Another Weekend

We are trying to get in as many trips up into the mountains before winter makes that scary.  We had to make a trip to the DMV on Saturday to get the husband's license changed to our new address so we did not have a full day.  But we don;t need a full day when we live so close to so many places to go see and be home by dark.  LOVE IT!


We went up to Woodland Park, a lovely little mountain town.  We had lunch at a charming local place.  Carmen's, where we had ceasar salads.  Very yummy.  After lunch we headed north on Hwy 67.  It was a great drive.  Sometime in the past there was a forest fire in this area.  There was a large area of trees that were bare.  Sad looking.  I don't think it was part of the Waldo Canyon fire in 2012.  That was the huge fire that got close to the Air Force Academy.  Besides the tress, the rest of the area was beautiful.  This hwy runs along the S Platte River.  Lots of people taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather and were fishing in the river, I believe it is called angling?  They were standing in the river, maybe fly fishing.  Anyway it was a nice drive.  We went up to where Hwy 105 meets  67 and headed back down south towards Palmer Lake.  We got home before dark.  We saw a few deer, but no other wildlife.  The next day, the Sabbath, we went to church and after lunch, we decided to go back up to Woodland Park and head south on Hwy 67.  This took us up to Tenderfoot Pass, 10,200 feet in elevation.  This pass is right above Cripple Creek.  The vistas up this road are amazing.  You can see the Sangre de Cristos and the Collegiates and more peaks that are some miles away.  Beautiful views!  And of course they all have some snow on them.

So hard to capture the view with a cell phone camera.

Today we had a cold front come through, no it is not the polar vortex, just listen to Joe Bastardi, but back to the weather, it has been unseasonably warm here and today it dropped drastically.  It is currently 12 degrees here and we have about 1 inch of snow.  But those mountains have more!  It will be pretty and white when the  clouds clear a bit.  I am pretty sure the bears have gone into hibernation as of today.  Have not seen any in person, but I hear the population was up this year.  YIKES!  We do hear coyotes here at night.  I really thought that I would not hear them after leaving the country in OK, but, yes, they are here.  Our neighborhood is surrounded by rough areas, so I guess I should not be surprised.  We look forward to taking more day trips and seeing all the things we came to Colorado to see.

S Platte River

The husband and DIL out to dinner.

The son and DIL.

My salad

And soup...Yummy.  It was smoked Gouda soup. It was delicious!

Now to stay warm!  I am glad this house seems to hold heat.  It is hard to believe that it is going to be 8 degrees tonight!