Wild wild west, a real cliffhanger! Trip report

[Songbird76]

August 7th, continued...




I loved these little purple flowers and thought maybe we could put some in our yard, if E will tend to them. She really is itching to have a garden. She had started a few plants last summer, but we were in the US for a month and there was a drought, so she came back to dead plants. She had tried to rig up an irrigation drip system with an upside down coke bottle, but it went too fast.


If you look closely, there's a squirrel on the left branch of the tree, right in the center of the picture. We watched him scurry for a bit.



There's my husband pushing Karla in the wheelchair, and my daughter is ahead looking at some plant she liked, probably using google lens to identify it.

 

[Songbird76]

August 7th, continued...

I've been practicing my photography. @fractal recommended a book to me and I've been practicing how to blur backgrounds or make them clear, how to get the light right, etc. I haven't mastered the knack of portraits, but I seem to do ok with plants.

 

[MinnieM123]

All of your garden photos are gorgeous! Your photography skills are quite impressive!

What a beautiful place you visited.

 

[Songbird76]

August 7th, continued...

After the gardens, we weren't sure what to do. It was too early for dinner, but too late for another site, and the kids had been really patient, but A was a bit bored, and Cameron was wanting to do something fun rather than old people stuff. We decided to try an arcade. We weren't sure if it would be too overstimulating for A. It's loud, there are lots of flashing lights, it's crowded....but he LOVES playing skeeball at the carnival, and those are similar situations, and he had loved the pinball machine at the museum in Gillette, so we thought we'd try it.

Anna is 15 and practicing for her drivers license, so she drove their massive vehicle and we followed. She did a very good job, though Justin had to stop her from entering a one way the wrong way. Cheyenne central is full of one ways, and it's confusing, so I can't blame her. And that big honking vehicle they need to carry their whole family plus Karla's crutches, wheelchair, etc has to be hard to maneuver. I tried to get some pictures of the Capitol building, but it was hard from the car. I ended up using my mirror to see if I could get a clear shot where the trees didn't obscure it completely. Enjoy my artistic endeavors.


And downtown Cheyenne, just because it's neat. Cheyenne and Casper are the two largest cities in Wyoming. They are around the same size, each with a population of around 50,000 people back when I was in school. Looks like Cheyenne now beats out Casper by around 5000 people. My how they've grown.


The arcade turned out to be great for A. He had so much fun. We bought cards for each of the kids to play the games, and Jaden showed up after a while to play, too. E was feeling overwhelmed by the noise and the busy. She played some air hockey with the kids, but mostly she sat quietly and tried to read and tune everything else out. She's not one for parties. While she likes hanging out with friends and such, she needs a recharge after a bit, and she values her quiet time, so we left her alone to find what peace she could in a loud, colorful, busy arcade. She was content to let the other kids have their fun, anyway.

The cards we bought have a set amount on them to play the games. There are no tokens or coins. When you play games like pinball or skeeball, you get points, and you can use those points for prizes. I like pinball and skeeball, so I played a few games myself, but I don't need any of the points for prizes. The prizes are things like mini slinkies, bouncy balls, candy, etc...unless you have massive numbers of points to get stuffed animals, or more grown-up things. I don't need any of that. There was nothing E wanted, so we combined my points with A's and he got a couple little things, but had a bunch of points left over, which we donated to Cameron. He's younger and is very excited by the massive amounts of candy he can get.

Played out, over-stimulated, and hungry, it was time for some foodage. Karla and I have a history at Applebees. (And Olive Garden) Neither of us are huge drinkers. Her disability makes getting drunk a bit risky with mobility. Her husband does cross fit or some big work out thing and he competes and everything, so he's muscly and able to help her, and with my husband there, too, she's in good hands. IF we are going to drink, it's the sweet froo-froo drinks. Applebees has always had a Mudslide, and Olive Garden had the Chocolate Amore, which is basically the same thing. So whenever we get together, we go to Applebees and we get tipsy and giggly and our husbands and children find it entertaining. One of the things I miss is the mozzarella sticks from Applebees, with marinara sauce. So we always order those, and then E and I order a steak and an order of Chicken Broccoli Alfredo, and we split both. I can neither confirm nor deny the rumor that I gave E a sip of my mudslide to taste its happiness. No pictures....I was probably a bit tipsy by the time our food came, and pictures would probably have only been blurry anyway. After dinner we went to hang out at their house again, I think. It's possible we went to the mall, which is right there, but I don't remember. Probably not if Karla and I were so giggly, etc. And it doesn't take much to get either of us tipsy because we hardly ever drink. So that was the end of that night. I do remember while we were at Applebees, we heard sirens and the restaurant a little ways away apparently had a fire and had to evacuate. I think we caught the tail end of it as we were leaving.

