1200 Miles West

Our new desk and bookcase arrived yesterday.

We’re definitely ready to start using this room!

We were in the Keys for a week and if you’re wondering what we did, here’s a sneak peek:

When we first arrived we met Mom and Dad at Wahoo’s Restaurant (and no this wasn’t a Wahoo’s Fish Taco like we have here in Denver.

After a late lunch/early dinner Mike and Dad headed to Outdoor Resorts to unload the car and relax a little, while I had to find a bathing suit. Can you believe it? I flew all the way to Florida without a bath suit. I guess that’s a good excuse for buying a new one, huh?

Thankfully we found one at the second store that we stopped at and it was even on sale! After our shopping was done, we headed back to Outdoor Resorts and relaxed for a little while before heading down to the south side of the resort to enjoy our first of many sunsets in the Keys during this trip. Here’s my favorite picture from that night:

The next day were headed down to Sombrero Beach which is at MM 50. The beach was relatively quiet and we didn’t spend too much time there as Mike and I arrived in the Keys with no recent exposure to the sun and we didn’t want to have a miserable trip by getting burned the second day.

After the beach we headed down to Burdine’s to enjoy a little lunch. After enjoying a couple of Corona’s we headed back to Outdoor Resorts and did a little sea kayaking.

Next we headed out on Bill & Peg’s sailboat to check the crab traps that they had purchased this year. We unfortunately forgot the bait to refill the traps, but thankfully there was still some in there. Here’s a picture of one of the crabs in the trap.

Per Wikipedia: When a claw is broken in the right place, the wound will quickly heal itself and very little blood is lost. If, however, the claw is broken in the wrong place, more blood is lost and the crab’s chances of survival are much lower. It only takes about one year for the claw to grow back to its normal size.

The next day we headed to Bahia Honda State Park at MM 37 to partake in some snorkeling, however due to the winds we were not able to head out. Unfortunately they also told us to watch for jellyfish on the beach as the wind was blowing in from the South, therefore increasing the chance that we might run into one. Thankfully we did not.

After spending some time at the State Park, we headed out for lunch and stopped in at Cabana Breezes to enjoy a couple of the better margaritas I’ve had. We also enjoyed some calamari and nachos which almost killed Mom due to the spicy nature of the sour cream they used.

We headed back to Outdoor resorts for yet another sunset, however due to the position of the clouds that day we didn’t get to see the actual sun go down, however we did have some fun hanging out with our Pelican friends on the pier.

The next morning Mike and I headed down to Key West for two nights of fun. (See the entries below for more details…)

Upon returning to Outdoor Resorts on Monday, March 17th we hung out at the pool for a while and then headed out for corned beef and cabbage at the Key Colony Inn. Unfortunately they don’t appear to have a Web site, but if the did it would picture a bunch of “old” people who arrive before 4pm to get corned beef at $6.95 instead of $10.95 after 4pm.

Here’s a tweet that Mike put in during our evening out:

The sorority girls of last night have been replaced by their mothers/grandmothers. I have been blinded.
04:55 PM March 17, 2008 from TinyTwitter

Next we headed out to Dockside Bar & Grill where we listened to a great band and Mom and Paula cut the rug.  We were drinking green beer, can you tell?

We made one last stop, although I can’t remember the name of the bar and that’s where the infamous Long Island Ice Tea was served.  I won’t go into detail, but when we got back to Outdoor Resorts Mom thought it would be a good idea to crash a party…

Overall we had a blast in the Keys and special thanks to Mom and Dad for letting us sleep on their pullout couch and to Bill and Peg for taking us out on the boat again this year!  Next year we’ll try to stay longer so that we can snorkel!

I can hardly believe that our first year of marriage is behind us already. Here’s a look back at one of my favorite pictures from our wedding day. This picture was actually taken before the ceremony on the steps of the Mango Tree Inn which is the B&B that we stayed at.

Here’s another one of my favorite pictures from March 16, 2007. This one was following the wedding and we were walking along the shoreline at Smather’s Beach near marker #10.

Last year after the wedding we dined at The Commodore in the harbor in Key West and it was possible the best piece of beef I’ve ever consumed. This year due to the fact that I’m no longer eating meat, we opted to enjoy a nice dinner at A & B Lobster House.

Mike enjoyed Sunset Surf & Turf while I had Wild Mushroom Fettuccine and we shared a delicious Vanilla Bean Creme Burlee for dessert. After dinner we headed back to Duval Street to see what was going on. Ultimately we ended up at Big Uns where Mike’s favorite performer in Key West, Matt Avery, was performing.

While we only spent two nights in Key West, it was enough for us to get our fix for the year and we look forward to celebrating anniversary #2 down there next year.

