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RAISING RHOADS

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Jenna Rhoads

Rocky Mountain Vacation

"The mountains are calling and I must go!" - John Muir



Why would we travel in the midst of a pandemic? Because holing up in a cabin in the middle of the Rockies, seeing fewer people than we do in our everyday lives in Texas, seemed like the mental health boost we all needed.



I scoured Airbnb looking for the perfect place and after losing out on two cabins because I wasn't fast enough, I found a REAL gem in Redstone, Colorado. We stayed at the groundskeeper's cabin that was part of the historic Redstone Castle in the Crystal River Valley. The cabin is on the National Register of Historic Places AND had seen the likes of Teddy Roosevelt. It's a 3.5-hour drive from the Denver airport up some winding mountain highways, but very much removed from the general tourism industry and worth every mile of the drive.






While there we hiked along the Crystal River and the Roaring Fork River (where Hudson fell in), drove up the mountain to Marble, Colorado, to pull Marble straight from the earth, watched a magical snowfall, and sat by a cozy woodburning stove in the cabin. We lucked out that an amazing (and I mean really amazing, we are pizza snobs) pizza place was close to us called Propoganda Pie, and the Redstone Inn kitchen was open that had some amazing food as well. As on any of our trips, we found two local parks for the kids to burn energy on which is key to the kids' happiness and found a coffee spot (Bonfire Coffee in Carbondale) that had giant donuts and a great house brew.





As on any vacation with Matt, we did our fair share of rock inspection and collection and drove up several roads to try to see quarries and old mines. We did do a cool investigation of the Coke Ovens in Redstone, which were recently restored. Coal was brought by train down out of the mountain and baked in the ovens to create "coke" which is a super-refined typed of coal that is used in iron smelting or steel mills. Now you know!





We were sad to leave our little cozy cabin in the mountains, but happy to see family in Denver for Thanksgiving. We took a nice walk in Golden on Lookout Mountain and saw the Colorado School of Mines. In a different life, Matt would live, work, and breathe the Colorado School of Mines. We also took a short hike in Boulder at the base of the Flatirons to try to find roaming cattle, played at a pretty incredible city park in Denver, and ate a feast on Thanksgiving.





"How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains." - John Muir


Yours, because we are His,

Jenna

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