The train pulls out of the station at 10 mph, chugging and puffing into the Black Hills of South Dakota. The steam locomotive of the 1880 Train not only moves you forward, it transports you back over 100 years to a time of gold mines, Wild West personalities and virgin wildernesses. Continue reading
When you’re from the lowlands of Louisiana, having your morning coffee with a majestic view of the Rockies in the distance is awe inspiring. Our perch at the Boulder County Fairgrounds in Longmont, CO, gave us a view of the mountains being painted by the rising sun in the morning and a silhouette in the evening. This morning was different. We packed a picnic lunch and set out to explore Trail Ridge Road in the Rocky Mountain National Park.
On our trip from Bear Lake we stopped in Estes Park to have lunch and see the sights. One of the main sights is The Stanley Hotel which sits high overlooking the town of Estes Park. F. O. Stanley, of the famed Stanley Steamer, came to Colorado in 1903 for health reasons.
Our third farmers market in three days was in the Highland area of Denver, Colorado. It is a neighborhood farmers market featuring farms goods, prepared foods and crafts. Our nephew, Matthew Erley, lives in the Highland neighborhood and was anxious to show us their market.
After our two week void of farmers markets we are making up for lost markets. Longmont Farmers Market is our second farmers market in three days. Since we are staying at the Boulder County Fairgrounds in Longmont and that is where the farmers market is, it was an easy and pleasant walk to the market on Saturday morning.
The Boulder Farmers Market is a community gathering place offering not only fresh vegetables, fruits, dairy and other items yet also offering prepared foods and a grassy lawn to enjoy those foods while visiting. There was even a Balloon Man forming balloons into various objects for the children to wear and enjoy. After two weeks of no farmers market we were in Farmer Market Heaven!
Barking Dog Café in Lyons, Colorado was recommended to us as a must stop on the way to Rocky Mountain National Park. So we did. We were expecting much more than we found; Barking Dog is a coffee shop where locals enjoy coffee, reading and visiting. This is a no rush, relax, take in the atmosphere, kick back kinda place. No surprise when we ordered breakfast and waited about 30 minutes for our items. The food was not worth the 30 minute wait although we were able to sit outside and enjoy the morning. Mingling with the locals and other travelers Barking Dog attracts makes this worth the stop.
Lake Scott State Park was an oasis for us – it was our first cool weather and the lake was full of water. The park is not only a recreational haven it is also full of history. The park is a nature lover’s paradise with hiking, horseback and biking trails, swimming, and boating, along with just plain relaxing.
Kansas and prairies are almost synonymous. You ride and ride and every once in a while you see a farmhouse, a barn, a small community but the landscape barely changes in the South West part of the state – prairies and rolling hills. But then, there’s Monument Rocks. Also known as the Kansas Pyramids
or Chalk Pyramids, they were the first natural wonder to be inducted as a National Natural Landmark in Kansas by the Department of Interior on October 31, 1968. These outcroppings are on private land and the owner generously shares these wonders with the public. The rocks are limestone formations formed 80 million years ago when the area was an inland sea and reach a height of 70 feet.
Before there was “Women’s Lib”, back when the West was wild and a couple decades after Kansas became a state, Maria De Greer and her daughter, Ida Eastman, founded what is today Scott City, KS. De Greer, a widow from Chicago, was a writer, a feminist, a newspaper woman, and the first woman admitted to the Kansas Bar Association. Being a strong advocate of the Temperance Movement, she came to Kansas to build a “model” community with no taverns and no brothels. Continue reading
