Mini Vacation

Carl and I spent a lot of 2011 traveling. And while we'd love to do that this year, we're saving up most of our vacation time and money toward our 2 week honeymoon in Europe. But we decided it would be great to take a few long weekends here and there, when possible. Due to the fact that summer typically starts in early May in Austin, we wanted to go somewhere north and get out of the heat.  We chose to go to Denver and Breckenridge over Memorial Day weekend. After a rushed start and fears of being late to our flight (only from me; Carl has no fears), we made our flight and started our trip that Friday.

We flew into Denver and drove to his friend, Wes's house. Wes lives in Evergreen, CO, a beautiful small town in the mountains outside of Denver.  We went with Wes and some other friends of Carl's to dinner.  These were all friends I hadn't met before - people Carl had gone to college with and/or run with - and it was great to get to spend time with them.  Like me, Carl values his friendships a lot and is great about staying in touch with people, especially when he travels to cities where they live.

After a night with Wes in Denver, we packed up and hit the road for the 2 hour drive west to Breckenridge. While typically known for its skiing, Breckenridge is a cute little town. We stayed in walking distance of most everywhere we needed to be and really relaxed for 3 days. We slept in, ate good food, drank bad wine, watched movies in our room and took a yoga class at the hotel we were staying at (it was more of a stretching class but I was proud of us for getting up early on vacation to do it).

We also drove to Buena Vista, CO for a day of white water rafting (well the rafting part was only 3 hours but the time to drive there and back, take a bus to the drop off point and back, etc. took all day).  While the temperatures the day before had been amazing (high 60s), a cold front had moved in over night. The outside temperature when we got back into our car at the end of the day was 42 and the river was less than 40 degrees.  Yes, we had wetsuits on. No, I never went in the water. But it was still pretty cold!  My hands and feet were numb from so much cold water exposure that it took the entire drive back that night to warm up. It was a fun rafting trip - we'd both only been once before. But due to limited snow this past winter in Denver, the river levels are pretty low. So you spent more time avoiding rocks then riding rapids.  But when in Rome....

We also spent one afternoon in Vail. We drove over the mountain to the next ski town and walked around, ate a snack outside and enjoyed the warmer sunshine that day.  Vail is much more upscale then Breckenridge (which is more my speed). It feels more European but I'm still glad we ventured out and saw some other place.  Later that afternoon, we drove into the mountains near Breckenridge.  We packed some snacks and wine and enjoyed the beautiful view.

Carl lived here for a summer, in between his freshman and sophomore year of college. It's also where he learned to rock climb!  So he has good memories here and hopefully even more now that we've shared it together.

While that was the end of our mini vacation it certainly wasn't the end of our travel. I had to be in Boston for work the rest of the week and Carl went with me and worked in the hotel.  Despite some delays getting there, Boston was fun, too. We went to a Red Sox game one night; ate delicious Italian food in the North End one night and drove to see where I used to live on our way out of town.  The weather was beautiful and I got to enjoy one last run in cooler temps for the season.  At the end of the work week, we drove a few hours west to see Leslie, Scott and meet their new (well, he's almost a year old) son, Joel.  They were great hosts and, despite rainy weather there, we had fun. Leslie is going to officiate our wedding ceremony so it was important to me that she got to spend more time with Carl.

After 10 days on the road (and together) we finally came home. I was ready.  We had a great trip and I was so glad to get to spend so much time with Carl as well as friends but I always enjoy coming home, too.  Sadly we didn't take many pictures on our trip but hopefully this very detailed, long blog post makes up for that.