3rd Day Again: Vail

We got into Vail last night about 5pm. We went straight down to the town area. It has built up so much since I have been here. Condos everywhere and a ton of new shops and restaurants. We ate outside on a patio, right next to a mountain. The kids kept running back and forth to the mountain, trying to beat each other's time. Ryan had the overall winning time of 93 seconds. Amaya had 99 seconds, and Jake had 102 seconds. It was great to get them out of the car, running, and using up some pent up energy. After that we just walked around a little, then went back to the hotel, where the boy all swam in the outside pool.

The Red Lion-Dinner

Day 3 Continued Panning For Gold

There's gold in them there mountains!!
The rivers are really high and fast right now because of all the snow and rain they have had here, so panning on a regular river right now is a low probability.

Poor Jakers in jail

A lesson in panning for gold. Amaya wanted to pan for gold. This place sells you a small cotton bag of dirt, that has small gold flecks in it. After a lesson in panning, Amaya poured her dirt packet into the pan, then proceeded to "pan" for gold. We all did it, and had fun picking out the scant flecks.

packet of sand/gold

 

LOVED this!

Oh, how I wish!

Day 3 On Our Way to Vail

After the Mint, we decided to start our way to the mountains, and to Vail, where I used to go skiing when I was younger. We stopped a few places on our way there. Just being in the mountains is fantastic. It is so beautiful, and the weather has been perfect for our trip (so far). The kids were actually looking out the windows and not at their ipads during this part of our ride! Amaya had her ipad ready at the window to take pictures of scenery, waterfalls, and potential wildlife, which we never saw. We stopped at a few areas that were posted wildlife areas, but missed out on herds of buffalo, and the mountain goats, which Amaya told us she saw while we were driving......she said it even had a bell around it's neck. Not likely, but who am I to say she didn't see it?

At one of our stops to see mountain goats, Ryan picked up a few rocks and was "making something", he was pounding and making "rock dust". I love how he can pick up anything and make fun from it. He is so fun.

Jake wanted to climb this mountain. I had to tell him he couldn't because the first level up was the Interstate 225. He was a little sad, but I told him, we have many mountains he can climb this trip. 

So many "falling rocks" signs and many "avalanche area" signs. Berit told us there was just an avalanche last week, yikes!

Day 3 Continued

Downtown Denver, the Denver Capital.

This building was awesome! It was their city hall, and was enormous. All marble inside, just really beautiful. 

The green sign. 

Located in downtown Denver, is The Denver Mint, which is one of six federal buildings, in our country, that prints our nation's money. We were not able to get reservations, but thought we would just see if they had any room (in case someone didn't show up for their reservation), during a tour. We got extremely lucky. We showed up twenty minutes before the tour started, and were able to be a part of the tour. HOLY security!! Those mint officers are quite serious about the safety there! I didn't even make it through the metal detector because of my Disney sunglasses! No phones on, and NO pictures were to be taken. YIKES! I am a pretty big offender of leaving my camera on, but didn't mess around with this federal building at all!! We waited outside, "under the green sign", til everyone was in, and they could make sure there was enough room for our family. YAY, they had room for us!


While standing in line to see if we could get into the tour, Ryan had a few (many) questions to ask this officer. Ryan: Do you have pepper spray? Have you ever sprayed pepper spray? Does it hurt? Do you have a tazer? Have you ever tazed someone? Is that a shield vest? What does it do? Have you ever arrested someone? Plus MANY more, but I just can't remember them. He is so funny and will just talk to anyone and want to learn everything about them. I have been told, he is very much like myself. (lol, Liana)

#1 Offender: I had my camera off, lens cap on, and cellphone turned completely off, as instructed. We get to the very last part of the tour, and our guide tells Ryan to stand in front of a door, which is a metal gate, but has some sort of clear material (probably some sort of gun resistant material, I am sure) to guard three gold bars. The bars were worth over $1 million. So Ryan is standing there being a "junior officer", and I say to the guide, "I so wish I could take a picture of this", he looks at my camera and says "maam, you need to turn your camera off all the way". I look down and tell him it is, indeed, off, and I even have the lens cap on. So, I look down to even show him this, and the camera is actually on, and you can see a picture on the screen that I had taken outside prior to the tour starting. Seriously!!!! He says to me to bring my camera over to the guard, so he can check it out, and says it really is to protect him and his job. I felt so dumb, and really didn't mean for that to happen, even tho usually I do mean for that to happen. The guard looked at a few pics, and all was good. DUMB, I am! I have been told, before, I may be a #1 offender for taking pics when I am not supposed to.

Old Stomping Grounds

I moved to Colorado when I was five. I was half way through kindergarten when we moved from Spring Lake. We lived in a townhouse in The Timbers. It was NOT that big, but we made do. It was pretty cool living there as a kid because there was a community pool, tennis courts, playgrounds, and a TON of kids. When I was young, we were outside all the time. We moved out of this town home when I was in third grade. We then moved into a house, but stayed in the Mission Viejo Elementary School. In fifth grade (during the school year, again), we moved into Smoky Hill Schools. I went to Trails West Elementary for fifth and sixth grade. (I forgot to take a picture of this school.....rats!). In seventh and eight grade, both of my old schools met up at Laredo Middle School. It was nice to see old friends again. In ninth grade I went on to high school at Smoky Hill High School, but we moved to Michigan the day BEFORE tenth grade started, and I continued on in Grand Haven. Wow, that is a LOT of moving! NOT fun at all, but that's life.

This rocky area used to be a waterfall that my sister, Heidi, and I used to play on. This tunnel used to be so HUGE to me! It was the go through from the town homes to shopping center that was newly built after we lived there. It never had a no trespassing sign when we were there. In the winter, during blizzards, we would get a ton of snow and it would drift really good down there, so we always made really cool tunnels. It was awesome!! The small picture is of the playground that was basically out my front door, but it was way cooler and had a neat wooden boat we always played on.

 All my houses!

All my schools!