Thursday, April 24, 2008
one year
I should probably post some pictures or tell some stories since I have had time to reflect.
We'll see.
Friday, September 14, 2007
284 - alpine rail
Over a year ago, blogger did not have the technology to upload videos. Now that it does...here is one for kicks. This video came from our trip to Colorado last summer.
This is the alpine rail slide in Glenwood Springs, Colorado. It is more like a roller coaster ride than a luge track. You are in a single car and you have a lever in each hand that controls the speed of your vehicle by braking. Very fun.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
217 - the 4th of July weekend
So when the 4th lands on a Tuesday, it's easy to take Monday off and have a nice four day weekend.
Here is a real quick run down of our activities:
Friday-
- Leave work at noon. It's my half day. Go home and pack the car full and leave about 2pm.
- Drive south on 71 highway towards Bella Vista, Arkansas. It is about a 2.5-3 hour trip. With kids in the car we stopped once for a bathroom break and ice cream.
- About 5pm, we arrive at my Grandparents house - Great Grandparents to my boys. Ewe has seen them many times and is really comfortable around them. But Els is a little shy at first holding close to mom. He soon warms up and begins to flirt.
- After dinner, we all go swimming at their neighborhood pool just up the street. Grandpa came too. Both boys learned to jump off the side of the pool into the water. Els was fearless. Ewe was a bit more cautious, but soon let his guard down.
- Spent the day at my Grandparents with little excursions.
- We all went to one of our favorite hiking trails, next to a creek with a waterfall that is close to a lake.
- After lunch, Els went down for a nap and I took Ewe out for a little drive where he ended up falling asleep. So, I kept on driving until I found a McDonald's with a playland. He played while I enjoyed a coke.
- We all went swimming again. Ewe let me throw him up in the air so that he lands in the water by himself. Both boys made great strides in the swimming department this weekend. Being able to get comfortable with the head underwater was a major accomplishment.
- We took our time in the morning, packed up, said our good-byes, and left for Branson to go to Silver Dollar City. It is about a 2 hour drive.
- Branson traffic was crazy, as usual. We found our hotel. I went out to get a quick lunch and bring it back. McDonald's is not good on hot, sticky days.
- We got to Silver Dollar City a little after 3pm. - which means we can use our tickets again the next day for free. We stayed until the park closed at 7pm.
- In the car, we called Pizza Hut for carry-out and then ran to a grocery store for a few items. We ate dinner back at our hotel.
- Continental breakfast.
- Back to Silver Dollar City for the day.
- We left about 4pm. Went back to our hotel for a short break to nap, refresh.
- Dinner at Olive Garden. The kids will eat breadstick and spaghetti. There is a funny story about our pager. (Later.)
- Back at our hotel. We all go swimming at the pool.
- Continental breakfast.
- Pack-up and check-out.
- A quick stop at the Tanger Outlet Mall.
- Eat lunch in Springfield.
- Arrive home at 3pm.
- A short little nap for me.
- Ewe and I head over to Leawood Park to watch the fireworks with our family.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
216 - a few pictures from Colorado
We all piled on this bus that was to take us to our drop-off point for our rafting adventure.
This shot was taken after our rafting adeventure. I believe those clouds brought us some snow about an hour later when we were eating pizza in Breckenridge.
Here are a few pictures of the new Denver Art Museum that is currently under construction.
The new building soars out over the existing art museum.
Architecture that is dangerous. The architect is Daniel Libeskind.
This is the Denver Public Library, which is right next to the Art Museum. This building has nice geometrical shapes. This was designed by Micheal Graves (the Target guy.)
Downtown Denver from the civic lawn.
This is the structural suspension system for a pedestrian bridge at the west side of "downtown." The bridge looked somewhat like a ship with a nautical vernacular.
This is the view from the edge of the cliff where the "extreme swing" was placed. It was quite a rush flying out over that space. (Look for the semi on the road.)
These are the Alpine Cars that rode along a rail like a coaster. We were able to control the speed. This shot is taken at the end of the ride as we are being pulled automatically back up the hill.
Here we are pausing for a moment to enjoy the view.
Monday, June 12, 2006
209 - Vacation, Thursday, Day 6, June 1st
On this day (June 1st) in 1996, Verna and I were married. That is the whole point of this trip - to celebrate our 10 year wedding aniversary. That is why we left the kids with the grandparents. He we are traveling around together like our past trips to Jamica, Europe, Chicago, Flint Hills of Kansas, Florida and we realized that not much has changed - our spirits are still the same, maybe a little older.
