This is true Colorado weather. After a very chilly week (see my last post), things warmed up considerably. The Bride and I headed out on Friday morning to spend the weekend in the ski resort, Keystone, about a hour west of the Denver metro area. The weather was absolutely perfect, 60’s daytime with brilliant blue skies.
Before the ascent, I took The Bride to three different RV dealers to look at new fifth wheels. We have both agreed on several parameters and those choices narrow the range of trailers to look at. Of all the different units we have looked at we are down to three models that we now need to choose from…that is providing that something unknown doesn’t pop up before a decision is made. Looking is fun but there are so many variables that it can be confusing at times. Each unit has pluses and minuses but it seems like no one unit has it all so we have to make choices.
The RV search lasted until noon and after a quick lunch we headed into the mountains. The weather could not have been more perfect and it was soul soothing to get into the high country under these conditions. Our destination was the Ski Tip Lodge. This quaint little lodge is an old 1880’s stage stop that was converted into a ski lodge in the 1940’s and then acquired by the ski resort in the 1970’s. Throughout the years it was remodeled and added on to numerous times but it still only has nine rooms. It would never be able to live up to today’s building codes because of the narrow winding hallways, frequent step ups and downs and other eccentricities of the add on building style. That is however one of the reasons it is so charming. It also has a fabulous restaurant in the lodge itself.
Saturday morning we decided to go into the resort area of Keystone. We were surprised to find that we were there in the slowest time of the year, after the leaf peeping but before the ski crowd arrived. It was absolutely deserted! The picture above was taken at 9:30 in the morning and if you look closely you can see one, count ‘em, one person in the middle of the retail area (I marked him with an arrow). Most of the shops and restaurants were closed until the snow falls.
That was a bummer to The Bride as shopping is ALWAYS a big part of any get away. Fortunately, Breckenridge is only a short drive from Keystone so Saturday afternoon was spent browsing around another ski town. There was much more activity in Breckenridge and all the stores were open and doing a brisk business.
This morning after a leisurely breakfast we headed back to the Denver area. We avoided I-70 for a while and took the Loveland Pass road which goes right by Arapahoe Ski Basin. This ski area is always one of the first to open for skiing and it’s not uncommon for it to be open as late as June at the end of the season. Sure enough there were quite a number of “early bird” skiers on the slope.
By the time we made it back into the Denver area (45 minutes) the temperature was up to 75 degrees. That change in temperature is appropriate as in two weeks, The Bride, The Emmer and I leave for a Caribbean cruise. We will fly from here to San Juan on the 29th and return to the Denver area on the 9th of November. More about that in a later post.
Thanks for visiting
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