Bob's Thoughts - Day 8

An easy day - and most welcome.

I skipped breakfast and went to get the car washed. Then I found the local grocery store to get milk, juice and a few other essentials. I was very surprised that the local grocery chain (City Market) is a Kroger company. My Kroger Plus card worked like a charm.

We had lunch in the RV (Montgomery Inn pulled pork), and then Matt and I set out to find a winery that is in the area. We missed it once, turned around, and eventually found it. The winery grows all their own grapes, except for their Syrah (for which they get grapes from Colorado).

I tried a few reds and whites in search of something to bring Dave. The first red I tasted was so dry that it made me feel like I had swallowed a sponge. The second red was not much better - so, Dave - you are getting a white wine from Utah!

The afternoon was spent doing more laundry and then planing, acquiring and cooking food for tomorrow. Our plan is to get up early (before it gets too hot) and head to Arches National Park. It is not supposed to break 100 degrees tomorrow (a cold spell) so we hope to be able to do some walks through the park.

Well - that's all for today.

2 more things

First of all - make sure you all scroll down when you stop by - we just posted about 4 times in 20 minutes - things tend to all happen at once. So if you see a new post, it might not be the only one.

Secondly, wanted to send one more picture along - this one pretty much sums up life on the road with the Specters. A bizarre combination of high-tech and faux-roughing it. Talk to you all tomorrow.




Matt

"Good job, God!"

Phew! The past two days have been fairly exhausting yet mindblowing! As Matt and Bob already posted, the Rocky Mountains National Park was pretty amazing! For those of you who have been to Glacier National Park in Montana, Matt and I put it this way: RMNP is bigger than Glacier for sure and has more trees. Not at ALL to diminsh Glacier because we still LOVE it but it has less to look at, if you can believe it!

It was great to spend some time walking around Estes Park and shopping and eating lunch before we went up in to the RMNP. I had been pretty confused all along -- this whole time I had thought Estes Park was the name of the Rocky Mtns Park. I was so confused when we got to Estes and it was this very adorable and pretty shopping and eating area. Hm. I'm all straightened out now!

Karen's cousin Ivy was with us of course, and we loved having her with us! Faith warmed up to her pretty quickly which is great. ANYway, Ivy took us on a very short and very level walk around a cool lake called Bear Lake. Faith was excited because she got to put her hand in the water. "Oh, Mama, it's so COOOOLD!" Eventually we made our way up to the highest point (about 12,020 ft). Karen and I had some issues with it -- the usual shortness of breath and headaches -- but it was SO SO worth it!j

The drive today up and through the Rockies was pretty awesome. Matt and I had driven through it eastbound on our trip in the summer of 2003. It was cool to come the other way this time. Matt and I agree that it seems like once you finally get over the Utah border, the scenery seems to change pretty quickly. Think desert, HUGH caynons, mountains, red, red rocks. Just so cool.

At one point Matt and I were in the back of the rv with the girls and Matt, who has always sort've had a special fondness for the Utah scenery since we drove through in 2003, looked up to see some pretty awesome rock formations. He said, and he is very spiritual but not usually overly vocal about his spirituality, or well much of a lot of things really, "Good job, God!" I laughed but totally think that that statement sums up this trip so far really well! We feel so blessed to live in this glorious, geographically blessed nation of ours. It is just beyond words and since I'm not the best at words, I'll just let Matt's pics do justice for themselves.

By the way, as I type this, I'm sitting at the dining table/bench in the rv and Mari's in her pack 'n play across from me in the "kitchen". She's supposed to be sleeping but she keeps peeking her eyes just above the top of the railing and cracking up then falling back on her tummy. Aye. I hope that she sleeps in past 5:45 in the morning since the younger of the 4 Specters share a bedroom!

Love you all and miss you all! Steph

Quick pics

Really tired - 2 long days of driving. We're taking a day off tomorrow - hopefully I'll be able to post more then. For now, get a load of this - this is the actual view from just outside our RV at the campground. We can see this out the window. Look closely at one of the photos and you can actually see 2 arches - Arches National Park is only a few miles away.

Matt

Bob's Thoughts - Day 7

Well, we made it down the west side of the Rockies and arrived in Moab, Utah at 4:30. The driving was not all that bad, but we had to take it at no more than 30MPH down some of the sections of road. There was one 8 mile stretch that had an 8% downgrade. Thank goodness for exhaust brakes. All the trucks were going slow and using their brakes so much that it smelled like burning brakes everywhere (we probably added to this).

We also had two motorhome "glitches" today - both related to the leveling jacks. It took us a long time to get one of the jacks fully retracted before we left Denver, and then that same jack needed to be retracted again two hours into the drive. Oh well - I will get that looked at when we return.

When we left the mountains, we saw the outside temperature start to climb ... and climb ... and climb. By the time we got to the RV park, we had seen a high of 104!!!

It would be unfair of me to not spend some time talking about the scenery. Wow!! Magnificent!! Unbelievable!! Matt will post some pictures later to share the grandeur of what we saw today.

