The Great Divide

So leaving Kansas was no great loss (except minus the $174.50 speeding ticket costs Kim has to pay), as we were very excited to get to some more exciting landscape. Enter eastern Colorado, Kansas’s landscape twin. Colorado didn’t start getting interesting until we randomly pulled over at a designated “point of interest”. After driving through dull Kansas for a day, a tree would have constituted a "point of interest". We figured, if anything, we could at least change drivers there. Little did we know how “interesting” this point of interest would be. We traveled down a gravel road as a sign appeared, advertising what seemed to be an “astounding tower” which you could” SEE SIX STATES!” from. As we drove up, Alexander grew more excited while Kimberly

became more anxious. The building was an oddly shaped, long building with walls that looked like waves in some places. We met the caretaker of the building, and we quickly walked past the two sunken cars (filled with broken bottles) and into a gift shop/history museum/potential episode of the television show Hoarders. The building itself was literally built of rocks from all 50 states, and every direction you looked there was stuff. All kindsa stuff. Every direction. Even up. As we adventured through the museum, we made our way to the tower, and began climbing, at some points, nearly vertically.

.The top was awesome! It was incredibly blustery, and we could not see 6 states, BUT we could see a lot of awesome flatlands for miles. Back on the road again, we communicated with our host for the night, the incredibly fabulous Paula, and she informed us we were in for some bad weather, and to watch out for tornados. UH OHZZZZ. We arrived in Denver in one piece (although Kim's hiking boots decided to ditch us in Kansas), and discovered that Paula lived in a fabulous 10^th floor condo with great views of the city. We spent the night conversing with Paula, who is quite the world traveler. After eating delicious split pea soup and corn bread, we chatted all night. She then showed us how her bookshelf turns into a secret passageway, and Kim fell in love! Kim and Paula went to yoga that morning in downtown Denver, while Alexander slept in (much more wisely –ed.). We spent the morning with Paula, eating breakfast, surfing couch surf, and helping her learn how to use her own cell phone. We left, ready to traverse through the Rocky Mountains, and…it started to drizzle L

But we were off anyway, heading UP UP UP into the mountains. Kimberly was practically glued to the windows. They were spectacular, despite the rain and fog. We stopped at Argo Tunnel, an old supply mine that serviced over 600 gold mines in the Rockies, took a sweet tour and panned for gold. At that point, it started to snow. We traveled along farther, stopping Georgetown for lunch to have some high quality buffalo meat for lunch. Yum J

We traveled along through the mountains, Kimberly gripping for dear life on the door handle while Alexander drove along smoothly. Alexander’s want to go up to the mountain tops along the Squall or Loveland passes were thwarted by the incessant snow and Kim’s fear of plummeting off a switchback. However, he was instead amused to find he could cost almost 18 miles in neutral, such are the Colorado highways. We then entered Glenwood Canyon, and it was amazing. It was very secluded and surprisingly fun! We followed the Colorado River along, through the canyon, and made our way to our next couch, in Grand Junction, Colorado.

Miriam and Alex greated us with smiles, beer, and pizza, and we quickly became attached. We spent the rest of the night talking, and said our farewells to Miriam, as she would be leaving early for her job. The next morning, we spent time with Alex, chatting it up about Arches National Park and eating his delicious wheat flour, wheat germ, and flax seed pancakes with honey and butter. Greatness for the tongue and the digestive system.

We made our way to Arches, and it was beautiful. We drove through some outstanding canyons with incredible views, and stopped and had a picnic on the Colorado river…delicious lunch with breathtaking scenery.