The Gibbons Family: Road Trip to Colorado Springs

We were anxious to see more of the Southwest, so decided to take a trip up to Colorado Springs and visit our good friends John & Beth over an extended Labor Day weekend. I was very apprehensive about taking Emmett on a long road trip because he didn't like 3 hours on airplane or 6 hours to Uniontown, WA, in the car. I insisted that we purchase a couple new toys and put the DVD player in the car. I also insisted that we plan stops at least every two hours to let the kids out (finding playgrounds whenever possible!). It took two days (over 20 hours of travel) and we made it there one piece! We loved northern Arizona, New Mexico and especially the mountains of Colorado. We saw lots of pronghorn antelope, mule deer, buffalo (not wild!), and lots of big open country. I decided that even though we have come to like the rustic beauty of Yuma, we are definitely in the armpit of the state! :)

Colorado is amazing topography - huge pinyon pine covered mountains and large open grasslands. We had thunder and lightening every afternoon and were so relieved to be in cooler temperatures (day and night!). Beth's parents have a condo at Keystone, in the mountains, so we spent one night up there exploring the area and enjoying even cooler temperatures! John & Beth's house is at about 5000 feet of elevation, but the condo was at 11,000 feet! It's a good thing we didn't attempt a long hike because I wouldn't have been able to breath! Unfortunately, like in the Northwest, the bark beetles are devastating the pine forests in Colorado - it looks like almost 50% of the trees were dead or dying. We hope to visit them again next summer, so it will be very interesting to see how much worse it has gotten (yes, I'm still a forester at heart!:)

Even though I was very exhausted after our trip, we definitely want to explore more of what we saw to the north and will try to plan more trips that way - probably during the summer to escape the Yuma heat!

Thanks for a great trip John and Beth!

Pit-stop at Coronado State Monument: Ancient Indian Ruins of Kuau'a, New Mexico