 

[Songbird76]

All of your garden photos are gorgeous! Your photography skills are quite impressive!

What a beautiful place you visited.

Thanks! I'm definitely no @fractal , but I'm improving. It really was gorgeous there!! And because of the weather, we had the place mostly to ourselves. Who wants to go look at flowers in the rain? But we only went out when it wasn't raining. There are a few spots on pictures where it was just starting to sprinkle again and a droplet or two got on my lens, and we headed out before it turned into a deluge. But it was perfect...peaceful and serene. We had good timing!

 

[MinnieM123]

Thanks! I'm definitely no @fractal , but I'm improving. It really was gorgeous there!! And because of the weather, we had the place mostly to ourselves. Who wants to go look at flowers in the rain? But we only went out when it wasn't raining. There are a few spots on pictures where it was just starting to sprinkle again and a droplet or two got on my lens, and we headed out before it turned into a deluge. But it was perfect...peaceful and serene. We had good timing!

Happy to learn that @fractal is sharing some photography pointers with you -- there's nothing like learning from the best!!

 

[Songbird76]

Happy to learn that @fractal is sharing some photography pointers with you -- there's nothing like learning from the best!!

Amen to that!! I doubt I will ever reach his level. But I do want to have nice vacation pictures and family pictures. My mom took my brother's and my senior pictures in high school, and they turned out really good and they look pretty professional. She had a REALLY good camera for back then, but my brother got that when she died. Honestly, if I ever win millions in the lottery, I'm going to buy a really good one and maybe take some classes, because it IS something I'm interested in, but I'm just not at that level right now. If I could take pictures like @fractal, I'd get a job as a photographer!

 

[Songbird76]

August 8th

This morning, we planned to get together with Karla's family for breakfast before heading out on the road. Karla's family was having issues. Jaden had practice for some sport....Golf, maybe? But the coach wouldn't let him practice without his Physical, which he had turned in the week before, but his coach couldn't find it and was saying Jaden never gave it to him. So they were trying to track down the doctors records to get another copy of the physical to turn in to the coach so Jaden could practice. We went to the Village Inn and got our name on a waiting list while we waited for their family...there was quite a hefty waitlist already. Karla's family made it just in time for our table to be ready. Our server was a superstar. We had a table of 9 people, all sitting intermixed despite separate tickets, because Karla needs to sit on an and because of her crutches, but the rest of her gang had already parked it at the other end of the table, and somehow she remembered every one of our drink orders and gave them to the right people. Amazing. (She also got a large tip!) Breakfast consumed, including Pie because it was possibly our last chance for Village Inn Pie (and how can you say no??) it was time to say our goodbyes. Always a very sad moment. But the kids had to run off to sport practices, and we had a long drive. I was sad to leave Karla and fam because who knows when we'll see them again? (I have yet to convince them to go to Disney, though they do go to Florida because Karla loves the beach and I think they have family there) BUT, we were on our way to my bestie's house in Denver, so I was excited for that. We had only gotten to see her in Casper for a day and she had to leave for a family emergency and hadn't been able to meet up with us again as planned. So now we would finally have a few days together. Bonus, her mom was there now, so I got to see "Mom" too.

I've always called her mom "Mom". Since we lived on the same street, we walked to school together every day, and we played together all the time. We spent a lot of time in each other's houses, in hers more than mine because my mom was so strict and her house had better snacks and entertainment. They were the first people to have a DVD player when they came out, and the first to have a fax machine. They had one of those soda making machines, where you put the bottle into the machine with whatever flavor syrup and it makes a bottle of soda. I remember being amazed when they had a computer and could talk live with other people on the computer....INTERNET! All the movies my mom wouldn't let me watch, like Pretty Woman, PeeWee Herman, Dirty Dancing....I watched them all at Shasta's house. The first time I ever went to Shasta's house, her dad answered the door and told me I couldn't come in if I wasn't housebroken. I didn't know dads could make jokes....I thought he was serious. Then he told me to eat my spinach so I'd grow up beautiful like him, and again, thinking he was serious, and in the honest way of children, I told him "But I don't want to be bald!" We ran tame in eachother's homes. Her dad passed away from brain cancer over a decade ago, and I was so sad. I wanted to be there for her and couldn't. But her mom had recently had an emergency and needed somewhere to go, and so there she was. So at least I got to see her mom.