We have decided to take it easy tomorrow and not do anything much. All of us have been on the go for a week now, and a day of R&R sounds great. We found a Utah winery nearby, and I hope to do some tasting and shopping. The weather will remain in the triple digits tomorrow, so some time at the pool might also be a good idea.

That's all for today.

Bob's Thoughts - Day 6

Our last day in Denver. Wow has the time gone fast.

We met Ivy at 8AM and headed into the Rocky Mountains. Our first stop was Estes Park, which is a small town just outside the entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP).

The shops and atmosphere were a lot of fun and we stayed there through lunch. I was happy to find an outlet for a Colorado winery (Wines of the Winds). We had wanted to get a bottle of Colorado wine for Dave and this seemed the perfect opportunity. Unfortunately, when we got there, it was closed. Rats!!!!

We had lunch in Estes Park, and then started the drive through RMNP. What a magnificent place. The views were magnificent. The drive takes over an hour and goes up to an elevation of over 12,000 feet. In some places, there was still snow on the ground.

Hopefully Matt can post some pictures of the day's highlights when he gets a chance.

Tomorrow we drive to Moab, Utah. In Moab, the weather forecast for Saturday calls for a high of 103! We have talked a lot about tomorrow's drive through the mountains, and I will be glad to get it behind me.

That's all for now...I will post again when we get to Moab.

Bob's Thoughts - Day 5

Yesterday afternoon I was aware that there was something funny going on. There was a lot of whispering and discussion that stopped when I came by. Later, Matt told me that Karen wanted to go out for breakfast the next morning, but that the location was a secret. I was thinking that this was either very good or very bad.

This morning, there was still no indication of what lied ahead.

When we arrived at the restaurant, I was delighted to note that the name of the place was Zaide's deli. (Zaide or Zayde is the Jewish/Yiddish name for grandfather).

Upon opening the menu, I saw things that brought back my childhood. The matzah brei with Salami and onions was just too good to ignore. (Matzah brei is like french toast but made with matzah instead of bread). I really enjoyed the meal.

We spent the rest of the morning at the Denver Zoo. The kids seemed to really have a great time until they became tired.

We had a low-key afternoon and just hung out at the motorhome.

This evening, we honored Karen's upcomming 60th birthday with a surprise dinner organized by Ivy. Ivy did a great job finding a nice place for the dinner and arranging for many of Karen's "Pennsylvania connection" relatives to call.

Tomorrow we will be driving (the van) up into the Rocky Mountains for the day. It is hard to believe that our time in Denver is almost up - but the experience has been really cool. I am very grateful that Ivy has been willing and able to spend time with us every day to help make our time here so worthwhile.

From Z to Z

Started the day at a great Kosher-style deli - wonderful breakfast - Zayde even got to have a stroll down memory lane with some Matzah Brei.




From there, to the Denver Zoo - Mari had a great time, especially in the Tropical exhibit - she ran frantically from display to display saying "ook!" (which is her word for "look") and saying "Hi" to all the animals. Faith was disappointed that the cat area was closed (here's why) but had a great time on the carousel.



Then had a nice drive out to Red Rocks. Coolest venue ever. This whole city is just great.



Lastly, had a wonderful dinner to celebrate mom's birthday. Cake back at the RV. Others will probably provide more details later. Gotta go put the girls to bed.

Bob's Thoughts - Day 4

We had a nice day today - in spite of an all day rain.

We started the day at the Denver Children's Museum. There were some really interesting things for the kids to do. There was a very large exhibit related to the "Blue Man Group". I could have spent a few hours there. The kids were ready to walk around and do something other than travel, so it was a good fit. Hopefully Matt can publish some pics of the kids there - it was fun to watch them.

The Museum is right across the river from Denver's largest amusement park (Elitch Park). So when we left the museum, Ivy and I walked down to the river bank to watch some of the rides (it had stopped raining for an hour or so). There was a nice wooden coaster and many thrill rides that we could see.

Karen had shared with me and Ivy her memory of Dolores and Margie riding the looping coaster at Hershey Park. Ivy then shared her memory of Dolores riding Space Mountain at Disney World. It is interesting to think of Dolores as a real thrill seeker.

The rest of the day was low key - and frankly a welcome change from our hectic pace.

A note to the Durkees - I played the "When Mommy and Daddy were Young" video for Faith and Mari yesterday. Faith must have liked it because when it was over she said "AGAIN"!

We had a nice dinner this evening - a pork roast that we acquired via Dream Dinners. It was really good - but we need to figure out how to translate cooking time from a baking recipe to a convection recipe (there is not a traditional oven in the motorhome).

That's it for today - we are going to try the Denver Zoo again tomorrow.

Technical correction

Since everyone is posting maniacally whenever they can, I adjusted the settings so that the main page will show ALL posts from the trip. If you missed one before, it should be there now.

Also, went back and added some links on previous posts.

Matt