I'm a Canadian military spouse living in Colorado. This blog will follow my adventures, activities, hobbies, and projects as I settle into my new role of "housewife" in a new country. Enjoy!
On American Thanksgiving Day, we decided a fun morning activity would be to hit up the Incline in Manitou Springs. It's a mile long trail up 2000 vertical feet of stairs made from old railway ties (there used to be rails and a train that took tourists up... now you gotta climb it by foot). It's a pretty popular trail in the area. We were surprised to see how many people were there on Thanksgiving Morning. We met one man at the bottom who drives an hour each day to climb it twice! Once was enough for the day for me!
I knew it was going to be challenging, but whew! It was so tough! I was completely winded the whole way up. I had to stop countless times to catch my breath. It's strange when you're moving as slowly as possible and still hardly able to breath. Needless to say, when we finally reached the top (in 59 minutes) it was a great feeling of accomplishment!
After enjoying a small snack, and taking a few photos, we started our leisurely descent to the parking lot on the Barr Trail.
If we were to have gone the other way on this trail it would have taken
us to the top of Pike's Peak. But we didn't have 16 hours to spare for the round trip, so
we'll save that adventure for another day (or weekend)!
We got two special visitors this month. First, Ty's brother Brad, who just happened to be flying in for a night. We got to check out the plane he flies, and have supper with him and his flight crew.
We didn't take many photos, but here are some with his plane:
Later that week Ty's Dad came down for the weekend. It was a fun weekend full of football, margaritas, sight seeing, more margaritas, and an overdose of high altitude! Ian made a video slide-show of his photos:
On Friday night, to get ourselves pumped up for the season, we went to a showing of the new Warren Miller movie, Flow State. Unfortunately we didn't win any of the door prizes, despite my special ballot folding technique. Oh well... It was a pretty good film, and definitely got us in the mood for skiing/riding!
This was the view from our seats.
After the movie it was straight to bed so we could wake up at 5:30am to head to Copper Mountain! It took us about two and a half hours to get there. We took the back way which was much more interesting than the highway through Denver; the alternate route. We got to see lots of cute little mountain towns along the way, including South Park!
On the way...
There were 3 trails officially open at the mountain. But two of them were only open to the US Ski racing team... So there was one trail open. It was a nice long run and the snow was quite decent. But it was pretty crowded as you might imagine. We still enjoyed ourselves. I was testing out my new board, which is turning out to be a lot of fun to ride! Can't wait for the rest of the mountain to open up!
flashing the season passes
After about six runs, we were getting bored of the one crowded trail, and a little bit tired too. First day out, no need to go crazy! So we headed into the pub with our free koozies that we were early enough to score! They got us a couple $3 beers, which we enjoyed along with some "spicy beer cheese soup" in bread bowls. Now that really hit the spot! mmm mmmm!
cold beer, warm hands
Then it was back to the Springs, and looking forward to our next trip to Copper Mountain.
Yesterday I joined along on another hike with the Canadian spouses hiking group. This time we were tackling the Catamount Trail. The trail head was located next to the tiny mountain cottage town of Green Mountain Falls, which was like a trip back in time. We had to hike from the park in town up the road to the trail head, which was in and of itself a challenging uphill trek! I was completely out of breath by the time we reached the beginning of the trail. It was a rocky ascent composed of many switchbacks up the side of the mountain to a lookout over the town. From there the trail continued up the hill, then through a meadow-ish area, then up along a stream, and to a large reservoir with some great views of Pike's Peak. It was a challenging, yet very enjoyable hike!
Being from Nova Scotia, the only type of bowling I've ever had the chance to play is what's called Candelpin Bowling. The balls are considerably smaller than the classic type with the finger holes. Until last weekend I had only ever seen those on tv and in movies. The pins are also a different shape.
Candelpin Bowling
On Sunday we decided to go bowling... My first "big ball bowling" experience! Not only was it my first time bowling with a big ball, but also the first time I didn't have to count and record my own score, or push the button to clear the knocked over pins!!! I have officially left the stone age of bowling! ha ha