This will be text heavy, because I wasn't worrying about pictures. We didn't do much in any case because her daughter had cheerleading camp every day while we were there.
I did take picture of our dessert at dinner. That's the important thing, I guess?

We ate at Saltgrass Steakhouse. My husband is a complete carnivore. He'll eat his veggies, but really he's all about the meat, and won't eat vegetarian-based main dishes. He likes a steak. In 2019, when we were on our vacation in Florida, he had complained about food not being good despite raving about several of our dining experiences. He had loved the Bon Voyage breakfast, and said his steak was cooked perfectly and everything had been delicious. We ate so much at our Boma breakfast that we could barely walk...he LOVED the sticky buns and bread pudding. Then at Pecos Bill, he asked why we hadn't been eating there all along as that was the first decent meal we'd had. Selective memory, much? Then at Universal, we left the parks every day for dinner and we went back to Olive Garden because he had raved so much about how great his shrimp pasta was and he wanted more. On our last night, he had booked us at a really cheap motel so we had a full day at the parks on our last day and didn't have to pay Universal or Disney prices for a hotel that night when we didn't need early entry perks before flying out. When we checked in, we noticed a Saltgrass Steakhouse just across the parking lot from our hotel. The kids didn't want food, so we had had a date night there and my husband fell in love with it. Best steak he'd ever had, he said. We got a Landry's membership which gave us a discount, and the month's deal was something about kids eating free or something, so we decided to go back the next day for lunch before we left. But there's no Saltgrass Steakhouse in the Netherlands and he LOVES it. There happens to be one in Denver, so he was looking forward to a big steak, and E and I were looking forward to battered mushrooms!
I don't know why I didn't get pictures of those. The chocolate cake was A's...he wouldn't eat there because he didn't like their fries and he won't eat steak. And then the cheesecake and apple pie were mine and E's and we shared.

 

[Songbird76]

August 9th

Addi had cheer camp every day, so she was up and gone early in the morning before we got up. I remember at some point we went grocery shopping for the stuff we wanted to send home. Cereal, gravy mix, jello, etc And also last minute "fixes" for the few days we had left. Pizza rolls, Pot pie, toaster strudels...things we can't send to ourselves in the mail, but can't get back home and need to enjoy now. Those were our breakfasts and lunches while we were at Shasta's house. Then we'd go out for dinner for our other "fixes". Saltgrass steakhouse for DH, a Mexican restaurant for all of us except A, and Indian for E and me. We'd go out to eat ourselves, and then take A to mcDonalds. While on vacation, everyone gets to eat what they like. It's no fun if you are starving, and we all have different tastes, so if we have to go to 2 or 3 different places, that's what we do. EVERYONE gets to enjoy meals. Fortunately, most of us are on the same page and A is easy to please. There's usually a McDonalds in any town of more than a few thousand people. In Denver, there are dozens of them.

I don't know what we did during the day. I know at some point I had to mail the box of Girl Scout Cookies, which I'm not even sure now that I mentioned buying cookies from my niece and having an entire box...like 20 boxes of cookies, to take home with us. Worried about the weight of the suitcases, I mailed them home with some jello mix, twizzlers, gravy mix, and a puzzle. I LOVE twizzlers and wish I could get them here. That's always on my list and I get the massive packages with the zipper close. I get several of them to last me until I can get my next fix. And I remember that my phone had lied to me about where the post office was...it had moved and my good friend google hadn't updated. I had to go into several businesses and ask where the nearest post office was and how to get there.

