Colorado Trip Part 1

Soon after school was out, we headed out on a road trip to Denver.  Brian had a conference there, so we added on 4 days to spend in the mountains as a family before heading down to Denver.  As usual, we drove and Denver feels close, compared to Yellowstone or Utah!  It only took us 2 days of driving to get there.

On our way west, we just happened to swing through Columbia Missouri close to lunch time.  We went back to our favorite pizza place, Shakespeare's and had a nice break. 

We briefly walked around part of campus.  I haven't spent much time in Missouri, but Columbia is a cute college town that we like to visit when driving on I70.

Nice picture

Silly picture

Nice picture

Silly picture

We cashed in some Marriott points and stayed over night in Junction City, Kansas at a Marriott Courtyard with a green pool.  Bummer.  No swimming.  The next day,  we stopped near Goodland, Kansas to check out the world's largest easel.  It was random, like most things in Kansas, but we had a great time checking it out.

Not sure what was so funny - but I can hear their laughter just looking at this picture!

We got to Rocky Mountain National park with a few hours of daylight to spare.  We had time to do a nice drive through and check out the beautiful area.  This is our first time ever really stopping in Colorado.  Usually we have just driven through to get somewhere else.  It was so beautiful!

Even in late May, there was enough snow up at the top to close the road, so we drove as far as they allowed and then parked and played in the snow.  There was snow taller than Grant!

This is my favorite picture from the entire trip!  

Our original plan included backpacking for 3 nights in or near Rocky Mountain National Park, but once we saw that nighttime temps were still dipping below freezing and that they were calling for more snow I looked into a plan B.  

Naturally, I first looked into cashing in Hilton or Marriott points, but they were all too far away from the mountains.  We wanted to be super close to Estes Park, a cute mountain town right outside the entrance to Rocky Mountain NP.  I google earth searched for hotels and stumbled upon YMCA of the Rockies.  I had never heard of it, or had any idea that YMCA's had resorts, but after googling it I knew I had found the answer. 

I can't say enough good things about YMCA of the Rockies.  Seriously.  It was awesome.  It is a huge campus right outside the entrance to the national park and had beautiful views in every single direction.  They have basic rooms, but we upgraded to one of their rooms that is basically like a normal hotel room since they were running a special.  It was only $85/night and included 2 free buffet breakfasts in their dining hall (which we used all 4 mornings.)  It is like summer camp for families.  Of coarse there were tons and tons of other groups there too, but there is plenty of rooms and space for all.

They had an indoor swimming pool, miniature golf, tennis, playground, a nice lodge, roller skating etc. all included in the cost of your stay.  I would go back in a heart beat.  Love, love, loved this place.

Here is the side entrance to our hotel on the left.

Inside the original lodge.

It was fun to just watch the elk chowing down on the baseball field each night.  They are so big!

The tiny indoor roller skating rink was a huge hit.  We went every single day, usually twice if we had time.  Grant went from being a wall hugger who could hardly skate to dancing to the music doing laps.  The inner 8 year old in me found it's way back out and it was so fun!  I lived in my roller skates when I was a kid!  Nothing like boogieing with the family while flying around.  Grant begged and begged to go back and even shut the place down one night.  It was right up his alley - friends, music and speed!