A vacation in Colorado
Greetings all! In March 2006 I took a well-deserved vacation to
Denver and Breckenridge, Colorado. Had a great time, saw some
awesome stuff, saw some weird stuff. Take a look-see...
The first full day I was there, we took a trip up to Boulder. A
very nice town, a college town, full of free-thinkers, Bush protesters,
and nice and interesting shops. Went to a store that sells
original old maps, bought a few, and they also sell vintage posters and
other interesting paper items. In addition to the nice, but large
French beverage posters, they also had a complete original set of the Beatles
posters Richard Avedon created for Look Magazine in 1967. Top
quality, authentic, and something a little different, I was naughty and
bought the lot. Judging from my research, I think I got a good
deal. Now where to put them...
Lots of good places to eat in town, including some with quirky names.
My travelogue fans seem to always ask "what does ... look like".
For those who haven't been to Colorado, here's much of what it looks
like:
This is driving toward Golden from Boulder.
Golden, Colorado is of course famour for Coors Beer. As you can
see from the below pics, the brewery is enormous and takes up a good
portion of the town.
Took a drive up a mountain in Golden appropriate called "Lookout
Mountain". Some nice views of Denver from there.
A few days later it was time to take advantage of my friend's timeshare
in Breckenridge. I was surprised to see the local Public Access
TV station showing programs in the hotel, and they look like they're
doing a good job on "Breck Buzz".
One day we went snowmobiling, a winter activity that we thought we
could handle. This company also does dogsledding in addition to
snowmobile tours. The dogsled was getting underway at the same
time we were preparing:
Getting ready for some fun. It was cold, so they provided body
suits as well as helmets.
After 10 minutes cruising around the practice track, it was off to the
mountains. Good
Times Adventures did a great job of making sure we all were
accounted for by providing various stops, turnarounds to count heads,
and by having the last snowmobile have a green flag on it to easily
spot the end of the caravan. I stepped up and was the
caboose. Yeah.
Here I am with my green-flagged snowmobile.
There are a few companies that do snowmobile tours in Breckenridge and
we liked this one because it's not just a rental, it's a couple hour
tour, and they also had as the destination the Continental
Divide, that border that runs down North America and divides the
Atlantic watershed from the Pacific. Cool.
Here we are on top of the Continental Divide.
One night we took a drive over to the next major ski area, Copper
Mountain, called just "Copper", the newest ski area up there.
Here's what that drive looks like:
Here's the town. Unlike Breckenridge, this town is smaller and
seems solely focused on snow sports..
Here's Main Street in downtown Breckenridge. Not a lot of plowing
going on, you're kind of expected to be able to deal with snow and ice.
And here's a pic of one of the lodges with the Breckenridge ski area
behind it.
Got caught in snow on the way back to Denver.
And a final weird thing. Those of you who follow the Comedy
Central cartoon "South Park" know it takes place in Colorado.
There was one episode in which for Kyle's birthday he takes some
friends to a local Mexican place called "Casa Bonita", which is, as
they say on their web site, "Colorado's version of a Mexican
Disneyland. In driving around Lakewood/Wheat Ridge I saw this
tower in a shopping center area. I thought it was some sort of
catholic shrine, but being bright pink I thought it unusual:
Finally I found out what it is - THE Casa Bonita. It's
real! According to the locals, this is the place that all the
Colorado kids dream of going for their big events.
A large sign under the canopy says everyone over the age of 2 has to
buy a meal, because you get to enjoy the entertainment regardless of
what you eat. It's an all-you-can-eat Mexican place of
questionable culinary repute. But it holds 1,100 people and has
300 staff. Yes, 300. The entertainment also consists of
haunted areas, cliff divers, and lots of stuff. Check out their web site, it's a
trip. We didn't go in, not being parents and being over 14, but
we weren't hungry either. Maybe next time. And as you can
see below, the South Park folks did a bang-up job placing this Colorado
oddity in its context of being in a strip mall next to dollar
stores.
So that's it. Had a great time. Recommended.