But I THINK we started off this morning with going to Dunkin Donuts to try and find chocolate-filled donuts. (Not to be confused with Chocolate Filled, donuts, which are totally different and people didn't seem to grasp this concept) A LOVES chocolate-filled ones. Not cream-filled donuts with chocolate frosting; not custard-filled donuts with chocolate icing; not chocolate donuts with any kind of filling. No, he wants a regular donut with chocolate filling, like nutella on the inside. It can have white icing or chocolate icing, but he wants the inside to be chocolate! We had been unable to find these anywhere so far. We have Dunkin Donuts here in the Netherlands now in a few places, and they have 2 different kinds with chocolate filling. So we figured that was the place to go. My husband had wanted to go to some computer store to get a part for the computer he was going to build. So we found a DD on the way. The kids were still back at Shasta's house sleeping. We went to DD, grabbed some breakfast sandwiches that were absolutely disgusting and got thrown away, and got a powdered donut with chocolate filling. Not exactly what A wanted, but it was the closest thing they had. Then we went to the computer store, got DH's cord, and then went back to Shasta's. I think most of the day was probably just spent gossiping and reminiscing. I learned several things about classmates I hadn't known, and we told lots of stories we had never told each other. She and I have always been friends, but there was a period, I think in our Junior year, where she got to be friends with a girl I didn't get along with at all. I thought she was kind of bad news. She had two older twin sisters who had a horrible reputation, and they were all on the speech and debate team with us. I think the only reason they joined was for the possibility of meeting cute boys and being away from their parents. None of them were very good at speech and debate and they weren't particularly motivated...it was more the social interaction with boys from other schools who didn't know them that attracted them. They were constantly getting in trouble for not being where they were supposed to be, for being late, for inappropriate behavior, etc...

My mom was extremely strict and her punishments were harsh. 1 time ever in my life of being 15 minutes late because I had to stop at a gas station for a bathroom resulted in a 3 week grounding. I wasn't allowed to wear makeup, my curfew was dark, and my mom believed people shouldn't date until their 30s. I was allowed to hang out in groups that included boys when I turned 17, provided it wasn't always the SAME boy, because that was dating and not allowed. I couldn't afford to get mixed up with this girl and her sisters, so when Shasta started hanging out with her, I kind of kept my distance. We ran in different circles, but we were always friends. And she never wanted me to get in trouble, so she protected me from that. When we were graduating, there was a big Senior party my classmates were planning, out in the middle of nowhere where the cops couldn't bust them, and they had someone who would buy them alcohol. There were some kids who I knew didn't really like me and they were for some reason angling really hard to get me to come to this party when I had never been invited to a party before, and I would never have gone even if I had been invited. It wasn't worth my mother's wrath. I was completely unpopular...the only senior in school on senior skip day because my mom wouldn't let me skip. I could tell something was up, but I didn't know what. Shasta came up to me in the halls and said under NO circumstances was I to go to the senior party! She had just overheard the kids talking and they were planning to get the guys to hold me down while they poured alcohol down my throat because they thought it would be funny to get me drunk. I had no intentions of going anyway, but it was sweet of Shasta to protect me. Anyway, she was more popular than I was, and so she had a lot of stories to tell, and we had fun reminiscing about all the things our classmates had gotten up to since high school. I was also a little surprised by how much her MOM knew about things. I know we talked until really late that night, just remembering things we had done in school, teachers who had been horrible to us, stupid things classmates did, etc.

Dinner that night was a Mexican place. It was really good and really inexpensive. One of Shasta's faves, I guess, and I can see why!

Looks like the first picture is my tostada with chicken, and the next one might be my enchilada? The one below my tostada seems to be fajitas....I think E ordered those, and then our plan was to share everything. I'm pretty sure my husband ordered a burrito, but I don't have a picture. And I don't know what Shasta's crew had. Sometimes it's hard to tell with Mexican food what's under all the lettuce, beans, rice, etc. I do remember E getting some sort of a Mexican soda, orange flavored. Google says Jarritos Mandarin. Addi had gotten one and Ella doesn't like most carbonated drinks. She likes Rootbeer, and occassionally cherry 7up, or cherry pepsi, but carbonated drinks often taste bitter to her, so she has a hard time in restaurants. She likes juice, but it's usually more expensive and no free refills. She likes lemonade, but found that a lot of the lemonade in restaurants had a weird after-taste. She was glad to find a drink she liked.



I took this from upstairs in Shasta's house looking down on her mom and the girls.



