The Fornero Family: Colorado Springs Trip 2010

This past week we went to Colorado Springs to visit Gramma Debi and Grampa Joe in their new house. We had a great time! Their house has great views of the mountains, and their yard is like a nature preserve... we saw mule deer every day, and they have even spotted a few black bears and a bobcat. The deer have no fear... you can get within about 10 feet of them and all they do is look at you. All week we waited to see the Mom and baby deer, and finally spotted them on the last day... so fun to see a little tiny fawn hopping around their yard! I was disappointed that we never saw the Mama bear and her cubs... maybe next time.

Here is Alexis getting her shoes on after we went through security in the airport...

Aunt Joclyn flew in 20 minutes after us, and we all drove from Denver to Colorado Springs together.

God forbid Dave waste any of his precious silent time on the airplane... he'd rather save his naps for the car ride. (Mental note: no more plane rides for Dave until he cares enough about TV to watch DVD's the entire flight).

Alexis having her breakfast overlooking the mountains...

Dave spent quite a bit of time searching for weaknesses in the baby proofing... Babies R Us should hire him as a tester for their safety products.

On Wednesday we went to visit the Garden of the Gods...

Taking a seat on the buffalo in the Visitor Center...

Dave liked this flap a LOT.

Beautiful view!

Alexis is holding up that rock all by herself!

Peeking!

Pretty girl and a pretty view!

On Thursday, we drove up to Pike's Peak... this was possibly the scariest drive of my life. There are very few guardrails, and lots of very steep and windy switchbacks to get to the top.

We took a short break from driving to check out the reservoir on the way up. Alexis let Grampa borrow her hat.

It is very intimidating to drive around a corner and your only view is the sky... just past the cliff that is 5 feet away! The pictures don't do justice to how scary this really is!!!!

Can you see Cort's white knuckles?

But... the view was amazing!
This was taken about 1/3 of the way up...

There was still some snow above the tree line... if you look closely, you can see the marks from the INSANE skiers and snowboarders that are crazy enough to go down this slope.

This is one of the very few pictures that I took on the way up... I was too scared to let go of my death grip on the seat and pick up the camera.

Whew, made it to the top alive! Next time we'll take the Cog Railroad... now I understand why it is so expensive to do that... it has got to be much less stressful than driving.

Nice and safe in the gift shop. This is me trying to not think about how we still had to drive back down...

Good to know... HOT BRAKES FAIL. Don't ride the brake! FYI for us flatlanders, there is actually a purpose for those lower gears in the car... driving down mountains. Go figure!

I was really surprised to find out that the drive down was much easier than the drive up... I guess that seeing where you are going (as opposed to just sky) makes it less stressful. The drive down was actually fun!

On Friday, Cort and Alexis and I went up to Seven Falls. It is a waterfall just outside of Colorado Springs, with seven distinct falls. There were 224 steps to get to the top... but Alexis and I were smart and brought the stroller and were therefore forced to take the elevator. :-)

Look closely and you can see the stairs that Cort took to the top!

The river above the falls...

Cort out on the edge...

The view of Colorado Springs from the top...

Alexis eating an ice cream cone and feeding the rainbow trout that hang out in the pools below the falls... very cool!

Back at the house... Dave trying to gnaw his way out onto the deck...

He learned a new trick this week... if you say "Oh No!" or "Oh Boy!" he will slap his hand against his forehead. Dave and Grampa probably had headaches from doing this so much together!