Then I think of our more recent trips that we've had with our kids to Seattle, Arkansas, and through the Ozarks of Missouri, and realize that not much has changed with the addition of a couple of small travellers. Forrest and Vernal are still doing the same things we love to do and the kids get to come along for the ride. Our spirit is still in tact and not worn down or given over to and isolated compartment called parenthood.
It's hard to believe that 10 years flew by so quickly. We were 22 when we got married.
Back to our trip:
After spending the last few days driving to different destinations around the area, we decided to stay in the area. We were going to take it easy, with no plans. We did whatever popped into our head. Today was our day to lazy or adventurous - whatever we felt like. That was our attitude.
We had a slow morning, and then decided to go for a bike ride. We figured with all the amazing bike paths (recpath), it would be a good way to take in some of the views with a bit of thrill. We rented our bikes on the east side of Dillion Lake. We set out to take a 3 hour ride. We followed the lake over to the town of Frisco, with stops along the way to take in view and make the ride more of a stroll than a race. After riding through Frisco, we headed over to Copper Mountain following the banks of a river of some valley. I am not sure how close we got to copper, because we turned around at the 1 hour, 2o minute mark. On our way back, we stopped at a grocery store in Frisco and had fruit and sandwiches for lunch. Then we followed our path back to the bike rental. It was a great ride and a lot of fun.
Next, we just sort of went to a few shops. I wanted to price some used snowboards. We had ice cream from Dairy Queen. We picked up a few gifts for the boys, etc.
After that, we played some Tennis. We brought our racquets with us and we had time. We hadn't played forever, so we were both a little rust, but soon it started coming back.
Finally, we ate dinner at Carlos Miguel's Mexican Restuarant. It smelled good as we rode past it on our bikes in Frisco.
After dinner, we packed all our stuff, getting ready for the return trip on Friday.
Friday, June 09, 2006
208 - Vacation, Wednesday, Day 5, May 31st
Today, we drove west on I-70 to Glenwood Springs. I think Glenwood Springs boast the largest above ground hot springs pool. Our first activity was to take a gondola ride up the mountain to a place that is called
Monday, June 05, 2006
207 - Vacation, Tuesday, Day 4, May30th
We started the morning off by doing a little shopping at the outlet malls in Silverthorne. From there, we drove into Denver. We found a place to park in their LODO district (Lower Downtown.)
It was lunchtime, we were hungry and wanted to grab a quick bite. Up the street from our garage was Chipotle and Noodles & Company. Both are yummy, but I have only been to Noodles once before, so I opted for some Japanese rice noodles. We ate as we gazed over some downtown maps and plotted our city adventures.
16th street is a pedestrian mall and the only allowed traffic is the free bus. We walked the whole distance because at the end was the Civic mall, the public library, and the new Art Museum. We checked all of them out.
I got lost in a Virgin Megastore while Vernal found a place to get a haircut. Two albums later we met up and walked across the river to the REI store. (Recreation Equipment International.) We each got some new shoes and picked up little backpacks for the boys. We were looking for normal solid color kid backpacks that were not plastered with kid things like Dora the Explorer or Thomas or Spiderman, etc. Oh, but first, we took time to relax a bit and sip an iced coffee at the in-house Starbucks.
Oh yeah, I thought it would be ironic to eat something form Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory on this trip. I made that dream come true with a chocolate covered rice crispy treat.
Back in LODO, we found this really cool bookstore called the Tattered Cover Book Store. We probably spent and hour or so browsing around. It was as big as a B&N and was in a really old building where the wood floors felt worn from all the traffic. It had two floors and in the upper floor there was a special assembly room where people were gathered as a featured author was giving a talk. I should have gotten another coffee and sat at their cafe soaking up the atmosphere.
It was getting late now and we were getting hungry. We found a Mexican restaurant (D'Corozan) a block away that claimed it was the best Mexican food in LODO. It was pretty good and not to expensive.
206 - Vacation, Monday, Day 3, May29th
We again slept in at our own leisure, woke up and ate some breakfast at the Moose. We were scheduled to go white water rafting with a rafting company called AVA ( Arkansas Valley Adventures.) I picked them becuase they sent me the best marketing material. In otherwords, they looked the most organized.
Their outpost was located about 14 miles south of Leadville along the Arkansas River. We had to meet at 11:30 to get geared up and by geared up I mean put on wet suits and water jackets with life jackets and helmets. It was a little chilly that day and the water is assumed to be a bit cold this time of the year, so the wet suits were nice to have on. Our hands and feet were the only parts exposed to the elements (besides our faces) and they did get a bit cold. But for me, it came in spurts and those parts soon warmed up.
