What a day!

We have certainly had a very "interesting" day! We set out early at 9am to go over trail ridge road to the Winter Park Ski resort. Sounds like an easy thing to do I hear you say .... but just listen to how our day panned out!

This trip should take about 2.5 hours driving over very windy roads and up steep mountains. The highest we climbed was approximately 12,000 feet above sea level.

We should have realised what kind of a day it was going to be when we passed a road sign indicating no left turn (and this was on the side of a narrow road where a left turn would have meant going over the edge of a severe decent!) Go figure!

Whilst still climbing we passed an accident scene - where a car was being towed up from over the fence (having gone over the side of the road down the mountain side).

We made it up to Alpine Information Centre (at the top) and actually had to line up for 10 minutes to use the restrooms!!!!

A fun time was had at the ski resort. Obviously there was no snow but it is set up for rides and activities in the warmer months. Andrew, Steph and Nick all purchased 1/2 day passes for $44 each (a $132 investment), which gave them unlimited use of many of the rides. They certainly got their money's worth as they had 7 rides EACH on the alpine sled ride (chair lift up - sled ride down) at $15 a ride if purchased individually. They also did some bungy jumping rides and ran through a maze.They managed to rack up over $300 value in rides!! So far so good, I hear you say .... well what came next.

We planned to leave by 4pm so as not to have to drive in the mountains at night. We started home and then came to a road block 1 hour down the road which made us turn around due to a bush fire. So back we went - now back where we started at the Winter Park Ski Resort ( 2 hours later!!!!!!) We had to take an alternative route which was much longer and complicated by a road block and sitting in a traffic jam for about 25 minutes.

Finally back home to our cabin at 9pm. What a day! I'm glad we didn't want to drive in the dark. What should have been a 180 mile round trip turned into a 270 mile trip.

Tomorrow must be better. We did have many jokes along the way and this extended road trip gave us the opportunity to talk some more. Glad I wasn't driving though.