A tourist afternoon

This afternoon Mr IM, The Boy, and I made a quick trip to Wyoming to get buffalo meat. We've been to this ranch before, but we don't think since The Girl was a toddler.  ( she stayed at home today). Here's a photo log of the afternoon.

 A stop at Johnson 's corner  ("open continously since 1952") for works famous cinnamon rolls (and gas)

 We're dorks

 The lamas kept looking at me.

 Giant chicken

Jackalope!

Flashback Sunday

When we first moved to Denver, I worked for a small alternative school with a relatively small staff. Mr IM and I became good friends with one of my co-workers, D, and then later many of his friends. We used to go to their house often and for a while, there was even a basement band to entertain us, starring D and Mr. IM as well as a drummer and whoever else joined. As so often happens, we all have been busy and suddenly literally years went by.  So when our friend, D, organized a birthday party for himself, beginning with breakfast and throwing in a walking tour of downtown Denver ,we were interested.  Turns out it was on a Sunday, and, hey, our kids are old enough to be left home alone! Whoo-hoo...however, I forgot that none of the other kids in the crowd are old enough to stay home alone, so I ended up being "the only girl"...although it was kind of like college  and the early days of Denver, when it was "a bunch of boys"...and me.  We had a really fun time--here's a brief overview of the day:

Doors Open Denver is an annual event that helps people explore the city through self-guided (free) tours and some  expert guided (for a fee) tours.  The focus is on architecture, history, and art and each place we visited had unique pros and cons.

We started our morning at Moe's Bagels on Broadway.  Funny story...when we moved to Denver, our U-Haul had a Moe's Bagel's sticker in the front window.  We've been saying for 20 years that we are going to check out Moe's...and now we have.

First tour stop was The Odd Fellows building just down the street.  It was built as a meeting place for members and has had many tenants in the years since, including a locally famous restaurant called Dutch something.  The building was interesting, but there wasn't a lot to explore, as most of the building is now full of restaurants and offices (including, David Lane, a "famous" local attorney).

Next up, a brief stop at the Filbeck Building, home to the Bovine Metropolis Theater.  The building is very interesting.  It seems to have been built to  be a theater and dance studio, but the tour guides, students from the Improv theater housed there, were a little fuzzy on the details.  We were able to do a little more exploring here than at some of the other locations.

The next stop was big-- the three theatres of the Denver Performing Arts Complex:
Boettcher Concert Hall, Buell Theatre, and the Ellie Caulkins Opera House.  We took the long way and found some fun artwork--I snapped this picture to show The Boy, today his career goals are (in no particular order):  graffit artist, snowboarder, guitar star:

We were able to do a little exploring and were able to see some cool things--my favorites were a giant painting, called The Rehearsal, by Stephen Batura that hangs above the bar in the Ellie Caulkins Opera house.  It shows many local, and not so local celebrities in the audience. As the tour guide said, "The more you look at it, the more you see!".  At the Buell we were able to see a tiny bit of back stage, including the posters that are signed after each show...including this one:

Look!  I'm standing where Melissa Gilbert stood!!!

When Mr. IM and I compared notes, we think we went to the Hotel Teatro next.  It was originally an office building for Denver Tramway.  It was used briefly by the University of Colorado Denver, then became a hotel in the 1990's.  We entered to win a free nights stay, so we'll let you know how that goes if we win!  They also had yummy cookies, which made us realize that we probably should stop for lunch soon.  We asked a nice older gentleman to snap a photo of our group, and realized as it "clicked" that we were missing one of us...(don't worry, someone snapped a slightly better photo later, with everyone in it!) and, golly, isn't it a fantastic photo?  (He, he, he)

 I also snapped this photo of our very tall friend and Mr IM, both demonstrating the impracticality of these particular chairs.

Now Mr IM and are chatted and we're not entirely sure if we went to lunch next (Illegal Burgers) or to the CU Denver Building, College ofArchitecture & Planning.  Mr IM says this was his favorite, because we got to see lots of models and modeling tools and big machines and so on.  It was interesting.  I was mostly amused at all the poor college students trying to work on projects while we all tramped through their space.

