We left Denver about 10 am this morning and drove into Estes Park. We were there by lunch, and had a picnic on the YMCA grounds when we arrived. If you don't know anything about the YMCA of the Rockies, it is awesome! A great place for a family vacation. It's huge, hundreds of 1, 2, 3, & 4 bedroom cabins, lodges, and tons of activity buildings. All in all, it can accommodate 4900 people!!! Luckily, it wasn't nearly that busy, as we were there early in the season. There's a museum, library, activity building, pool, mini golf course, livery, tennis courts, and it borders Rocky Mountain National Park, so you can hike into it. What a fun place! And believe me, we took full advantage of all these activities in the 3 days we were there!
After lunch, our cabin still wasn't ready, so we got a map from the activities center and took a hike. We went up to what they call Bible Point. It was all on the YMCA grounds and was a nice little hike. It was about 1 1/2 mile round trip, with a 600 ft. elevation gain. The kids LOVED it. They jabbered the whole time and made it to the top with little problems (a couple of spills/slips but nothing bad). Will loved it so much he asked if we could live in a cabin in Colorado and Grace wanted to take the hike again when we were done! I was so proud of them for making it all the way up!
We came back down and our cabin was ready, so we checked in and unloaded. Let me say, what a great cabin! It wasn't fancy, but it was clean and in good repair. It had 2 bedrooms and a fireplace (even though we didn't use it!). The kids' room had a set of bunkbeds and a 3rd bed, so it was a perfect setup for us. It had a fully-stocked kitchen, and living room. We were able to bring food to eat breakfasts and lunches there. It just couldn't have worked out better for us! Plus, we had a gorgeous view (see pictures below). After our hike the kids were a little tired, so we had them take a nap (the one and only of the vacation). Then we went and played a round of mini-golf and had dinner at the cafeteria-style restaurant and went home for a shower and early bedtime.
Our first glimpse of the mountains when we got to the YMCA camp!
Our cabin, the "Aloha" cabin.
A picture of the kids standing on the porch of our cabin.
The view of the mountains from the porch of our cabin. Let me tell you, the sunrises and sunsets were gorgeous!
Ready to go to sleep! The perfect room for them!
From the top of Bible Point. Total elevation about 8700 ft.
Playing mini-golf at the YMCA. You can see it was a little cool this evening, in the high 50's. We did bring warm clothes and glad we did! It wasn't this cool the rest of the time.
No comments:
Post a Comment