If you’re game…let us know as we’d love to have friends and family join us!  How could you not enjoy yourself in a place that looks like this?

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before, but there is a group of girls that I work and we have fondly nicknamed ourselves the Indigo Girls. The name is a result of the fact that 80% of the people who attempt to say the name of our company pronounce it wrong. If you haven’t noticed, there’s an extra “i” in Indigio.

Anyway, here’s some highlights from the weekend that I spent in Frisco with Sara and Heather:

1. We participated in the Stomp for a Cure snowshoe event helping to raise $250k. We were all inspired by the participants and survivors who participated in the event and look forward to doing it again next year.

2. We stayed at the Frisco Lodge where we shared a Victorian Delux En-Suite which basically equated to a bedroom with three beds and a small bathroom. Each of the beds had it’s own unique feature as Sara’s was the squeaky one, Heather was lucky enough to get the one that was slanted and mine had a soft spot right in the middle.

3. Frisco is vegetarian friendly! Technically Sara is a vegan, but regardless we were able to find something delicious to each at each of the restaurants we frequented. I especially enjoyed the lettuce wraps from the Friday night.

4. During our first night in Frisco, we were awoken at 4:30am by the sound of Heather’s cell phone. She had set the alarm in order to wake up early to pack before work on Friday, but unfortunately she “forgot” to turn it off. Thankfully we all fell back asleep and awoke again at 7am to prepare for the snowshoe trek.

5. Frisco has some of the best coffee we’ve ever tasted and it can be found at Abbey’s Coffee shop. I enjoyed two wonderful vanilla soy lattes while in town.

6. On Saturday Sara and I did a little shopping in Dillon as there is a good sized outlet mall there. While we were bargain shopping, Heather stayed in Dillon to watch the Avalance game. When we returned, we met up with for a nice Italian dinner and then headed back to the lodge. Heather had some other friends in town, so she decided to out with them while we stayed back and hung out. After two puzzles and various conversations with John who worked at the lodge, we headed to bed. At 2:30am my phone rings and I immediately answer it and to my surprise it’s Heather and she can’t figure out how to get into the lodge. Ironically earlier in the evening while we were chatting with John we found out that only the front door is open 24 hours. I provided Heather with the details of how to get in and we all laughed about it the next day.

7. Snowshoeing at Clinton’s Gulch was amazing! We originally tried to find Mayflower Gulch as it had been recommended by the lady at the bookstore where we bought our matching socks, but we couldn’t find it.

If you ask me, it worked out for the best as we were the only three people on the trail which meant that the only sounds we heard were each other talking when we stopped to take a break. Check it out, isn’t it absolutely beautiful?

My first experience snowshoeing was wonderful, but maybe that’s because I was accompanied by two of my favorite people. Special thanks to Sara an Heather for letting me tag along!

7a. This piggy backs on the above, but I could let Heather forget that she left my car door open at Clinton’s Gulch. Thankfully someone in the parking lot that was heading out on a ski trip was nice enough to flag us down and ultimately shut it for us. Did I mention that Heather was out until 2:30am the night before?

On Saturday, March 8th I participated in a Breast Cancer Snowshoe event in Frisco, CO. It was my first experience snowshoeing, however with help from my friends Sara and Heather I made it the entire way which was 5k!

Snowshoeing is much like hiking except for the fact that you have two big tennis racket type contraptions on your feet. They are actually much more high tech then you would think, but I always think of the old school ones that the Eskimos wore.

When the event first started I found it rather difficult to maneuver, but that might have been due to the 2,500 that were all trying to trek down the same path. Randomly Sara would start running, however I am happy to say that was able to keep up!

Overall $250k was raised for the local Denver affiliates of Susan G. Komen for the Cure and I was happy to contribute. I’m already looking forward to next years event.

Erin and I are big Kenny Chesney fans and we happened to hear on the radio shortly after we arrived in Florida last week that he would be playing at Sloppy Joe’s on our first night in Key West. Yes, the highest grossing touring country artist and Entertainer of the Year for 2007 would be playing a bar that probably legally holds around 250.

We first passed through the bar about four hours before show time but decided to leave because it was standing room only at that point and standing for that long did not sound like fun. We decided to come back around an hour and half before his 5:30 show and to our surprise we could still get in. It was hot and crowded but we decided to stick it out figuring that he would come out and play a few songs and leave quickly. Um, we were seriously wrong.

