Colorado Bound, Episode V: The Finale

   After the Great Sand Dunes National Park, we headed even further southwest to Durango. It was here that we had to part with Gunther, as our activities in Durango were not pet friendly. So we put him up in a kennel for a night. The first day, we went whitewater rafting on the Lower Animas River. It was a beginners 2-hour raft trip. And it was very mild in my book, even though I have never been rafting. It was very cold, though, and I told Jason that we needed to wait until July or August before we do another, more advanced rafting trip. It was still fun, but unfortunately our camera is not waterproof, so we did not get any photos of this adventure.
   The next days adventure was to take the old steam engine train ride from Durango to Silverton. It was a lovely ride thru the mountains.

Colorado Bound, Episode IV

  After Pike's Peak, we headed southwest to Alamosa. Along the way, we saw some pretty mountains. I believe these were called the Spanish Peaks.

I'm not certain, but this might be the San Luis mountain range.

Colorado Bound, Episode III

   Our second day in Colorado Springs took us to Pike's Peak. It is over 14,000 feet high and if the road is open, you can drive to the top. You can also hike it or take the cog train to the top. Thankfully the road was open and we drove our little Silver Bullet to the top. You should know that there are very little guard rails on the entire road. It was a little freaky at times.

Here we stopped at a little rest stop and reservoir which was almost the half-way point. Up to now, the road was pretty easy.

The mountains were so pretty!

Colorado Bound, Episode II

   After taking a break at the dog park (in Episode I) we went to see the Manitou Cliff Dwellings. They are some of the remains of the Anasazi peoples homes. If I remember correctly, there was a part of this display that was still being lived in up until the mid to late 1900's.

It was really neat to be able to walk inside of the different dwellings. They were crazy small and I believe that one family would typically live in a

Colorado Bound, Episode I

   Last week, Jason and I were able to take off of work for a week of vacation. We decided to take Gunther and explore Colorado! Thankfully, Gunther has had lots of experience with long car rides from the very first day we brought him home, so he traveled very well.

Our first stop took us to Colorado Springs where we walked thru the Garden of the Gods.