We drove up to the Willow Creek Reservoir to let Bear play in the water and also to take in the beautiful views. Bear loves the water:
Nothing as pretty as seeing water and snow-capped mountains together! The flowers were in full bloom:
I’m not sure what kind they were, but the purples were stunning. Ok, curiosity killed the cat so I looked it up on Google – Perennial Blue Lupines. Now you know too. You’re welcome. When we left there were some deer alongside the road:
From there we drove along Lake Granby which was beautiful. The dam that created the lake was an engineering marvel and we were able to drive on top of it with the water on one side and a huge drop off on the other with no guard rails.
Scary! Good thing that the aspens were keeping watch for us:
The next day we met up with Bouraine and her friend Mary Young at Pepe’s for our second visit.
Wonderful meal and drinks! Outside we saw another moose.
All decked out for the upcoming Blues Fest! From there Larry meet us at the Rendezvous Amphitheater to listen to some local talent.
It was downright chilly:
I’m convinced we are not in the Chicago area anymore as you can grab a chair on the honor system.
Then we went to Vicious Cycle Brewery for a nightcap.
All-in-all a fantastic evening!
The next day Rhody and Barry Hausauer rolled into River Run. They parked a few spaces down from us.
Note our new truck decal! Our realtor invited us to their office for their annual appreciation party.
What a wonderful spread of food and drinks! Thank you Lynn Burrows!
Afterwards we met Larry and Bouraine for a drink at Denos.
From there we stopped at the Fraser Valley Distillery for a night cap (good thing as it was last call when we arrived).
Note to self: Don’t order a grasshopper at a whiskey distillery!
The next day I got the electrical reel fixed that Bay Diesel broke last month with the help of an electrician that Katrina had met on the pickleball courts and Barry. The wiring part was easy, but (of course) the new reel was outfitted differently which meant that Barry and I had to get a little creative. We got her done! While we were working Rhody was kind enough to keep Bear over at their place where he and their dog Ruger could play.
After getting cleaned up the four of us heading into Grand Lake where the girls shopped and Barry and I found a stool at the Sagebush. While we were waiting, Barry and I struck up a conversation with a local who told us stories of the local Busse family and also about a benefit being held in Grand Lake the next day. A polar plunge into the lake which is about 53 degrees. We might have to check that out. Once we all got back together we headed over to The Historic Rapids Lodge and Restaurant for dinner. We got seated right next to the rapids:
The food was excellent! What a fantastic setting! The girls found this sign and had to have their picture taken with it:
We decided to check out the Grand Lake Lodge since it was still early.
What beautiful views of the lake! The lodge is very historic being built about a century ago. We headed back to our campsite for a fire and s’mores afterwards.
The following day Rhody accompanied us as we toured two more townhomes. We didn’t like either of them. On the way home we stopped at the Smith’s to see how Larry was coming along with his flooring. He was completely done installing the hickory wood floors in their main room. Larry does excellent work as it was beautiful! He had leftover planks so we took them with us for our campfires.
We got back to River Run in time to pick up Barry and head back to Grand Lake for the polar plunge. We didn’t make it in time to witness the festivities so we decided to have a late lunch at the Grand Lake Lodge. We got seats on the porch and had a wonderful meal with the spectacular view!
Probably the best food was the soup of the day, smoked salmon with cheese and jalapeños. Delish!
We had time to take a tour of the local marijuana store called Igadl.
Interesting process, although I feel that distilleries have a much more detailed process than just growing and harvesting plants. We headed back to River Run to burn Larry’s expensive firewood! Boy, hickory burns very hot and I had to move our chairs way back.
The four of us met up with the Smith’s the next day for a boat tour on Grand Lake. It took about an hour and it was a little cold with high winds, but we made the most of it and learned a lot about local history of the lake.
Beautiful lake and houses:
Nice day on the water.
Once we got back on dry land, we went over to One Love for a drink as Captain Rick told us about their happy hour. We were hungry and since we started drinking margaritas we thought that a mexican dinner would hit the spot so we went to Charlie’s Sports Bar & Grill. Trust me, it was mexican food.
The Hausauer’s and the Busses got up early to head into the Rocky Mountains National Park in hopes of seeing animals and the sights.
We had to get into the park early as we did not have a pre-planned time slot to enter the National Park! Yes, that’s right! You need to plan out months ahead of time now to get into National Parks! Crazy! The good thing about turning 62 this year is that I got a Senior Lifetime National Park Pass for $80! Yahoo, a bene for aging.
As for the animals we saw a herd of elks in the distant, a duck, a chipmunk, and some birds. We did get a chance to see some elk cross the road in front of our truck:
Very neat!
We did get to see these beautiful views:
And we had some fun with nature with the windy and cold summit of 12,000 feet.
My favorite picture:
Our final stop was to see Adams Falls outside of Grand Lake.
Pretty falls! After that hike we went to downtown Grand Lake and had lunch at Rockies where the burgers and elk brats were good. We used the rest of the afternoon and evening to catch up on emails, calls and other things.
The next morning we looked again at the townhome that we have zeroed in on – it is near the Winter Park ski area. This time Larry came with us so that we could look at the structure in more detail. We haven’t made the final decision yet. We met up with Barry and Rhody to ride bikes from Fraser to the Winter Park Resort. It was a nice easy ride uphill for those of us that had electric bikes (Rhody was a trooper).
We got up to the ski area and purchased a summer activities day pass which allowed us to take the gondola up to the Sunspot Mountaintop Lodge situated atop the mountain.
The cafeteria style restaurant was actually quite good. We rode the gondola back down the hill and decided to try the Alpine Slide.
What a fun ride! Cruising down the ski slopes on a modified sled. It was so much fun that we did it again!
The bike ride back to Fraser was extremely easy as it was downhill the entire way. Rhody was very happy!
Back out at River Run Campground we walked the dogs up to the clubhouse to grab a drink. After we got cleaned up we drove over to the Devil’s Thumb Resort where we had reservations at the Ranch House. The restaurant specializes in Waygu beef! We had some delicious drinks at the beautiful bar.
Check out these specialty drinks:
Dinner was fantastic! Very delicious! Highly recommend although it was very expensive. Beautiful views from the ranch:
Wonderful time with the Hausauer’s!
The next day the Hausauer’s had to return their rental car back in the Denver area and met up with some of Barrys family who drove them up to Idaho Springs for lunch. We started to pack up when we got a call from River Run that we needed to vacate our site as our reservations were only until the 30th, not July 1st like we had thought and planned. Luckily they had another spot where we could stay for the evening. We drove down to Idaho Springs (about an hour drive) to pick up Rhody and Barry and on the drive we saw a small group of Big Horn sheep along the road.
When we got back into Winter Park we noticed that the town had changed the moose from “blues” to Independence Day:
We got back in time for dinner so we asked Larry and Bouraine to join us at the Tabernash Tavern. It was only appropriate to have our last meal there as we had our first dinner there with the Smith’s a month ago.
After saying our goodbyes to Larry and Bouraine, we headed back to the campground. Thank you Smiths for all your hospitality during our stay in Colorado.
Update on the truck: We haven’t had the gurgling sound occur again since I opened up the radiator cap. Perhaps an air pocket?
Update on the townhome / condo: We just couldn’t make the numbers work so we passed on putting an offer in. We will find out over time if that decision was a good one or a bad one.
Since the Hausauer’s and us we traveling in the same direction the next day we decided to caravan for about hour north on 125.
Goodbye Rhody and Barry! Safe travels! We will see you back in Florida.
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