Day four of our trip brought us gorgeous weather once again. Everyone piled into our minivan around 9:45, which had become our morning routine, to explore another part of Colorado. Today's agenda included the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs and lunch in Manitou Springs. On the way to the Garden of the Gods, we surprised the boys with a stop at a donut shop. They were so happy!
We arrived to the Garden of the Gods and stopped immediately to take in the majestic scenery and capture a few photos...
The boys did a pretty good job climbing the rocks...
This big rock that looks like is about to topple over was jaw-droppingly incredible!
We went on to the Visitor Center before walking the hiking trails. We got a beautiful view of Pike's Peak towering over the giant red rocks from the Center's upper terrace.
The boys really liked the buffalo statues inside the Visitor Center...
They kept asking me to take more pictures! :)
We got back into the car and drove to the hiking trails. Oma and Ben shared a hiking stick...
Of course, we had to get a picture of the whole gang...
This place was simply breathtaking!
Very sweet...
Taking a break...
We left the park and drove just a few minutes to Manitou Springs to have lunch and walk around. I didn't take pictures there, but here's one that oma took of Ben playing on a cool swing at the playground...
We had two very tired boys on the drive back to the house!
That night the boys enjoyed some bonding time with Gabrielle while watching a movie on oma and opa's bed. :)
The next day, we went to see Seven Falls. I just read on their website that Seven Falls is located in a natural box canyon and is the only
waterfall in Colorado listed in the National Geographic list of International waterfalls.
Bryce quickly made a new friend with a brave little chipmunk...
Gorgeous view of the Seven Falls...
Evan and I started our ascent to the top of the waterfalls, while everyone else left to find the elevators. Evan decided the height wasn't for him, and decided to go back down. I was too scared to turn around and have to look down to descend the steps, so I decided to keep going, with plans on taking the elevators back down. Once I reached the top, I discovered to my dismay that the elevators were not accessible from that side of the park, so I had no choice but to walk all the way back down! My legs were sore for the next two days!
With my out-of-shape state combined with the high altitude, I was out of breath halfway up. Luckily, there were benches to sit on. I stopped for a few minutes to catch my breath and took some pictures of the spectacular view from halfway up...
I really can't believe I made it to the top with my strong dislike of heights! If you look really closely at the center of the picture, there is an observation platform on the other end of the park that gave guests a great view of the Seven Falls... that platform is accessed by the mountain elevator that I was desperately wishing for! Later, when I rejoined the rest of the group, I found out they were all waving to me from the platform. They were able to see me at the top of the falls because of my bright yellow shirt!
We were all pretty tired that day and went back to the house after Seven Falls. We took the boys for a swim in the community's indoor swimming pool, then relaxed the rest of the evening. Here are the boys watching tv from their makeshift "beds"...
The next day we took the boys to a dinosaur museum...
They loved the two big dinosaur statues in front of the building, but the ones inside were mostly of dinosaur skeletons, which they weren't really excited about. They were much more interested in the gift shop!
Afterwards, we took the long scenic drive up to the top of Pikes Peak, which forms the beautiful backdrop for Colorado Springs and is the most visited mountain in North America.
It is also the 31st highest peak out of the 54 Colorado peaks.
As you can tell by Benjamin's expression, it was really cold up there!
Amazing view!
View of Pikes Peak from below...
More pictures from the rest of our trip coming soon...
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