The rafts would hold 5-7 people and one of those people was the raft guide. We all had paddles and would follow the instructions of our raft guide. The journey was beautiful through the Brown Canyon. The river was rated a level 3 (intermediate)...meaning between the serene and calm were rapids that were fun and wild, but not to difficult for us first timers. There was one tricky rapid ahead where the rafts pull over and we take a short hike to look at it. The guides then figure their best plan of attack and give us a little instruction and pep talk. Our group didn't lose anybody which was nice because...after the rapid our guide confessed that she lost all but one the day before, but she did say they were a rowdy bunch who kinda wanted to "go for a swim."
The raft trip was a blast. The rapids are the best parts - going up and down - it's like a roller coaster ride. It's amazing that we don't fall off. We went 15 miles down the river and I think that lasted about 4-5 hours.
When all of that was over, we changed back into our dry clothes and by that time we worked up quite an appetite. Vernal suggested that pizza sounded good and I agreed. We drove into Breckenridge and tried a local pizza joint called Extreme Pizza. It was an old house decorated with skis and snowboards that had a room of arcade games and TV's that hungs showing local sports. We ordered a large (leftovers are always nice) and I got a side order of spicy buffalo wings. Mmmmh!
205 - Vacation, Sunday, Day 2, May28th
We went out to eat breakfast at the Sunshine Cafe in Silverthorne. The Sunshine Cafe is a breakfast only place very much like a First Watch.
From there, we went out to explore the local surroundings and towns. First we went to the marina at Dillion Lake and walked along the shore. Then we drove up to Keystone and then over to Breckenridge. We stopped at Breckenridge's Main Street and walked along the shops. From there we drove into Frisco to get some supplies for the week at Wal-Mart and Safeway.
We got back to the Moose Lodge and put away the gorceries. I called a rafting company and made reservations for a rafting trip the next day. We ate lunch and then took a guilt-free Sunday afternoon nap.
Later that night, we saw Mission Impossible 3 at the theater in Dillion. I can't remember the last time that we saw a movie together at the theater...very enjoyable.
204 - Vacation, Saturday, Day 1, May 27th
The day started off with us taking the boys over to my parents house. My dad came over with his truck in which we took apart the crib to load. We also threw on the truck bikes, trikes, and scooters.
Now that the kids are dropped off, we come back home to load up our car, then gas-up and add air to the tires. It is about noon when we leave.
In the car, we listened to music and podcasts; we conversed; we read books: and Verna watched a dvd for MOPS. We stopped in Hays, Kansas for a mid-afternoon dinner at the Golden Corral for buffet food. (a decision I always regret later.)
I don't remember exactly the time, but I think we arrived at the Moose Lodge (Doc's place) around the 10 o'clock hour. After unpacking and getting a bit of the munchies, we picked up some McDonald's to take back to the Moose. It was our one and only stop at McDonald's on the trip.
Thursday, February 23, 2006
President’s Day Weekend 2006 – part III
Monday, February 20th
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
President’s Day Weekend 2006 – part II
Saturday, February 18th
Moose Lodge has two bedrooms. Doc has dibs on his master bedroom. The other bedroom has two twin beds and that is where my dad and I slept - (Although, I kept offering my bro-in-law the opportunity to sleep in the same room with his father-in-law.) My cousin-in-law slept in the living room on the hide-a-bed sofa and my bro-in-law in the same room on a mattress on the floor. We had breakfast at McDonald’s after several other attempts proved to be to busy. After our quick breakfast we made it to the slopes of
I woke up to the smell of breakfast. My dad made omelets and hashbrowns. We were all sore. We soon got dressed and were back out on the slopes of
President’s Day Weekend 2006 – part I
I have been away for a while, so here is a quick rundown of this last weekend. (in parts)
Rock music – a good way to start off a little vacation time… I hadn’t been to a show since U2 in December, so I had been itching to see some music. BB and I went to see the Violet Burning who were in town. The usual venue that they play at has closed down, so it appeared that they played at some friend’s house in the basement. It was more of a private show that opened to a few people in the public. I had to email and reserve a spot to the host. Needless to say, I had never done that before. It was a bit strange, but the violets were as good as ever. After the show, I came home a packed up for a weekend of snowboarding in the Colorado Rockies.
I worked until noon and then went home and loaded up the car. The family drove me over to my dad’s house were I met up with my dad, bro-in-law, and cousin-in-law. We had rented a van with a DVD player. We hit the road and drove west on I-70 until we came to Silverthorne. I think we left about 1:30-2pm and got in at 12:30-1am. We stayed at Doc’s place in Silverthorne. We have come to call it “Moose Lodge” because everywhere you look is some sort of moose decoration. The weather across