Friday, January 3, 2014

Christmas in Colorado

I always love going to Boulder, Colorado, if only to hang out with the family in their touristy mall with the quaint shops and lovely animal carvings. Also you do see  a number of performers using the tourist traffic to try and "buss out". This time there were the usual singers and a rubber man who sounded like he was from the eastern Caribbean.

Madelyn had fun running up and down while we window shopped and our little Italian restaurant delivered great food as usual.

The best meal I had on this trip to Colorado, but in Denver this time, was at an Ethiopian restaurant and Devin had to treat us to as he lost a bet to me lol.

Their of food is really spicy and delicious and as usual, people always think Michele and I are Ethiopian which I consider a major compliment as they are in my book, the most beautiful people in the world.

 You know what too, eating with our hands like we do at some Indian restaurants, beats having to struggle with knives and forks as you simply use the delicious breads they supply with the meal to sop up the delicious meats, lentils and vegetables.hmm.

You know I would not be surprised if my granddaughter turns out to become a great criminal lawyer. Yes she is just two and  a half but I heard her doing an  excellent piece of cross examination which left her parents running around trying to avoid the traps she was setting for them!

They had promised to take her to the zoo to look at the Christmas lights but when we got there, the parking lot was full, it was quite cold and the lines were very long.

 So they decided to take her to the botanical garden instead to see their display of lights there.

As we drove out of the parking area, she started to smell a rat and demanded to go to the zoo to see the lights. So they told her they were looking for parking space, to which she replied "At the zoo?"

 They spent some time trying not to lie to her but there was no compromise as for probably the next 10 minutes, every single question and sentence ended with "…at the zoo?" It was really uncanny hearing the way she came back to the main topic and the intelligence with which she posed the questions! Thank heavens when we got to the gardens and she saw the wonderful display of lights, she forgot about the zoo and the animals.

New Years day started out quite bleakly with snow falling but by 10 am it was sunny and warm (40 degrees), so we decided to drive to Black Forest to see Devin's brother and family.

 Black Forest lies between Castle Rock and Colorado Springs where they had a huge fire last year. His brother lives there on a 5 acre plot in a million dollar house but the fires which destroyed 379 homes and killed 2 persons  in June  had them having to to evacuate their home for a week  but thankfully when they were allowed to return, their home was intact.


It was an easy ride going down and the scenery was pleasant with rolling open ranges and the 14,000 foot Pike's Peak hovering on the horizon.

Dan's place is a lovely 4000 square foot ranch house with pine trees all around and actually it is the only place I have seen that still has green grass since everywhere else the grass is brown. No one could explain to me how sections of their grass remained green!

 On the way back we ran into a snow storm and within minutes the once rolling brown fields were pure white as was the long narrow road. We had nothing to fear however as Devin was driving his 4 wheel drive Jeep which he uses to climb rocks for fun. We did see a number of vehicles skidding on the road but luckily no accidents.

It is interesting though for despite the high rate of snowfall in Colorado, it is far more pleasant in the winter than places like New York,  Toronto and Chicago. For what is amazing is how quickly the snow melts here as by the next day almost all had gone and the blazing sun warmed up the entire city.

However, occasionally the poor sun gives up in the struggle to emerge, as it did on the 5th January when there was a nationwide snow storm which saw even Denver dropping to 2 degrees. I had to go out and could not find the road half of the time. Only driving where I saw tyre tracks saved me.

Yes it was wonderful being here for Christmas but there is no place like home, beautiful, warm Jamaica. Yup, the four inches of snow that fell on Saturday and he extra snowfall on Sunday sure brought me back to reality quickly!

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