December 6th weekend – we took Friday off and
slept in before whipping up some coffee.
Soon we were packing up and loading Flo for the drive up to Glenwood
Springs to celebrate the 21st anniversary of us dating. By the time we left the house we were hungry
so stopped at Qdoba and Firehouse Subs for lunch and were then on our way.
The drive to Glenwood Springs was uneventful as traffic was
light and the dogs were thankfully quiet.
Susan remembered a couple of things we had forgotten to bring so we
stopped at City Market for a minute before checking into our hotel.
We stayed at Hotel Colorado which is a historic hotel with
wide hallways and odd-shaped rooms. At
Susan’s request I had called to ask that we get a room overlooking the
courtyard and we were. This was great as
there were neat Christmas lights and it was fun to people-watch in the
evenings.
Hotel Colorado is pet-friendly but only allows two pets in
total. As we brought all three dogs we
had to employ a bit of subterfuge.
Basically I carried Bella up to the room covered in a blanket after we’d
walked the other two dogs in. No biggie
as Bella never had to leave the room to do her bid’ness since she uses puppy
pads.
We were hungry again and brought our swim bags for the walk
across the bridge to The Pullman for dinner.
We found it to be a hip restaurant with interesting offerings. Susan got a burger and I ordered a chicken
dish. The food was wonderful and we
enjoyed the atmosphere.
After dinner we walked to the main hot springs pool and
started hot-springing. We found the pool
to be largely the same except for some stairs that appeared since our last
visit. It was chilly outside but not
unbearably so and we enjoyed a couple of hours walking back and forth across
the large pool and boiling alive in the smaller “hot” pool.
Once done at the pool we walked back to our room to hang out
with the pups and crack open a bottle of wine.
Saturday we slept in before feeding the dogs and taking
Pebbles and Mel out to do their morning business. We elected to eat a late breakfast in the
hotel restaurant and found the food and coffee acceptable. I was feeling out of sorts so we went back to
the room to relax and let the caffeine kick in.
Once I determined a nap was out of the question we dressed and
left.
We drove to Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park to have some
adventures. We rode their new gondola up
the mountainside. It was a longish
journey with a nice view. At the end of
the line was a faux town and several attractions. We elected to do the cave tours.
The timing was such that we first went on the King’s Row
Cave Tour. The tour lasted 40 minutes
and was packed. The guide really tried
hard to be entertaining and his enthusiasm was generally effective. The grand finale was a room chock-full of
natural cave features that our guide had personally lit with different colored
lights. We were sufficiently wowed.
Once back outside we walked to the entrance to the Historic
Fairy Cave and sat on some benches. Soon
enough a different guide arrived and we entered the cave. This guide had a nervous personality but did
a great job telling us about this and that.
Our group was a bit oversized but we made due. The Fairy Cave was discovered a long time ago
and most of the original formations are gone.
It was still an interesting tour and proved to be much longer than the
King’s Row tour.
Upon exiting the cave the tour guide mentioned a spelunking
box Susan might enjoy trying. She eyed
me and told me I wouldn’t fit. We walked
around and Susan was delighted to jump in the large contraption and climb
about. The sign said to expect a 15
minute journey but Susan pulled herself out in a hair over 10 minutes.
We walked along the faux town and discovered their alpine
slide “Alpine Coaster” was operating.
For some reason we thought it was closed for the season. After picking up tickets from the gift shop
we came back to take a ride. The
operators told us that the brakes were unnecessary so neither of us utilized
them at all. The ride was surprisingly
enjoyable and faster than we expected.
We both agreed it was worth the price though the seat backs seemed to
have been designed with children in mind instead of full-grown adults.
After walking around the gift shop and looking at this and
that we took the gondola back down to our car.
We returned to the hotel to feed and take care of the dogs
before driving to Rivers for dinner.
Unfortunately we were informed on arrival that the restaurant was closed
for a private party. We sat in the car
looking for a substitute eatery and settled on Glenwood Canyon Brewpub.
We drove back to town and found excellent parking on the
street around the corner from the restaurant.
The brewpub had a standard tavern-style menu and Susan ordered steak and
I their fish and chips. The food was
amazing and we absolutely stuffed ourselves.
Iron Mountain Hot Springs was our next stop and we made our
way there with no delay. It was busy
though we managed to find room in the various small pools when we needed
to. While Susan reveled in the hot pools
I enjoyed the cooler ones and we alternated for a few hours. It was a really nice time. Iron Mountain isn’t cheap but has a pretty
slick operation going on including nice showers complete with soap and
conditioner.
