Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Dreaming of Colorado

Have you been to Colorado? I have not. And I can't believe that. Me who has traveled to so many states and so many countries over the past 43 years...how could I have missed Colorado? It is a cool place, with so much to see and do, yet somehow it has escaped me. Ok, ok, I drove straight through it once when I was like 11 or 12, and once when I was in my 20s and hightailing it back to the east coast after a summer living in Portland, Oregon, but on the first trip my mother was driving and on the second my ex-husband was driving, and I am pretty sure I slept most of the way through the state. So those drive-bys do not count. I have not experienced Colorado. I have not seen the Rockies, or Boulder, Denver, Colorado Springs, Grand Junction, Pueblo, Durango - these places I've read about and want to see.

Not my photo
Now that I live in Utah, Colorado is so teasingly close. It is just east of me. In the state next door. Just over this mountain range in my back yard. Well...just 200 miles and about a 4 hour drive over the mountain range if you take Route 40. But that isn't that far is it? That is less time than it used to take me to drive up to NYC from Washington, DC, if I remember correctly. Route 40 takes you to a town on the border called Dinosaur. Can you imagine living in Dinosaur, Colorado?  Population 319 according to my friend Wikipedia. It is really only there because of something called the Dinosaur National Monument. Take a guess on why it has that name. Yes, you are correct. Dinosaur fossils. I read somewhere that this location has more than half of all the different kinds of dinosaurs that ever lived in North America during the late Jurassic period. I am not really into dinosaur fossils, but that sounds pretty cool. Sounds worth a visit. Sounds worth the four hour drive from here.

So, again, have you been to Colorado? What do you love about the place and what should I see when I finally get there?

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