The cousins had a great time together. Once they got used to the dogs, Amanda and Sophie also enjoyed getting to know Pearl, 2, and her baby brother Kevin, 6 months. Here's the group, assembled on the front porch just before we left for Geneva Glen: Amanda, Kevin, Hallie, Mitchel, Sophie, and Pearl.
Off to camp for Amanda's first time! This is a special camp. Both Bill and I went as children in the 1940's. I spent childhood summers there and worked as a counselor when I was 18.
After registering for camp, Amanda was given a handful of "fairy dust" and we followed the trail of fairy dust to the council ring to meet her counselor. We passed this very friendly Irish troll as we crossed the bridge.
Counselor Lizzy helped us more Amanda's luggage. Sophie kept trying to hitch a ride.
This is Amanda's cabin.
Amanda posed for a picture with her counselors, Lizzy, Cody, and Meg.
Sophie met a fairy on the walk down the hill after dropping Amanda off.
From camp we went a little over three miles to Morrison, near the farm where Bill and brother Dan grew up, and ate burgers at the Blue Cow. Morrison, gateway to Red Rocks Amphitheater, has become quite trendy with many restaurants and boutiques.
Tiny Town is very close to Geneva Glen. Coming here with my grandparents is one of my earliest memories, and I hiked here from Geneva Glen during my summers at camp. It has been lovingly restored, new buildings have been added, and volunteers keep it going.
Here are a few of the houses at Tiny Town.
The Tiny Town train is still the highlight of a visit there.
Up the mountain from Tiny Town, in South Turkey Creek Canyon, a narrow dirt road winds its way to Mount Lindo Cemetery. The views are spectacular.
Sophie stands at the foot of her great grandparents' graves on Mount Lindo.
Sophie swam for the entire morning on her first day at Park Plaza.
We met Cousin Michelle for dinner in Edwards.
Sophie and Cousin Jasper got to play for eleven hours, several of which were in the Park Plaza pool and hot tub. Then we went to Jasper's house where we had a good family visit with Michelle and Brent, too.
This is Beaver Creek. It was running high, but doing no damage. The Colorado River, on the other hand, prevented us from doing the Glenwood Canyon ride we wanted to do. It has destroyed a good part of the bike path, which is now closed.
Mindy, Sophie, and I took a ride in Vail.
Mindy said pulling the trailer wasn't that difficult, but I was glad when we came to a hill that she was pulling it and all I had to do was peddle my own bike!
Amanda made lots of friends at Geneva Glen and had a great time. This little girl, Sadie, was her special camp buddy.
After picking Amanda up at Geneva Glen, we went to Boulder, where I took a picture of the building at 985 16th Street, my college address. What was the lovely new Alpha Delta Pi house when I was there has morphed into this unattractive apartment complex.
I couldn't find a good picture of the sorority house, but this one, taken at Homecoming about 1960, gives the general idea of how it looked.
I took this picture from the car window as we drove away from Boulder. At least the Flatirons and the surrounding area hasn't changed. I also appreciate the fact that as the University has grown, the new buildings blend beautifully with the red Lyons sandstone Italian Rural architecture that has been characteristic of the campus for nearly a century.
Even though the kids are good travelers, we needed a little playground time at Beaver Creek.
Our Sunday trip was over Battle Mountain and Tennessee Pass to Leadville, where we took the train ride to Climax, walked about town, and ate lunch and dinner at the historic Delaware Hotel and Golden Burro. Both were good and reasonably priced.
The train ride starts in Leadville at an altitude of over 10,000 feet. The aspen leaves there were fully out. However, as the train took us to higher altitudes, we noticed that they were just starting.
As we started our train journey, we viewed a panorama of the Sawach Range, including Colorado's highest 14er, Mt. Elbert (the pointy one on the left) and Mt. Massive (the massive one on the right).
On the way back to Beaver Creek, we stopped at the site of Camp Hale, where the 10th Mountain Division trained during World War II. We also stopped at the nearby memorial to the men of the Division.
I took this picture from the car windshield as we approached Avon on the way back to Beaver Creek on Sunday evening. It shows the approaching rain, which came during the night. We awoke Monday morning to fog, rain, and temperatures in the low 40's, with snow forecast for afternoon.
Monday was to be a hiking day--a last hurrah before leaving on Tuesday morning. Given the forecast, we decided to leave Monday. We packed up and drove away at 3:00, arriving at the Marriott La Vista in Omaha at 3:00 AM on Tuesday morning. During that eleven hours we drove through some pretty exciting storms. On Colorado I-76 we saw a traffic warning sign for "high profile vehicles" that there were high winds throughout Nebraska. Mindy said she'd never driven in wind that strong, and we saw a semi tipped over on its side. We also watched the black clouds and lightning as we drove straight into it. It was it bit tense for awhile, but we made it back to Chicago, safe and happy, at 8:00 Tuesday evening--just in time to beat it to their basement to wait out the tornado warnings. After a good night's sleep, I headed for Ripon at 6:00 Wednesday morning and was home by 9:00. Despite the last-minute excitement, I had such a lovely, relaxing time.