We returned to Hotel Colorado to find zero parking as there
were three separate parties going on. I
drove around the building twice before lucking into finding someone leaving.
Later in the evening we people-watched the courtyard. It was interesting seeing the various couples
doing their couple-things. Lots of
selfies and holding of hands. It was
cute enough that we decided to head down ourselves. I brought Pebbles and Susan led Mel down and
we sat next to one of the outdoor fireplaces and chatted about this and
that. It was cold but we didn’t
mind.
Sunday came and we were up and out of bed before 8:00. After taking care of the dogs we again ate
breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Susan
wanted to get a picture of all of us in front of the main Christmas tree so,
after we packed a trolley with all of our things, Susan asked someone to
capture the moment for us. Susan had
dressed the dogs up in various holiday clothes and they looked cute as could
be.
We stopped for gas on the way out of Glenwood Springs and
hit the road a whisker before 10:00.
Said roads were a mix of wet and slick as the morning had begun with
snow. The closer we got to Denver the
worse the traffic became and it was stop and go up to Eisenhower Tunnel. Despite the delays we made decent time and made
a stop at our favorite Walmart for food stuffs before finally arriving
home.
After completely unpacking (something we usually don’t do)
we plopped on the couch with our tired pups.
During the afternoon we napped off and on before ordering pizza for
dinner. It was a wonderful anniversary
weekend.
December 14th weekend – not a lot went on. On Saturday we slept in before coffee-time
and drove to a new liquor store to get free wine glasses and cheap wine. The holiday traffic was pretty ridiculous in
Park Meadows so we went to the Parker Walmart and then Target to buy other
stuffs we needed. Once we were home and
unpacked we hung out with the pups for the remainder of the day. Sunday we didn’t get up to anything which was
alright.
December 20th weekend – I took Friday, Monday,
and Tuesday off to burn up the remainder of my 2019 vacation. While I did accomplish a few errands much of
my time was spent hanging out and chillaxing with the pups. Over Saturday and Sunday I’m confident Susan
and I did this and that though I honestly can’t think of anything particularly
noteworthy.
Christmas day started with a mid-morning alarm followed by
coffee. Our food assignment was to
prepare mashed potatoes and bring stuff for a relish platter. I thought it would be fun to make the potatoes
a little different this time so we made a parmesan, caramelized onion, roasted
garlic mashed potatoes. After I chopped
stuff Susan handled the caramelizing and roasting before I mixed it all
together. I thought it tasted pretty
good but Susan was unconvinced.
I called Mom to wish her a happy birthday. Sounded like her holiday was shaping up to be
a good one which was nice to hear.
Susan and I packed up our food stuffs and headed to Kari and
Alvin’s around 1:30. We arrived just
before the turkey was lowered into the deep fryer. We’ve seen some scary videos about deep
frying turkey but Alvin did a great job and no flames were forthcoming.
We hung out and chatted about this and that while the turkey
cooked. One thing that is super-nice
about deep frying turkey is how fast the meat cooks. The bird was essentially ready in about an
hour. Just before food-time the last
guests made their appearance. In the end
Susan, myself, Kari, Alvin, John, Karen, Emily, and her husband Jeff sat down
to eat a fantastic meal.
I liked everything but Susan absolutely did not like the
taste of the mashed potatoes. I think
next time we’ll prepare the potatoes in a more traditional manner. Once our bellies were full and the tables
clear we played a few hands of Cabo.
Susan and I hadn’t played in many months and had a good
time. Emily and Jeff had to leave to
pick up Emily’s kid and we all started a new game once they came back. This game seesawed all over the place with
several crazy hands and high points. It
ended abruptly when Susan successfully “shot the moon” and punished everyone
into her winning the game.
Susan and I finally got home after 10:00 to take care of our
needy creatures. It was a nice Christmas
for sure.
December 27th weekend – Friday we went out after
work. First was a stop at the post
office to pick up a heavy package. In
the box were the parts necessary to swap Scrappy’s motor. Then it was off to dinner and a bit of
shopping.
Saturday we woke to find a fair bit of snow on the ground
with more coming down. With the weather
outside frightful we elected to stay in all day and hung out with the
pups.
Sunday it didn’t snow anymore but it looked cold out so we
snuggled up on the couch again. Not
exactly a productive weekend but it was nice nonetheless.
New Year’s Eve was just Susan and myself at our home. I made a bunch of spinach and artichoke dip
and bought entirely too much pita bread for us to munch on. As the final seconds of 2019 ticked down I
popped a bottle of Costco bubbly we had left over from last year’s New Year’s
celebration which was surprisingly still yummy.
Crazy to think that another year and decade has begun.
