wavywards: Living Off the Land

We spent a week living out of a pop up camper trailer in Winding River Resorts in Grand Lake, Colorado. We arrived the Friday of Labor Day weekend. The weekend was beautiful. The resort provided a pancake breakfast both Saturday and Sunday mornings and an ice cream social Saturday night. We got to pet the horses and the smaller animals at the animal park. There were bunnies, pigs, chickens, roosters, goats and sheep, a Shetland pony and a donkey. Casey could spend hours feeding the goats dandelions and grass.

Grand Lake has a great main street boardwalk with lots of restaurants, ice cream shops and souvenir shops. There is a marina and a beach area and a big playground, so Casey found plenty to do in town. We rented a pontoon boat for a couple hours and toured around Grand Lake and had a picnic lunch. Grand Lake is the smallest of the 3 lakes (there is Shadow Lake and Granby Lake too). We drove into Rocky Mountain National Park and took an easy 1/2 mile hike/walk along the river. With Casey the walk took over an hour, but she had fun, running to all the informational signs and testing out all the benches. We drove Trail Ridge Road to Horseshoe Park, then returned on Old Fall Road, a dirt road.

It rained Tuesday and Wednesday, but Casey was a trooper! She had fun reading books at the library and playing with her toys in the "clubhouse" (our camper). Wednesday, while Stan worked from the camper, Casey and I drove through the entire park, which take a good hour and 45 minutes one way. Though grumpy when we got to Bear Lake, she walked the 300 ft and let me get a picture in the rain.

Thursday, we drove to Dillon in the morning for Casey's first swim lesson. Casey had no problem going with her class and playing the little games. Her only issue is she doesn't go underwater yet. Half the class does, so we're hoping she will gain the courage before the 6 weeks is over. She seemed to have enjoyed it. We then picked Sarah and Rowan up and returned to the campsite. Casey was SO excited to have Rowan to play with. Friday morning the girls got to ride horses, while we led them around the campground. Neither girl was ready to get off the horse. They loved it. Casey rode the white horse, Star. Stan went for his first ever horseback ride too and seemed to enjoy it. He was the only one, so he got a private tour. We went into town for lunch, beach time, playground time after Brian got in town. Back to the campsite for hot dogs and smores. The girls played horseshoes, football, rode Casey's strider. Needless to say, Casey was exhausted!

Saturday we drove to Denver to hang with Steve and Stacia and watch College Football, Go Hokies!! We are now back home and Casey couldn't be more happy to see her toys.
"Mommy, I love our home." She pulled out every toy and book she could yesterday. We didn't here from her until dinner and then she went right back upstairs after dinner for a good hour and a half. She was devastated when she had to leave her books and come down for a bath.

The camper was AWESOME! We were hooked up to electric and water all week, so I wouldn't call it "roughing it." We also had a heater running off propane which worked out very nice, especially since after the rain, the nights got down to the lower 30's. The campground also provided really nice bathrooms with warm showers. Casey would get really excited when we returned to our campsite..."Look, there's our campsite and there's our port-a-potty!"

Casey wants to wish her cousin, Lily, a very Happy Birthday!!
On to pictures...