We were straight in front of the stage about 20 tightly packed rows back. I would guess that about 500-750 people were stuffed inside the bar. The worst thing was that bathrooms were behind the stage and basically inaccessible. I tried following a really big guy that was barreling through the crowds with his girlfriend in tow, but that ran out of steam about half there as people would simply not move to allow people through. After I felt like I was going to pass out, I left Erin behind and sought relief at a neighborhood bar. Luckily I was able to snake my way back in after several other folks had to do the same thing. Security was letting new people in as people left.

The show was awesome and he played many of his hits old and new as well as covered some southern rock and country standards even a Journey tune.  Uncle Kracker was on hand also - he looked like a disaster but did a great job.  Kenny’s band took a brief break at the 2 hour point but Kenny kept playing until the 2:45 point before he took a break.  Erin finally got tired of standing and we left after three hours into the show.  I think the show lasted over four hours.  That is a LONG show by any standard I have ever seen.  Truly a great and memorable experience and we’ll always remember seeing Kenny in the Keys on the Eve of our 1st Anniversary.

I think I am officially a Coloradoan now as I finally got out and went skiing. My friend Chris Gilliam, who I met because he is married to the daughter of good friends of Erin’s parents, and I went to Vail on Saturday. I don’t have any pictures of my skiing because my big honking camera doesn’t fit in my pocket and Erin wasn’t there.

The beginning of the day was a complete catastrophe as I lost my wallet at the park and ride in Golden where I met Chris. I discovered it was missing when we stopped for Breakfast in Frisco. About 20 minutes after I discovered it was missing, I received a call from someone that had found it. He was headed up to Loveland and agreed to meet me. Fortunately I only had to back track about 15 minutes to meet him and I was reunited with my wallet. I was very lucky.

Once we finally made it to the resort we were greeted with what was an excellent day for skiing. Chris has a season pass and he as able to get me a good discount for my daily pass with his “Ski with a Friend” option. We excitedly made our way up the mountain and began skiing. It had been a few years for me and Chris was very patient as I got my legs underneath me. Chris is a good skier and with my limited experience it was very tough to keep up with him.

Here are the beginner runs I went on:

• Lost Boy
• Eagle’s Nest Ridge
• Cub’s Way

Here are the intermediate runs I went on:

• Dealer’s Choice
• The Woods
• Baccarat
• Born Free
• Lodgepole
• Hunky Dory
• Christmas
• Northwoods
• Snag Park
• Avanti

Here is the advanced run I accidentally went on:

• S. Look Ma

It was an accident as I was only trying to traverse across the top but instead ended up having to go down the run. It had moguls the size of Volkswagens and I am sure I looked pretty funny trying to make my way down. My one and only fall was on this run.

My favorite part of the resort was in the Game Creek Bowl as there were several intermediate runs that were quite challenging and long. Unfortunately there is only one way out of the bowl once you reach the bottom and that is by ski lift. On about our fourth run the lift broke and we were stranded at the bottom for about half of an hour. It was very frustrating but once the lift was finally repaired and we rode up we were greeted with a gift. Vail gave us each a free lift ticket for our troubles. Wow, that is great customer service and no small token given that a daily lift ticket is $92.

All in all it was a great day and I thoroughly enjoyed my first ski trip. I am sure I will be getting out much more in the future.

We weren’t impressed by the city of Pueblo, however we did get out of the car and walk through their collection of trains that was part of the Pueblo Railway Museum. The museum wasn’t “open”, but we were able to walk through and look at the different trains.

I’m not sure that we’ll be heading back to Pueblo anytime soon, but at least we got to enjoy the trains while we were there.

During our drive into work on Friday, Mike and I discussed options for what we could do on Saturday. They were predicting the temperatures would reach 70 degrees, so we figured we’d take advantage of the warm weather and head down to Canyon City to ride the Royal Gorge Route Railroad.

We bought our tickets online and elected to sit in the vista dome portion of the train.

Upon boarding the train, we found our table and sat down. They offered a full drink menu, along with snack/sandwich type food. We had eaten breakfast at Le Peep on the way in, so we just nibbled on some chips and salsa during the ride.

We spent the first 30 or so minutes inside the train car, but then headed outside to the open air car to enjoy the sun and the views.

We made it outside in time to see grab a few pictures as we approached the Royal Gorge Bridge.

Here’s the view from under the bridge.

The entire trip lasted about 2 hours and while we chatted about heading up to the bridge to walk across the Royal Gorge, we didn’t make it. Instead we headed to Pueblo to check out their restored depot and their collection of trains.

When we decided to move to Denver, my Dad made mention of the cookie-cutter subdivisions and how you wouldn’t want to get lost as you might not be able to figure out which house is yours.

Driving down E-470 yesterday, I snapped this picture as I think it shows the number of houses that they are building or have recently built in our area.