October 23: Boulder!
I woke up so excited because I would be spending the day with a dear friend. Em and I were college volleyball teammates at Purdue and I love her to death. Sadly with her living in Boulder and me living in DC, we don't see each other often, which was why I was so excited for the day.
I had a three hour drive east on 70, passing Vail and Breckenridge to get to Boulder. It was a beautiful drive through some of the mountain areas. Vail looked like a fun town to visit someday, but I was in a hurry to get to Boulder to visit with Em and her husband, who I hadn't met yet. I arrived before lunch and it was so nice to hug Em. Em is such a loving spirit and when you enter her life, she embraces you to the fullest. I got to meet CT, her husband, and her brother, sister-in-law, and niece who live next door. We enjoyed a healthy lunch (she was so relieved that I eat salads now since I refused to eat them in college) and set out on our adventure for the day.
She took me to a local hike on the outskirts of Boulder. She said this is the must do hike for visitors and I can see why. It was a challenging hike, thanks to the altitude for me, but it had some incredible views of the mountains in the distance and of the city. Callie enjoyed some off leash time during the hike too, which was nice so we didn't pull each other back. It was a great hike and gave us both time to catch up on life. Em is the type of friend that even when you don't talk for months or even a year, you can pick right off like no time had elapsed. She even gave me plenty of breaks to catch my breath. She had just started a cleanse and was running low on energy, which benefitted me. I am pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to keep up with her if she weren't on the cleanse.
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| Love this girl! |
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| Had to show our Cubs love. The shirts got so many comments to. I guess people in Boulder love the Cubs! |
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| Callie enjoyed being able to join for the hike. |
Post hike, we showered and went into downtown Boulder to explore and grab some dinner. We kept running into her friends so I am convinced she knows everyone in Boulder. I loved the town. It was cute and full of adventurous stores and healthy eating and of course breweries. We went to the clean eating restaurant in town that actually promotes the cleanse that Em and CT were on. I skipped the super healthy food and enjoyed a local cider. I forget what I ate, but I remember thinking it was delicious. I enjoyed taking this time to get to know CT and seeing how happy Em is with him. It is always a great thing to see two people so happy with each other and life.
Just to prove how great these two are, they took me to their favorite local ice cream place to get some dessert. They were unable to eat any of it but they knew I had a sweet tooth and told me I had to try it. I definitely agree with them that the ice cream was delicious. Oh and did I mention we biked from their place into town for dinner. I loved it! My goal is to incorporate some biking into work so this was just a start to see how nice it is to get around by bike.
We were all tired from the busy day and cleanses, so we chatted a bit more and hit the bed early. The next morning, Em made me oatmeal (which again, she couldn't eat) and we had to say goodbye since they had to head into work. I loved every minute of this visit and I can't wait to get back to Boulder sometime soon to go on more hikes with Em and CT.
And one more amazing thing happened while I was in Boulder...I won tickets to the World Series! The Cubs do a lottery for the ability to buy tickets to all playoff games. My whole family had registered but had no luck so far. While sitting and chatting with Em and CT before dinner, I did a quick scan of my email and saw "Congratulations" from the Cubs. I opened to find that the following day at noon, I had the ability to buy 4 tickets to any of the World Series games at Wrigley. I was beyond excited and knew my family would be too. I instantly emailed it to my brother, mom, and dad and followed it with a text. I was the only winner in the family and it was instant excitement. (Best road trip ever!). Later that night I followed up my brother to tell him that I wanted the tickets to go to him, my mom, and my two cousins who are all die-hard Cubs fans. I love the Cubs, but I am not as die-hard as those four. My mom followed up that she couldn't take the stress of being there so I got the 4th ticket. Corey and my cousins were in charge of getting the tickets at noon the following day since I would be in the Rocky Mountains exploring.
