? Anyway, I played the best I could considering it had been about 10 years since I had been on a tennis court and we got hot and sweaty and had a blast. Then it started to rain, so we got back on the road.
The next day we drove back into Utah on our way back to Idaho. First stop was Enstrom Candy Co. so that we could see their factory but it was closed because it was the weekend. We peeked in the observation windows but that was it. Later that day we stopped at the BYU bookstore and I picked up a few elusive books that I had been wanting for some time. Then we went on to Spencer's house and had dinner with his family. They have a beautiful new home in a great area. I hope they stay there for years to come. We picked up Sierra at their house who was also on her way to Idaho for a youth camp. That evening we drove back to Tutu's house in Idaho.
We missed the boys a lot, but it was great to just be together with each other and enjoy some uninterrupted time. Our trip to Colorado was a lot of fun.
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