A week ago last Saturday, the wife, my youngest son and I loaded up the car and headed west, for a well deserved vacation.
About midday Sunday, we arrived in Aurora, Colorado. Aurora is a suburb of Denver. We spent a couple of days there visiting with my granddaughter and, by default, my oldest son (her dad) and my dear DIL. The granddaughter turned 3 in December. I hadn't seen her since we got married, a little over 2 years ago. As expected, considering her lineage, she is very smart and an absolute doll.
While there, we attended a Rockies game. As is their custom, they lost. We also visited the Air Force Academy and Garden of the Gods, in Colorado Springs. The next day, we headed up to Estes Park and spent the day exploring Rocky Mountain National Park. I took a picture of my son and GD, standing in front of a sign, that said our elevation was 12,003 feet. We saw countless elk and even a couple of big horn sheep. Having lived in Colorado for 20 years, and visiting RMNP several times, I know seeing big horn sheep is not common.
On Wednesday morning, we pointed the car north toward Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota. When I worked for Goodyear, Mt. Rushmore was in my territory. I stopped there very briefly, one bitterly cold, winter day. I always wanted to go back. I was not disappointed. We hung around long enough to watch the sculpture lighting ceremony.
If you ever have the chance to visit the Black Hills, do it. Take your time, and learn a little history about how we white people treated the Indians. I will leave that right there.
On Thursday, we spent the day in the Badlands National Park. I don't think this is an especially popular tourist destination and I don't understand why. The best road to take through the park is gravel, but the scenery is stunning and there is wildlife galore. They have signs telling about the danger of approaching buffalo. Personally, I didn't find those signs to be terribly necessary.
We decided to spend an extra day (Friday) in the area. We headed back, 1 1/2 hours, to Mt. Rushmore, to do some horseback riding. We arrived, only to find the area in the midst of a rare thunderstorm, that was not expected to let up, so we headed home.
One thing that made the trip more interesting is I took a GPS, that my brother had given me a couple of years ago. Buy the man in your life a GPS. Trust me on this one.
Why a GPS, you ask? And by the way, exactly WTF is a GPS and who cares?
A GPS is an absolutely indespensable travel aid. I could instantly tell, among other things, what our travel speed is, our current altitude, how far from home (as the crow flies) we are and our global position. I could tell that we are currently tracking 082 degrees. If we turn right to heading 097 and maintain our current speed, we would be home in 6 hours and 17 minutes. Of course, driving 70.6 mph across an Iowa farm field might not be very practical, but surely this is useful information.
I am certain my wife appreciated my frequent updates to her on the GPS information, although she disguised it well. Maybe it's a guy thing? Oh well, buy him one.