Sunnyside Knoll Resort, LLC Estes Park

Ohh, Ohh Mexico! I love our Southern neighbor. I've been to border towns a few times throughout my life, but I have never seen the Caribbean. It was so wonderful and beautiful. And I will never forget it, hopefully!!

I took my 6 year old. From the airport we drove to Chichen Itza (about a two hour drive and a lot of pesos too) where we stayed at the most grorgeous hotel, the Hacienda something or other. The rooms were huge and cooled ...

... was the day!

The park was just as beautiful as we remembered. Unfortuantely the road was closed about 8 miles into the park because of the recent storms. It seems to be a theme with us, doesn't it? Well, that didn't stop us from enjoying our visit. We even managed to find a few spots we didn't 'discover' last time

We pulled out of Hart Ranch in South Dakota a couple of days early because of an anticipated cold front. We also changed the route we had planned on taking. Rather than going to Scotts Bluff, Nebraska we headed to Colorado. Strange as it may seem the weather promised to be better in the Denver area....

After about 400 miles, which is a ...

... languages, many ecosystems and even more adventure in the next 3 months, and I cannot wait. We have a diverse and talented group of gap-year students from across the States and Canada, and I expect that it's gonna be a rockstar team. Look out for more blogs in the near future, and don't forget to check out the trip map, photos, and videos so that you can follow along on our crazy journey..

Enjoy the ride!

Andrew

... and play a round of mini-golf at Small Town: A Nice Place for Nice People. It was only $2.50/person, so why not! Niko won the game, but there was a 19th hole. If you got a hole in one you won a free game I was the first to go and guess what… I won! Then it was Katrin’s turn. And she won too! We got to write our names on the hall of fame, which was fun. Niko unfortanely did not win and decided to watch Katrin and I play another round. When we ...

This morning we woke up at 6:30. We packed up our stuff and hoped to get a coffee at the general store and a shower in Grant Village, but unfortunately, nothing opened until 8. So, we decided to drive out the east entrance of Yellowstone and take our chances there. We found showers with unlimited hot water for $3.25/person. We also got coffee at the general store to have with our bagels. Then we were off yet again! This ...

... was large, old, and creepy. The movie was not filmed there, but King was very unhappy about how the Jack Nicholson film turned out, that he created a miniseries called The Shining and returned to the Stanley Hotel to film it. Estes Park is also the site of the largest natural disaster in Colorado history. There was a huge flood in the summer of 1976 that pretty much destroyed the town...killed 139 and destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses ...

Yes, we finally made it. We planed on doing a lot of hard-core driving. So, Ram was always happy to finally reach our destination.

The funniest thing happened though.... We ended up getting a room for the night only because the great Rocky Mountain National Park was closed for construction!?!?!?!?! huh?!?!?!?! ha ha ha....

... have a north!") We departed Emerald Lake at about 3:30 and, since we had all the pictures we wanted in the far more conducive morning/early afternoon light, we made great time. Alisha put the quick dry ability of the fabric in her pants to the test after a quick slide down some slippery snow/ice, and I planted a foot right through some snow into a slush puddle beneath it. Now, I will thoroughly admit that cloth running shoes don't keep your feet dry at all in ...

... station saying "No hand grenades allowed in the shop"...we don't know if it was a joke sign or not! Turning on to a tollroad into Denver, we had to pay $6 for our truck/5th Wheel, which we didn't think was too bad, until we'd only gone a little further and then we were at another toll plaza paying another $6! In the end we paid $18 for 18 miles of toll road - we were not impressed! The foothills of the Rockies that we could see while we were driving up towards ...