After a long and cold winter (in the negatives for a week!) and an eventful Christmas of traveling to Virginia and North Carolina to visit family and meet our new niece, Cari and I enjoyed a great getaway over President's Day in beautiful Colorado (quickly becoming my favorite state) which hopefully you've seen pictures of an Facebook by now. We left on Friday around midday so we wouldn't have to drive in the dark. This was probably the best decision we made all weekend, because the drive up involved a lot of smaller back roads (took me back to Southside VA!). The cabin where we stayed was located outside of Cortez, CO, which is almost to the Utah/CO border, about 45 miles from Durango. We actually had to take a couple long "county" dirt roads to get to the cabin, but eventually arrived right before dinner time, and just in time for a beautiful sunset which we watched from our deck. The cabin was great, smelled "loggy," was fully stocked, and had great views. We brought dinners up with us and plenty of food for the weekend to save money, which was good decision #2 since we were 30 minutes from any sort of civilization. Friday night was taco night, which we enjoyed thoroughly before crashing.We woke up Saturday morning and checked the weather for the weekend. It was supposed to rain in Durango/Cortez, so we decided to spend the day inside and save our one day of skiing for Sunday. This was good decision #3, considering we got sheets of rain at our cabin during the day, and we also know someone who was skiing in Durango on Saturday and said they got caught in a thunderstorm on the mountain! So, we spent the day Saturday cooking breakfast, reading, eating lunch, watching Cold Mountain, taking naps/reading more, watching the UNC/BC game, playing some board games, and grilling steaks. It was a fantastically relaxing day.
We got up a little earlier on Sunday and got dressed to go skiing. The road from Cortez to Durango and up to the slopes was awful, since it had rained/frozen/snowed the night before. Apparently, people in that area expect that everyone there can drive in the snow, so they don't spend money to plow that much. Needless to say, it took us an hour and a half to get to the slopes (which isn't too far off of what it would usually take, but much more stressful). Skiing was great...I've been to Santa Fe to ski out here, but this was better. The conditions were amazing...I've never skied anything like it before. The slopes are long, with fresh powder, and since there are more trails to ski, it doesn't seem as crowded. We were there for about 4 or 5 hours and only made 3 runs!! The first time down the mountain was a little rough for Cari since this was her second time skiing ever, but she progressively got better/more comfortable as the day went on, and by the last run, she didn't fall at all! (Not to mention, she had a great instructor..). We got back to the cabin before dinner and enjoyed a huge pan of nachos before turning in.
Monday was our leaving day :(. We got up, packed, cleaned a little, and headed out. We had heard of Mesa Verde National Park and decided to check it out on the way home. It's probably better in the spring/summer when all the roads in the park are open and those that are open aren't slushy/wet, but we didn't think we'd be driving too far. Oops. The road into the park was the second scariest drive I've ever done in my life (second only to being driven up the Alps to Hilter's old hideout, the Eagle's Nest, by a bus doing 40 around hairpin turns with no guard-rails). At least I was in control this time, but cresting hills with previously mentioned hairpin turns and thousand-foot dropoffs, despite having foot-high guardrails was a little disconcerting. We made our way through the park (20 miles) at a leisurely 10 MPH until we got to the museum. There wasn't a ton to see there, but we got some maps and continued our drive. The Park contains a lot of cliff dwellings and other previously inhabited (some excavated) Native American homes. The views were incredible, and the history of the place was fascinating. After spending a few hours sight-seeing, we headed on home.
It was a great trip overall...we're hoping to take a few more day trips this spring (finally getting down to White Sands and possibly Carlsbad Caverns), and one weekend trip to the Grand Canyon/southern Utah. We'll keep y'all updated! Thanks for tuning in!
