We've been home from our trip now for more than a week and it is time for me to try and recap the second week of our adventure. We actually left Rocky Mountain National Park a day early as Don and Amy were intrigued by our plans to go to Glenwood Springs and the canyon.
We camped in the town of No Name along I 70 at a resort which, among other amenities, offers white water rafting on the Colorado River through Glenwood Canyon. While they took the older two first thing in the morning on the ride of their lives, Don and I spent the morning with Elise. Like Amy said, "Give her a few rocks and a body of water and she can be occupied for hours." After last year's excursion on the Virgin River in Royal Gorge where we almost killed Don on a rafting adventure we kind of decided our days of white water rafting may be over.
After the rafters returned, we went on a short bike ride up the canyon and found a place they could play in the river for awhile, and after a nice lunch in town we said good-bye to the parents and began our solo adventure as they headed for home.
In the morning, we set out on a road trip to the Colorado National Monument. It was Saturday morning and a little more than an hour on the road so we entertained ourselves with the blue tooth by calling everyone the children knew in my phone book. If you were on of the lucky ones who got called, you were and important part of our adventure.
Colorado National Monument is another Canyon. This canyon was a product of erosion rather than water. We naturally found more rocks to climb and had a great picnic lunch among the rock formations. At the visitor center these children amazed us with their interest in learning more about the natural wonders of our world. There was a hands on display of big horn sheep horns which Elise touched and excitedly exclaimed "I can't believe I am touching this!"
On our last day we went on our official bike ride up Glenwood Canyon. Round trip "Excellent Ella" rode her new bike 14.6 miles She was an awesome champ. Jack rode the whole trip pulling Elise on her trailer which slowed him down almost to our pace. They all worked hard to get up the canyon earning the relatively easy trip down until the wind kicked up right into our faces making it a bit more challenging to get home.
Of course, we had a great picnic at the top, and stopped to play in the river and on the rocks for a bit.
You must know now that this whole trip started at the end of last year's trip when the children decided the next trip should be to Missouri to see the St. Louis Arch so we had to go home by way of St. Louis. It gave them a good look at the state of Kansas, which we decided looked best through the rear view mirror. No offense meant to Kansans, I'm sure there are some redeeming qualities there. My long time wonderful friend, Grace, happens to reside in St. Louis so we took the opportunity to mooch off her family and have a nice visit while marking the Arch off our to do list. She happened to have her daughter and 5 grandchildren visiting at the same time. The kids had a great time there. You see they have a backyard swimming pool with a diving board, a pool table, a foos ball table, and the biggest TV you have ever seen. As well as a dad who loves to talk hockey. Needless to say I think this was Jack's favorite place.
Don and I had done the arch once before, and found it to be an experience which was cool but only needed to be experienced once in a lifetime. It is amazing how an ordinary thing can become exciting when looking at it through the eyes of children. Suddenly the claustrophobic confines of the elevator car which took us to the top became the most exciting ride at Great America. The view from the top may as well have been the Empire State Building even though you have to lean into the windows to be rewarded with views of the Mississippi River and the Cardinals stadium. There is a little museum attached to the arch which commemorates Lewis and Clark and our early pioneers and included a film about their expedition in Cinemascope (anyone remember that?) It was here they found their souvenirs of their trip and a fitting finale to a great adventure.
As you might have guessed already, they have already planned where they want to go next year. Looks like the nation's capitol will be descended upon by the Adventuring Chilson Clan sometime next summer.
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