That's it...sorry, I know most of this probably isn't interesting to anyone. It's just us hanging out.

 

[Songbird76]

August 10th

Our last day. No idea what we did this day either. Slept in, packed, etc...but beyond that, I don't know. It was almost Addi's birthday, and her dad was flying in to celebrate. I know we booked a hotel for this night because it would be a logistical nightmare to stay at Shasta's that night because we had an early flight and had to return the rental car that night and didn't want Shasta to have to follow us to bring us back to her house and then get up in the middle of the night to drive us back to the airport, so we just booked a hotel at the airport and took the car back and got a shuttle bus back to the hotel and then again in the morning to the airport. We did go out for dinner at a restaurant called Yak and Yeti, which is NOT affiliated with Landry's. There were several Yak and Yetis in Denver, and I guess we happened to pick the ONE that was not affiliated with Landry's, but it was good.

I know E and I ordered Buttered chicken, and perhaps chicken curry. Shasta ordered a vegetable korma, and I BELIEVE Tikka Masala We ordered garlic naan, and I'm not sure what else. But we all shared. I think "mom" was maybe new to Indian food and didn't know what she'd like, so we just all ordered various things and shared. It was all really good, but the Tikka Masala was too spicy for E and me. (And of course A ate later at McDonalds) But the vegetable korma was really good, though Shasta had ordered it medium spicy, and that was too much for E and me. We ordered everything mild.



I at least got a picture of all of us together this time, unlike with Karla's family.



DH and Me on the way back to the hotel after dropping off the car. Shirley status!!

 

[fractal]

Nice job on the photos!

And I thought I had a strict Mom. You have a great friend in Shasta.

 

[Songbird76]

Nice job on the photos!

And I thought I had a strict Mom. You have a great friend in Shasta.

Thanks!! I have a long way to go, but everyone has to start somewhere, right?

My mom was super strict. Even my friends who were LDS (LDS are known for being very strict) had more freedom than I did. My mom actually refused to let me go shopping with my friend Nikki who was LDS, because she thought Nikki dressed "Too provocatively".

And yes, Shasta's about the best friend I can imagine. She's more like a sister than a friend. I miss her intensely.

 

[Songbird76]

Just for fun, I'll post some pictures from today. Since A LOVES sheep, we go to lamb adoption day every year. You can see them up close, there are vendors selling honey, jam, stuffed animals, etc. So A got a new plush that he named Russell.


There are hiking trails all over the place and I just really liked this spot with the fallen tree, etc.



It was really hard to get the settings right on these. The light kept changing, because any time someone stepped up to the door, they cast a shadow and I'd have to reset it to get a good picture, or the sheep would move into the sunlight or into shadow and then the settings would be off again.


They also do demonstrations of wool spinning, sheep herding with dogs, etc.



I took this for @MinnieM123 even though I know she can't read in Dutch. It's just an explanation of how donations help take care of the sheep and what you get with the 25 euro adoption fee.



I loved this little guy just chillin' on his own away from all the other sheep in the field, but pretty close up to the fence. And he stayed there the whole time, completely unbothered by my picture taking. Thanks, little dude!! The sun was in my eyes, so I wasn't sure what I was going to get...I couldn't really see the display on my camera with the glare, but it's not bad! And he's so cute!

 

[HouCuseChickie]

I'm so glad you posted food pics from The Yak and Yeti. It's a small Denver area chain that's not affiliated with Landry's. The food looks really good! I remember we passed one last summer. We were on our way to see a friend playing in Broomfield (outside of Boulder) on one of our off days and we passed it while we were looking for dinner options. We wound up picking something else that was quick and easy, but it looks like our Colorado hotel this summer is only about 5 minutes away from the Westminster location. Maybe I'll finally get to try it! It's also funny to see Saltgrass. I know they're now everywhere, but Landry's is Houston based, so we've got Saltgrass locations all over. It's funny, but it's their chuckwagon fries that are our Saltgrass favorite. The floral pics are also great!

