The drive through the Rocky Mountains was certainly very interesting. We went over Vail Summit and Loveland Pass. We also went through the Eisonhower tunnel. The car / trailer combo did pretty well through the rugged terrain. Fortunately, we had good weather. A few days later there was two feet of snow along this route!
We drove down in to Denver and then headed just north up to Fort Collins, where David's second cousin Scott Erickson and family lives.
When we arrived we came to their house, truly a house set up on a hill:
Scott and Perrie keep a very neat, very nice house! This is particularly awesome considering they have three very adorable, but still quite young, kids. Their oldest, Jeanette, awoke (from her nap) and came down wearing her crown (pretty as a princess). Carl and Owen (the twins) also awoke. Carl, we learned, really likes green (and is almost always wearing it). This made it much easier to distinguish the twins apart.
That evening, the kids (all seven of them) had pizza (well, actually, Owen doesn't like pizza) and Pam, David, Perrie, and Scott went out to a nearby Vietnamese restaurant (Scott and Perrie's favourite). It was excellent!
It was great to get to know Perrie and Scott better (David had only seen Scottt briefly on one occassion in the previous 25 years). Heather Lynn had a wonderful time with the kids (she was a massive hit). They particularly like to read books. HL and Reba were the babysitters for the evening while the adults went out to dinner (how civilized).
Dan and Jim played on our computer as well as the mini-basketball they had in the basement. They were surprisingly good at slam-dunks (mind you, the net was at Jim's shoulders).
The next morning the kids awoke and had breakfast (which one is the ham?)
Fortunately, we were also able to get a group photo in their living room in front of the fireplace:
Scott headed off to work at Hewlett Packard and David spent a bit of time trying to fix a damaged file that Perrie had been working on with her computer. No luck. David then headed down to Loveland to take the trailer in for some much needed maintenance (repack the wheel bearings and check the brakes).
Because we had extra time we decided to take a 40 minute drive north to Cheyenne, Wyoming. Another state added to our list!
We picked up the trailer on the way down south. We ended up driving through Denver just before rush hour, and then on down to Colorado Springs.