After an exciting trip across downtown on the 16th Street Mall shuttle, we walked past the new Ralph J. Carr building (not open), housing the Colorado State Supreme Court and the Colorado Judicial Learning Center, which is on my list to visit some day.

We visited Union Station, recently re-opened as an Amtrack and bus station with an attached hotel. We attempted to tour the hotel, but were unable to get far.  We had fun looking at the architecture and a little people watching.

Our next destination was the Counterterrorism Education Learning Lab, which, for lack of a better word, was overwhelming. I'm not sure I'd recommend this location--it was interesting, but distressing, which I suppose was their point.  They do offer some disaster prep classes, that one of our party, a Cub Scout leader, is going to look into.

We ended the day by dropping into the Colorado History Museum fifteen minutes before closing for the quickest tour ever--looking forward to going back some other time when we can linger!

After a trip back across downtown, we headed our separate ways...promising that we will get together again soon.  I'm already looking forward to next year's adventure when we focus on another part of downtown!

I apologize, friends, if I missed any of our stops...If I did, I'll add an addendum!

A Day Trip in Colorado

Even though we've lived in Colorado for almost 20 years, there still are an amazing number of "tourist traps" that we have somehow missed.  Today's  "missed treasure" is Bishop Castle.  Bishop Castle was built by a single man, beginning in the 1960's.  You can read all about it on his website.
A couple weeks ago, Mr. IM's law partner visited with his daughters and inspired us to go.

 On the road on a gorgeous Saturday morning...

 Surprisingly, the castle is located right off the road-we parked on the side and crossed the highway to join about 250 bikers and a few other tourists driving cars.  Check out that dragon!  Wow!

 This is quite a project for one person--wow!

 We stood at the bottom for a few minutes and admired the castle while deciding what to do first...

 There go Mr IM and The Boy--I decided to stay nearer to the ground.  Mr. IM said something like "oh, just come up, you can just turn around and come down" (later, while watching someone come down these stairs he said, "gee, I wouldn't want to come down those steps!")

 And up and up and up....

 While the boys explored up high, I explored ground level--some interesting things to see.  I also had a funny exchange with another person whose feet were firmly planted on the ground while his friends/family went up--he said, "Not going up?"  I said, "Nope...not gonna do it".  He said, "Yeah, I jump out of airplanes for a living, but I'm not going up there--no chute..."

 I was later convinced to go up two levels using these stairs--it wasn't too bad, since it is enclosed.

 This place really is cool!  I guess weddings and parties can happen here--some of the stairs would be very interesting in heels, but then again, so are grassy meadows...

 Here we are, up one level of stairs--actually a fairly large "party room"--very nice--flat floor

 beautiful stained glass..

 Secret passage?

 View from another floor up--beautiful scenery and large room--if you can get to it, it would be a great wedding/party site!

 Cute bear from the very bottom floor--he is pretty cute.

 I think he might be crying--this is when we wouldn't buy the $50 sword from the gift shop.  I contemplated a $30 purse...then noticed that it not only had a Colorado flag, but also a marijuana leaf.  Hmm.  Not really my style.

 Viet of the scenery, including porta potties (for The Girl, because of her love of porta potties, of course)

 The boys went up in the gatehouse--I again stayed close to the ground...

 Up they go...

 The Boy, waving from the top

 One last view as we head out (look how blue the sky is!  After a month of (unusual) rain, it is soooo nice to have  blue Colorado skies again!

 Couldn't talk about this without showing this shot--motorcycles lined up along the road as far as the eye can see!  The Castle is on a "ride route" and since there are porta potties and snacks, it is a popular stopping point!

 Now what? you ask?  The open road (with Pike's Peak in the distance)

 Ah, What is this?  Well, this, my friends is THE Supermax facility for the United States...name a terrorist and they are probably contained here.  This would be the facility that was "being populated" in the movie Con Air...

 We rounded out the day by driving home past Castlewood Canyon Park--causing The Boy to ask if we could hike there (no...it has been raining for month...anything with the word "canyon" in it isn't a good hiking spot until the water levels go down!)

And home before the thunderstorm!  Whoo!
A great day trip--lots of fun and very pretty!