October 24: Rocky Mountain National Park and Colorado Springs
Now it was on to see another dear college friend. Kara is an Olympic javelin thrower and had just started her training sessions again after a short off-season break. She had training that morning, so I decided to go spend some time in Rocky Mountain National Park. It was a short drive from Boulder and it crossed off one more National Park on my list.
Rocky Mountain National Park was beautiful. I love mountains so this was right up lane. Instantly, I saw a pack of elk (or moose, still honestly not sure what the difference is). They were beautiful and sadly they slowly moved away. I got back in the car and started to drive when one walked right in front of my car. I pulled over and got some shots of it (from a good distance). I was able to go find a beautiful lake and enjoyed a few minutes of solitude. Sadly, Callie couldn't go hiking with me anywhere so again, I stuck mostly to viewpoints. We drove up the mountain a fair distance so I could enjoy some of the snow. It was a little scary pulling my trailer up a mountain, but my car did well. It was a perfect 2-3 hour taste of the park and I know I would like to go back sometime for some quality hikes.
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| Another camera post...brilliant |
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| I loved watching the deer hiding in the grass |
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| So many of them enjoying the hillside. |
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| Another happy place. I will be returning here soon! |
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| This is the guy that crossed right in front of my car |
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| And then disappeared into the woods |
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| Another happy place. |
I had no service in the park so I was dying to get my cell reception back to find out what tickets my brother was able to get for the World Series. I had been hoping to go to the Friday game so I could get back to work on Monday. They weren't able to get Friday tickets and instead ended up with bleacher seats on the Sunday game. I text my coworkers to see if they really could survive without me for one more day and decided it was important to stay in Chicago to see the game.
Then it was off to Colorado Springs to see Kara and Russ. Kara was my sophomore year roommate at Purdue and I love this girl. She is one of the most positive people I know and her attitude is contagious. She is also one of the hardest working people I know and her three trips to the Olympics prove that. I was so excited to catch up with her and Russ and meet their new pup, Maddie. She is also a person that no matter how long it has been since you have talked, you pick right up like there was no time apart.
I was nervous how Callie would respond to Maddie since Callie doesn't get along with other dogs very quickly. She kept to her normal actions and didn't want to interact with Maddie. Kara and I decided to go on a long walk with the pups to see if that would help. It did for the walk, but as soon as we were back, my pup went back to being afraid of Maddie. Maddie was adorable and so smart. Kara and Russ have done amazing things with her and she adores them. Following the walk, Kara took me to the Garden of the Gods. It was beautiful and I would love to return again to get more time to hike around and take pictures. We picked up dinner and cupcakes (YES!) on the way back to the house. It was a great night catching up with Kara and Russ and hear their new adventures.
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| Enjoying Garden of the Gods |
October 25: The morning started with Kara getting a visit to be drug tested. She is pretty much always on call as an Olympic athlete and I happened to be there when they visited. It was interesting to see how this process worked. Following the visit, Russ made us breakfast and we decided we would do a hike in a nearby state park before I continued on the road. The park was wonderful. We took the dogs and hiked into a small canyon and through streams. Callie even showed some interest in following Maddie into the water, which she never does. It was the perfect ending to my time in Colorado.
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| She willingly went in the water (1st time ever!) |
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| Beautiful canyon (no more pics though because my phone ran out of memory) |
I can't say enough about how much I enjoyed catching up with Em and Kara (and CT and Russ). These are girls I know I will be friends with for life. It also proved another fact to me that I would love to live in Colorado sometime in the future. The people seemed very friendly and there are so many opportunities to enjoy nature. One of these days.
The rest of the day was spent driving towards Chicago. Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois are very boring states to drive through. You no longer have beautiful scenery, but instead have never ending flat lands and fields. Thankfully I had a good audio book to keep me going. I stayed at the KOA in West Omaha leaving me only a 7 hour drive left to Chicago the following day. I spent the night watching game 1 of the World Series. It wasn't an easy game to watch since the Cubs lost 6-0.
