Colorado Vacation (chapter 3)

(ugh! I deleted the picture AGAIN!!) After a full day of mountain driving, stopping for tons of pictures, and touring Silverton, Ouray and Ridgway, we rested up back at the condo and then headed out to go fishing. Between the kids’ short attention spans and the empty hooks, we spent less than an hour at Haviland Lake and headed on to Durango Mountain Resort to see what activities they had open. It was an almost empty resort area, but we were able to play 18 holes of putt-putt for free. We abandoned the idea of teams and keeping score and just played to have fun and finish. It was so nice and such pretty scenery. There were some annoying unsupervised kids playing around and we had to watch for some of their stray balls and eventually their clubs that went flying through the air. Dad was about to go looking for some parents, but they ran off and we were finally at peace with playing by ourselves.

Another fun picture in the beautiful scenery at Durango Mountain Resort near the putt-putt area.

A - 11
G - 5
S - 9
K - almost 7


Mom and Dad posing for a picture the same as they did almost 15 years ago - only there was lots of snow then!







Mom and G on the chairlift. G hadn't let go of Mom's arm just yet, but she was soon comfortable and sitting by herself and telling Mom she didn't need to hold her any more. Little did G know, but Mom DID need to hold on to her!!





We got to the top of the mountain on the chairlifts and were set to walk around and explore. Unfortunately, (or fortunately as the storms were rolling in) we were immediately attacked by massive mosquitoes and decided to head right back down to the bottom. Seeing us taking pictures of the kids, a nice ranger at the top of the mountain asked if we wanted him to take a family picture, so we finally got everyone in at the same time.


After we got back to the bottom of the chairlifts, the storms were clearing out and the kids ended up talking Dad into a ride on the alpine slides. (Mom was shocked!) We all got to ride (G with Mom since she wasn't 6 yet) and got back in line for the chairlifts so we could go halfway up to where the slide started. The kids had a blast! (and so did Dad!) Given time and money, we probably would have done that many more times. We saw a grandma and grandpa racing each other down the slide at least twice in our two chairlifts up the mountain!

After lunch, we rested for a while then headed out to Lime Creek for an “easy” hike (so the map indicated). What it didn’t show was that the drive there was exceptionally difficult – 3 ½ miles of the absolute worst rocky road. We were about a mile away from out destination and we could go absolutely no further. So, we turned around and carefully treaded our way back to the main road. The kids were disappointed in the hike outcome and we headed back around the corner to the condo. Just before crossing the bridge, we turned down a side road beside the Animas River to see what we could find. We parked just off the road and walked a ways into the wooded area and headed down toward the water. It was a perfect “hike” for the kids. They waded through the rushing water and K went for a slippery “swim”. The slide and the hike were the highlights of the day.