 

[Songbird76]

I'm so glad you posted food pics from The Yak and Yeti. It's a small Denver area chain that's not affiliated with Landry's. The food looks really good! I remember we passed one last summer. We were on our way to see a friend playing in Broomfield (outside of Boulder) on one of our off days and we passed it while we were looking for dinner options. We wound up picking something else that was quick and easy, but it looks like our Colorado hotel this summer is only about 5 minutes away from the Westminster location. Maybe I'll finally get to try it! It's also funny to see Saltgrass. I know they're now everywhere, but Landry's is Houston based, so we've got Saltgrass locations all over. It's funny, but it's their chuckwagon fries that are our Saltgrass favorite. The floral pics are also great!

I don't know if ALL the Yak and Yetis in Denver are the same chain or if some of them are Landry's. No idea, but the one we went to was NOT. But it was soooo good. I hope you get to try it!

We're pretty much only going to Saltgrass this summer for the mushrooms. We MISS deepfried mushrooms, and I scoured the disney menus and it doesn't look like you can get them anywhere on property. Not at Universal either. So we plan to do Saltgrass once just for those. E and I are huge fans of fries. We love a good steak, though E is pretty picky about her steaks. But what we really want is the mushrooms, so we've decided we'll order one order of mushrooms and one steak, and we'll share both. I could honestly probably eat an entire order of the mushrooms myself. I wish we could get them here.

 

[HouCuseChickie]

I don't know if ALL the Yak and Yetis in Denver are the same chain or if some of them are Landry's. No idea, but the one we went to was NOT. But it was soooo good. I hope you get to try it!

We're pretty much only going to Saltgrass this summer for the mushrooms. We MISS deepfried mushrooms, and I scoured the disney menus and it doesn't look like you can get them anywhere on property. Not at Universal either. So we plan to do Saltgrass once just for those. E and I are huge fans of fries. We love a good steak, though E is pretty picky about her steaks. But what we really want is the mushrooms, so we've decided we'll order one order of mushrooms and one steak, and we'll share both. I could honestly probably eat an entire order of the mushrooms myself. I wish we could get them here.

As far as I can see from the Landry's site, the only one they own is the WDW location. So, they're unaffiliated establishments. Either way, I was looking at the menu for the CO places and I'm ready to go...NOW! LOL

I think we had the Saltgrass mushrooms back in December. We don't order those as often, but Saltgrass has really good ranch dressing, so the dipping adds to the appeal. It's too bad that none of the restaurants on Disney property serve them. They are a really popular appetizer where we live. Still, we usually stick to one appetizer at Saltgrass to leave some room for steak, especially since you get the bread/honey-butter, soup or salad, and two sides. It's a lot of food. I like that their chuckwagon fries are the cubed home fries vs. traditional French fries. Sam went through a phase where that was all she'd want as her meal. She's growing into a steak lover and a much more expensive date!

 

[Songbird76]

As far as I can see from the Landry's site, the only one they own is the WDW location. So, they're unaffiliated establishments. Either way, I was looking at the menu for the CO places and I'm ready to go...NOW! LOL

I think we had the Saltgrass mushrooms back in December. We don't order those as often, but Saltgrass has really good ranch dressing, so the dipping adds to the appeal. It's too bad that none of the restaurants on Disney property serve them. They are a really popular appetizer where we live. Still, we usually stick to one appetizer at Saltgrass to leave some room for steak, especially since you get the bread/honey-butter, soup or salad, and two sides. It's a lot of food. I like that their chuckwagon fries are the cubed home fries vs. traditional French fries. Sam went through a phase where that was all she'd want as her meal. She's growing into a steak lover and a much more expensive date!

E and I cheat and share an entree. Neither of us can eat a full meal there, so we just share. But I could absolutely make a meal of just the mushrooms.

 

[HouCuseChickie]

E and I cheat and share an entree. Neither of us can eat a full meal there, so we just share. But I could absolutely make a meal of just the mushrooms.

Sadly, we are all able to finish full meals at Saltgrass. Oh, and I was in the market last night and after all of this mushroom talk, I had to buy a box! Not as good as restaurant ones, but it satisfied the craving.

 

[Songbird76]

Sadly, we are all able to finish full meals at Saltgrass. Oh, and I was in the market last night and after all of this mushroom talk, I had to buy a box! Not as good as restaurant ones, but it satisfied the craving.

View attachment 710182

We sometimes get tempura batter mix and do up a bunch of veggies and mushrooms. Not quite the same, but it does satisfy the craving, and that's as close as we can get here.