Labor Day weekend - Sunday

Saturday night we stayed at the VQ on Peterson AFB, which was nicer than our one room cabin. We got a suite room (literally).

Sunday morning we grabbed breakfast at the canteen by the golf course (another yummy breakfast) and then headed out to Seven Falls. We got a little later start on Sunday so by time we drove over to Seven Falls there was already a line waiting to get in. By time we got near the front of the line we noticed that they were only letting a car in as another left. Luckily by that time we were within 6 cars of the entrance. And then when we got up to the parking lot there were lots of empty spots...so I'm not sure what the big deal was.

We decided to hike the stairs to the lookout platform (185 steps). Sean had a little easier time than I did climbing all those stairs. I was really, really glad they had a resting area at the halfway point! We both made it to the top though.

Sean faking being tired

Me actually very tired

The view of Seven Falls from the lookout point

The names of the 7 different waterfalls

If you look at the picture of the falls, you'll notice that there are also stairs next to the falls that go to the top. So we hiked up those next (224 steps). As we were climbing the weather was getting more and more cloudy and by time we got to the top we could hear thunder in the distance. There's a couple of short trails at the top that we wanted to hike. Because of the weather, we decided to hike the shorter trail first. It was maybe .3 miles and took all of about 15 minutes. It went out to Midnight Falls (I think that was the name of it). As we were hiking that it started to drizzle and by time we got back to where the other, longer trail split off to go to Inspiration Point, it was raining pretty heavily so I made the executive decision to head back down. It'll give us something to come back to (like we really need an excuse to go to CO).

A 450 year old Ponderosa Pine

Sean and I by Midnight Falls

The view coming down the trail (can you see the people in their rain gear?)

Since it was raining and all our plans for the afternoon involved being outside, it was time to come up with plan B. Looking through the different brochures and pamphlets we found Cave of the Winds and decided a cave tour is a good activity for a rainy day. We stopped for a quick lunch and then head off to the cave. Well we weren't the only ones that thought this was a good idea because when we got there the parking lot was packed. We ended up waiting almost an hour and a half for our tour group and they were taking groups out about every 5-10 minutes. So we got to rest and people-watch while we waited for our tour to start.

View from the "lobby" of the cave

I found a cute, cuddly bear in the gift shop

This picture is sideways (don't know why) but these stairs used to be part of the tour - back when they carried around candles and lanterns. The black marks are from people snubbing out their candles.

Romeo and Juliet (a broken column due to shifting earth) - never the two shall meet

An ~8.5 foot stalactite

The original entrance to the cave (now sealed to keep out critters)

After the tour ended, we decided to head to downtown C Springs to see if we could find some dinner. Again using our handy-dandy brochures we decided on Jack Quinn's Irish Pub because we liked the name and Jack Quinn did not disappoint. There was an Irish band playing inside, a great atmosphere and some delicious Irish food.

Jack Quinn's

The rest of the evening consisted of chillin' and watching Design Star (bye-bye Lonnie).

Monday morning we got up early so we could hit the road and try to get home at a decent hour. We stopped at the golf course again for breakfast. We could see the hot air balloons (there was a festival going on) through the windows in the eating area.

View of the golf course

Lots of hot air balloons and 1 airplane (they looked bigger in person!)

Bye-bye Colorado (for now)!