Denver 2018 day 9 Rocky Mountain Red Rocks Try

August 4, 2018

Breakfast, a clearer head, and me peeking at the All Ears categories helped Anabelle finish her Disney Restaurant list for MGM.

The weather was nice making it a good day to bring Abuelita back to the pool.  The insane winds of the night before, however, filled the pool with leaves making it a bad day to bring Anabelle.

After many and varied turns with each of us using the skimmer…

It still wasn't clean enough and another round of Hot Tub Disney World Trivia kicked off.

Lunch was a collection of leftovers. My suggestion of combining a couple of Uncle Roy’s dishes had Anabelle becoming a fan of bratwurst on a waffle.  No doubt a staple of Germans below the Mason Dixon line.

Planning our trip to hike in Red Rocks Park was confusing even for us.

Titi Luzma simultaneously existed in the quantum states of:  hiking with us and too busy to come hiking with us, along with: driving herself to make her appointment and riding in Silvermist the Fabulous Monkey.

Somehow the superposition aligned her in our vehicle and we all drove to Red Rocks.

My own plans continued the day’s pace. There were some Carnegie Dinosaurs I saw in the flushable Dinosaur Ridge store that I didn't get at the time. Hoping to buy them in the Morrison Museum didn't pan out, and I was going to pick them up since that building is at the entrance to Red Rocks.

Or more accurately: That building is at ONE entrance to Red Rocks.

Or even MORE accurately: That building is at the one entrance to Red Rocks that we were not entering by this day.

Given time constraints and space constraints (the theater and gift shop areas were closed to prepare for Steve Martin and Martin Short performing there that night) we took the short trail.  

The stone formation and woodlands, like all of rural Colorado, were gorgeous.

That probably explains the professional photo shoot we had to walk through along the trail. 

Haven’t you people heard of green screen?

Anabelle took advantage of the gorgeousness as well, taking many artsy flower photos.

She also took advantage of her genetics and posed for many hammy, goofy photos.

We saw some Deer and more appearances of Carrot the Bunny at random locations.

As we neared the end of the (fortunately) short trail, the sky opened up, gushing down waterfalls on us as we sprinted our hiking booted feet over to Silvermist the Fabulous Monkey.

We exited by Flushable Dinosaur Ridge but didn’t have time to stop. Therefore, after we brought Titi home, we went back out for a much more scenic now that the rain stopped drive to the spot we’d just left.

We parked next to the full size juvenile Brachiosaur statue I forgot to mention the other day we were here.  That’s how you know the amount of dinosaur awesomeness in a confined area that place has.  A fifteen foot tall sauropod in the parking lot slipped my mind.

I bought my toy dinosaurs and tried to donate my change to Dinosaur Ridge The volunteer at check out and I proceeded to make so many mistakes with the card reader and register I eventually just handed her a couple of singles as a donation.

Back on the road again, we stopped at Titi’s church. Not for any services, but to pick up the umbrella that would have been much more useful in the car than left in the pew the other night.

We decided to look around a local mall. In one store, I found Joker Chuck Taylors on sale and in my true size that no one usually carries: 11 1/2.  YAY!  We also found an aquarium.  The signs in the gift shop mentioned a Sloth, several exhibits, a petting tank, and snorkeling.  The area behind the gift shop didn’t appear big enough to hold that all, and with the admission the same as the Denver Aquarium, we decided not to call their bluff.

There was a kiosk selling “Dragons Breath.”  Anabelle had heard of it, but wasn’t crazy enough to be lured into trying to eat fruit dipped in liquid nitrogen to allow smoke breathing.  The news item shortly after we got home warning people about the damage to soft tissues contacting a solid slushy at minus two hundred degrees could cause was not a big shock.

On the way out of the department store, there was a fortune teller reading tarot cards at one of the makeup counters. Unimpressed by the Magic Eight Ball next to the cards, we continued out.

Since there was a sign for a Comic Book shop on the other side of the highway, we answered the questions, “Why did the geek cross the road?”

It was hidden away on the back side of the strip mall, on the bottom floor next to some abandoned stores.  The back issues were all completely out of order.  I do not have time for that level of searching.

The three of us sat discussing in the car for quite a while as crazy hungry was interfering with our decision making ability.  By the time we selected to go to Chili’s, Titi Called as I was pulling towards the parking lot exit.  She informed us about Uncle Roy’s Shepard's Pie and cornbread experiment.  Going home instead we decided it was a success.

After dinner, we learned Uncle Roy had been trying to convince Titi Luzma to watch the new Jumanji.  We joined in the convincing and all enjoyed it, in another success.

We tried to show her Monsters Vs. Aliens after that, but Titi’s cartoon tolerance drops significantly when tired and she went to bed.

Once the movie was done we turned in. I had a nightmare recreating a previous Colorado trip’s drive into a thunderstorm cloud at Rocky Mountain National Park, except this time, in the true cinematic spirit of my dreams, the car careened off the pavement and into the lightning filled cloud to a dramatic musical sting.

I really should pay the effects guys in my head more.

Hey look, more cool Red Rocks pictures! I probably should have written more about that place.

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