While not at the top of our list of ‘must sees,’ Mount Rushmore is an American icon and since we are relatively close to it (300 miles), we decided to take a long weekend trip to visit.

Unfortunately, we didn’t time our visit well. We went the same week as the Sturgis bike rally and, although Mount Rushmore is an hour away from Sturgis, the monument and the area were packed with bikers. Sadly, most didn’t wear masks and there was very little social distancing.

We have all seen so many pictures of Mount Rushmore that we wondered how different it would feel to see it in person. It really is amazing to see and to realize the effort that went into it. There is also a trail that allows you to see it from different angles and a display of the original model it was made from.

We didn’t want to take the camper for a short trip, so we stayed at The Roosevelt Inn in Keystone. It is an older hotel, but is well maintained and included a free breakfast. The local restaurants were all packed and again, no social distancing. But luckily, Sherpa’s Kitchen was right next door. It was only open for carry-out but they had a nice patio where we could eat. We haven’t found many Indian restaurants since we went full-time so this was a real treat!

We had planned on going to Custer State Park the next day but right as we were leaving the hotel our truck suddenly lost power and became undriveable. We had Good Sam Roadside Assistance tow us to Accelerated Diesel in Rapid City, about 30 miles away. These folks were fantastic! They squeezed us in even though it was a Friday afternoon, diagnosed the issue, and were able to make the repairs that afternoon.

So, it may not have been the BEST trip we’ve taken, but we wound up enjoying it and can now check off one more item on our ‘been there, saw that’ list.

For something different than hiking, we went on a train ride through the Royal Gorge. This historic train follows the Arkansas River between thousand foot cliffs in what has been called the “Grand Canyon of the Arkansas River.”

We chose the Vista Dome seats, which were a little more expensive, but definitely worth it for the view. The ride is about an hour each way. We ordered sandwiches for lunch on the way out and then walked to one of the one of the open cars for the return ride. From the open car we could really see the gorge and we even got to race some rafters! (We won!)

(click on a photo for gallery view)

The colorful clays in these rocks were mined by American Indians to make paint! The bright colors were caused by oxidized iron compounds and make for some of the most colorful rocks we have ever seen.

They are beautiful, and entry is free, but they are in a very remote area about an hour northeast of Colorado Springs. In fact, about the last 5 miles to the location is a dirt road! If you only had a week in Colorado this wouldn’t be one our top suggestions, but if you have time to spend it’s worth the trip.

(click on a photo for the gallery view)

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Colorado is known for its State Park System and as volunteers in one of those parks, we get the benefit of access to all Colorado State Parks. Fortunately, Roxborough is literally right down the street from where we’re staying. It’s completely different from our park and beautiful in its own right. Here are some pictures from just one of the trail loops there.

(click on a photo for gallery view)

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We recently visited the Manitou Cliff Dwellings in Manitou Springs, CO. It was interesting to see how the Anasazi tribes lived a thousand years ago! As we walked around the area we found ourselves wondering what the area must have looked liked at the time and how living then must have been both simpler and more difficult.

(click on a photo for gallery view)

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Hmmm, what to do when your truck is now old enough to vote? Why not celebrate! We hit a milestone of 100,000 miles the other day and just thought we’d give our old truck some credit where credit is due. To us, it still looks great and it runs fantastic. We’ve modified a few things to help it out with pulling the loads of today’s fifth wheel trailers. In diesel truck miles though, she’s still a ‘baby’!

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We took a nice day trip to a place called Helen Hunt Falls. The falls were honestly a bit underwhelming … but the hike up to the top of the mountain above it was pretty nice with some really nice views.

(click on an image for full screen view)

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There are so many places to go and see in Colorado. It’s going to be impossible for us to visit them all, but we’ll get to as many of them as we can!

If you do ever visit Colorado, a ‘bucket list’ place to go in Colorado Springs is a park called the Garden of the Gods. It’s open to the public, free, and AWESOME!

The following is a gallery of some photos from there.

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Here’s a link to a 360 degree view of the Siamese Twins.

So, we finished our first year on the road and it has been amazing! While we are definitely NOT seasoned pros, we figure we don’t have to call ourselves Newbies anymore!

We thought we’d write about some of the Ups and Downs we’ve experienced during our first year.

The biggest Up for us is the people we’ve met. We have made some great friends that we hope to stay in touch with. This one has two downsides, since we want to continue to travel, we have to say goodbye to the friends we’ve made, which is really sad! And of course, we miss our friends and family back home. Fortunately, since our house is on wheels, we can make plans to meet up with our old friends from back home and the new friends we meet on the way!

The next big Plus has been the places we’ve seen. We haven’t traveled as far as we’d like, but we have seen a lot of the country that is new to us. We have also been able to spend time in these areas and see what it is really like, not just the touristy stuff we used to see in a week or so on vacation.

The Down for this is missing some of the places back home we love, especially Ocean City, Maryland. So far we still consider Ocean City to be our favorite place in the world and we almost always got there at least once a year when we lived in Maryland.

So far workamping has been a Plus, we’ve really enjoyed it. We get to know our co-workers which is a lot of fun and gives us a sense of community. “Workamping” itself is a learning experience. We are still working on our ‘balance’ of how much we want to work and the type of work we want to do.

Of course, one big, surprising downer for us has been COVID-19, but that’s been a downer for everyone. For us it means we haven’t gotten to see and do as much as we wanted to for the last few months, but for the most part, it’s just a big inconvenience. We know many people have been affected much worse than we have, so we really have nothing to complain about.

All in all it’s been a great experience! No regrets! We are truly looking forward to many more years on the road!

We finally got a chance to get out and see some of the area around us! Like everyone else, we have been pretty much shut-in due to COVID-19, but as things are starting to open up we are looking forward to being able to get out and see the area surrounding Denver.

For our first outing we drove the Lariat Loop Scenic Byway. It is about a 40 mile drive that starts about 10 miles from where we’re staying in the charming town of Morrison. Unfortunately, Morrison’s main attraction, the Red Rocks Amphitheater and Park, is still closed.

From Morrison we drove west on the loop and through a few other small towns. There are several County and Municipal Parks along this drive that we want to come back to, but for today we really just wanted to drive the whole loop so we decided not to stop, which turned out to be a good thing, since they were all full!

Next was the town of Evergeen, which is really cute and looks like a great place to come back and spend an afternoon.

We did stop at the top of Lookout Mountain to see the view and take a few pictures. The view from here was amazing!

(click on a photo for gallery view)

Driving down Lookout Mountain was fun, but a little creepy. It was pretty steep with a lot of switchbacks and hairpin turns. One thing that amazed us was the number of bicyclists we saw going UP the road.

About a third of the way down the mountain was a pulloff that overlooked the city of Golden. We stopped to appreciate the view of the Coors brewery!

Once we got to Golden we stopped for lunch (and a Coors of course!) at the Old Capital Grill and Smokehouse.

(click on a photo for gallery view)

It was great to see some of the area around where we are staying and get some ideas of places to visit in the future. We sure are glad we didn’t make this drive with the trailer in tow!