Weekend of Menko

We were very excited to have our BFF from Chicago to visit...the one and only Menko (aka Kristen Klimenko).  She flew in Thursday night and we grilled out at our house while drinking a few bottles of wine.  On Friday, Matt unfortunately had to work, so it was girls' day.  We slept in a bit and then went to Red Rocks to do some hiking and explore the amphitheater.  For the first day at altitude, Menko did great on a 4 mile hike!!

After Red Rocks, we headed to have lunch and explore Golden.  We didn't go to the Coors brewery, but did have a Coors product at lunch (which we felt obligated to do since we were in Golden).  The sign welcoming you to Golden looks very old west, which adds to the charm.

Friday night was a happy hour with volleyball friends and then dinner at Ignite with  Naomi and Ryan.  On Saturday, you could tell Matt had something to do with what time we left because we were out of the house by 8:30am...no sleeping in this morning!  We met up with Naomi and Ryan and hiked up Chief Mountain.  Menko was a little nervous about the altitude (started at ~10,600), but she rocked it.  The views from there are amazing.

After Chief Mountain, Naomi and Ryan headed home while the three of us went to Idaho Springs for lunch.  We ended up at Tommyknockers where Matt and Menko enjoyed the craft beers.  From there we drove through Golden canyon and decided to go alpine sledding (Menko and Karla spotting it on Friday and decided it was a "must do".).  Matt was a little hesitant at the idea, but it ended up being really fun.

After a quick trip to Colorado Cider Company for some tastings (and for Karla and Matt to replenish their stock), it was home for a quick nap.  For dinner we hit up downtown for dinner and then LoDo's for drinks.  We met up with two friends of Menko's that lived in Fort Collins...she met them while on her 6-week Europe trip.  Her friends were aghast that we hadn't been to Rio for margaritas after living in Denver for 5 months.  So, we ended up at Rio for margaritas, which were really good and quite strong!  Of course, we had the munchies on the way home and ended up at Biker Jim's for some gourmet hot dogs at 1am.

Sunday morning was brunch at Snooze where our waiter could tell we had a late night.  He asked Karla if she wanted a small or large orange juice and all she could do was stare blankly at him.  He ended up taking pity on us and giving us a free pancake for breakfast dessert, which was awesome.  There's a reason we love that place - they have great service!!

It was a fun-filled weekend...we can't wait for her to visit again.

Mt. Democrat

Friday night we headed to Kite Lake - the trail head for Mt. Democrat.  We arrived there around 8pm (after hitting a little traffic in I-70).  It was dusk, but still enough light to set up our tent.  It was a gorgeous night.  The full moon made it easy to see around and made the mountains look beautiful.

Sleep was a little hard to come by, particularly because our air mattress didn't have any air in it.  Our battery operated blower decided to give out after blowing for about 10 seconds.  Luckily, the ground wasn't too bad and we were semi-comfortable with a sleeping bag and a few blankets.

Our goal was to hit Democrat, Lincoln, Cameron, and Bross, which are all accessible from the same trailhead, but Karla was having a tough hiking day so Democrat was the sole 14er of the day (which is still an excellent day)!  Here we are at the summit:

At the summit, we ran into someone who told us about a Which Wich promotion.  If you take a picture of you and a Which Wich bag at the top of the 14er, print out the picture, and bring it to Which Wich, you get a free sandwich!  We, of course, had to take advantage of this because we love Which Wich and even love a free sandwich more.  :)

On our way down, we saw a mountain goat.  Just one, but it seemed as though he was keeping track of all of the people trekking up and down his mountain!

And finally, a view of Kite Lake from Mt. Democrat.

Rocky Mountain National Park

We went up to RMNP fairly early on Saturday, and thought once we hit boulder we would take the 'back way' to Estes Park.  This included some beautiful scenery...and a dirt road.  Thanks google maps.  We wanted to hike 6-9 miles, so we ended up starting up to Ypisilon Lake.  4.5 miles each way.  A very nice hike, about 2100 feet in elevation gain, and also fairly quiet. We really didn't see too many people at all on the trail.  We got to where we thought the trail ended, and say a 'pond'.  Karla was fairly disappointed that she hiked all this way for this small, yet very pretty pond.  Matt wasn't sold, so they kept on the trail for another 15 minutes to the actual lake.  A very nice mountain lake with a waterfall that feeds into it, and some fly fishermen that seemed to be doing pretty well.  We had lunch up at the lake, and then headed down.  It started raining a little once we were about 15 minutes to the car, but it was very refreshing and felt nice.  On our way out of the park we saw a herd of about 50 elk, which slowed up traffic a bit.  Then on our way back to the interstate through Roosevelt National Forest Karla got stuck in accident traffic.  But it did allow us to see some big horn sheep up on a cliff overlooking the road.  Once back to civilization, Matt got a DQ Blizzard, which made the day just that much better.  Before heading home we stopped by the Colorado Cider Company to try their new honey apple cider, and pick up a bottle or two to grill out with at Naomi and Ryan's.  All in all a very nice Saturday.  Deer, Elk, Sheep, and a great 9 mile hike.  Oh yeah, and a blizzard.

Chief Mountain

Last Sunday we decided to do a short(er) hike.  After browsing through a hiking book, we decided on Chief Mountain.  We tried to climb it in May, but it was snow covered and we didn't have snow gear with us.  This time there was definitely no snow.  It was just under two miles up and, wow, what a view.  Great reward for such a short hike!!  This is one we'd definitely do again.

Bergen peak

Karla got her good pair of hiking shoes last weekend, and we thought we would break them in.  With a 9.2 mile hike.  7500 feet to 9500 feet from Elk Meadows in Evergreen up to Bergen peak.  Definitely not as strenuous as a 14er, but still a 4 hour hike.  Good views at the top.  It's the tallest peak close to Denver so we could see downtown off in the distance, along with Pikes Peak even further off to the south.  We had a nice lunch in Evergreen and got back in time to relax before Karla went to a concert with Naomi at Red Rocks.  A nice non-14er Saturday.

Bierstadt adventure

We decided to climb Mt. Bierstadt this weekend.  Given Karla's altitude issues on Quandary, we decided to car camp a mile or two from the trail head.  On our way up Guanella pass we encountered a cow moose and her calf.  Trip immediately worthwhile.  We had fun car camping by playing poker with Ryan using jellybeans for poker chips.
We knew there were storm warnings on Saturday morning, but we didn't expect it to rain all night.  We may have gotten 4 hours sleep due to the rain on the car and the fact our small car isn't exactly made for sleeping.
We didn't have grand designs to summit given the weather, but when we got to the trail head it looked like it might clear up.  On the way up it was perfect conditions for a rainbow,  stretching all the way across the sky.  Absolutely incredible.  As we got close to the summit a cloud came in and the summit was pea soup as Karla described it.  If you had told us at 4am that we were going to summit...Matt would have said "bullshit".  But we made it!  14,026 feet.

Wedding weekend in Chicago

Our good friends Jeanne and Patrick got married last weekend in the Chicago suburbs, which meant it was our first trip back since we moved.  Karla got to go back on the Wednesday before, allowing her to see some friends and take in a game at Wrigley.  Matt wasn't jealous at all. 

The wedding was a lot of fun, and we got to see our old soccer friends, pic below.  Gil and Matt decided to go for broke and after a long night of drinking decided to go to the casino a few blocks from the reception.  Gil lost and Matt pretty much broke even, but it was more of a precursor to our Vegas trip on November with the soccer peeps.  Either way it was a fun, but short weekend!