Great Sand Dunes and SOCO

We woke up at sunrise (which is hard, even when sleeping in the car) and took in the beauty of the canyon one last time. We saw a coyote running alongside the road as we headed out, which made the entire trip worth it for Emily. We drove back through Southern Colorado, stopped in Alamosa for mexican food, then took a side trip to the Great Sand Dunes at sunset. The Aspens were bright yellow against the dark green pines surrounding the dunes. The background was a stormy deep blue sky, but the sun was still shining and the only visitors were us a family of deer, including a little fawn that Emily tracked down in the bushes.

Grand Canyon

We drove through the night to get to the Grand Canyon by early morning. We drove around the park stopping at the various viewpoints and then got on a shuttle that took us to more viewpoints in a different part of the park. Impresionante. Then we went on a hike to see more viewpoints. Overall it was a lot of viewing.....points. It was very windy and chilly, so we were all relieved to stop the endless whistling in our ears with a bad meal in a down home restaurant and a hot chocolate with Baily's for dessert. The Grand Canyon is just too grand to see in one day- but we certainly tried our best.

International Balloon Fiesta!

While I was home for Emily's surprise party, my sisters and I managed to squeeze in a road trip to the balloon fiesta in New Mexico and the Grand Canyon and the Great Sand Dunes...in 3 days. We slept in the car every night and caught both sunrise and sunset every day. We chose to afford ourselves one luxury : a coin-operated warm shower in a campground for 8 glorious minutes. We debated just getting one shower and switching every 2 and 1/2 minutes, but decided in the end that it was worth the splurge to each have our own!
















The first day we woke up at 4:00am, after sleeping in the car for 2 hours, and hopped on a bus to the Balloon Fiesta Fairgrounds. The initial launch in the morning was amazing, as well as the mass ascension that followed. After this we waited around at the fair all day for the night glow that was supposed to come that evening. All three of us crashed on the lush lawn underneath a picnic table for 4 hours in the middle of the day and unfortunately the night glow was canceled due to weather, so we got in the car and drove on to the next destination- the Grand Canyon.

Emily Surprise Party

I flew back to Colorado for a surprise 30th Birthday party for my older sister Emily. Imagine a 5-year-old's first birthday party blended with a 21-year-old's first night out at the bar. Here are the pics: