New Adventures

The last couple of weekends have been pretty busy with us traveling to new sights in and around Denver. Last weekend we decided to drive down to Colorado Springs to visit another zoo we discovered was down there. It is called the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. It was a lot of fun to visit a new place but of the two zoos we decided we prefer the Denver zoo. Cheyenne Mountain is famous for its giraffe herd, which I admit was very large, and the exhibit is very cool because you can pay $1 for 3 crackers and you can hand feed the giraffes. Evie and I were all for doing that and got right in. Sam wasn't too sure about it and decided to hang back and just watch us do it. I decided not to force him too if he didn't want to. There will be plenty of more opportunities I'm sure.


You can't see it well, but Evie is feeding a giraffe through the bars. I also finally decided to invest in a hat. With all this sunshine around here I got tired of squinting all the time. LOL

It was amazing to be within touching distance of the giraffes. I caught a picture of one tasting other things. LOL

Part of the zoo's attraction is that it is located on the side of a mountain. They offer a ski lift which takes you up to a viewpoint to take pictures, etc. I have to admit the views were amazing but I don't know if we will pay the money for the lift next time we visit. Especially since you can get better views by driving up to a shrine on the top of the mountain.

This is one of the views from the top of the memorial for Will Rogers called Shrine of the Sun. It was kind of strange to see such a monument built for an actor but the building was really neat and you got to see out over Colorado Springs and surrounding valleys.

Entrance to the shrine of the sun. They have a small cathedral inside and several rooms with various photographs of the life and history of Will Rogers. We mostly went to take a peak at the views which were pretty incredible. You can climb all the way to the top of the tower.

This weekend we decided to drive around some more checking out areas around the Denver area. We especially wanted to make a trip to the mountains since we are so close. Melody is interested in going camping when she comes to visit and so it was a good opportunity to scout the area and see what kind of campgrounds we could find. I made a list of all the state parks in the area, packed a picnic lunch, made sure I had my maps in order and off we went. Of course, I forgot the camera. We found a park that was nearby, had camping, but was still close enough to Denver to not really have any trees. It was pretty open and not our ideal setting. We then managed to find the right highway to head up into the mountains and found a beautiful drive, rocky cliffs, bubbling creeks, and Finally.... loads of trees. I'm pretty excited because I think we have found a campground that will suit us. Now to do some research because we are high enough into the wild areas that we have to be cautious of bears, cougars, and the occasional moose. One of the park rangers said that if we go back in a month or so, all the spruce trees will finally be in leaf and the wildflowers will be blooming. The campground was closed when we drove by but they expect to be open next month. I think we are planning on going back then to double check that yes we like the campground and to go ahead and make reservations for camping this summer. Being a state park, we need to plan ahead if we hope to get a decent place. I'm so excited. It was so beautiful and only took about an hour to hour and a half to get there.