Cliff Dwellings

I woke up this morning and Rodney was missing.  He had gotten up at 5:30 and decided to go for a walk.  He saw a buck right outside our house as he left.  Pays to be an early bird!  Rodney ended up walking around the town of Woodland Springs and finding a donut shop so he brought home a big box of huge donuts for everyone.  Everybody wins!

Buck in front of cabin

After breakfast, Rodney left to wash the car and get some ga$.  Yikes!

Our big event for today was to visit the Manitou Cliff Dwellings.  There was already a line of cars waiting to get in when we arrived at 9:45.

Sorry, no martinis allowed.  Ha!

The cliff dwellings were really cool.  You could go inside and explore everywhere.  Some places were easier to get to than others.  It really was amazing to see how they lived.

There was even a fancy cliff dwelling with a balcony.

Enjoying the beautiful view outside the gift shop.

After exploring the cliff dwellings and doing some shopping in the gift shop (Caleb got some real gold and Morgan chose a sticker), we drove over to downtown Manitou Springs.  It was just before noon and the whole area was packed.  The only parking we could find was on a residential street several blocks away.

Downtown Manitou Springs

We were getting hungry so we found a place to eat called Border Burger.  We had a short wait so the kids amused themselves on this giant rock outside.  I'm happy that they're still young enough to be entertained by a big rock.

I'm also glad that they're old enough to do this with minimal supervision so Rodney and I can get a drink and wait in the air conditioning.

Lunch was delicious.  We highly recommend Border Burger if you're ever in town.  After lunch, we explored some more downtown and Caleb was particularly interested in the House of Jerky.  To his disappointment, we left empty handed.

When we'd had enough of shopping, we headed back to the cabin to relax a bit.  Some of us planned to take a hike, but it looked like the weather was not going to cooperate.  Eventually, we decided the rain was never really going to amount to anything and we took our chances and left for the hike. 

Our hike began in the tiny town of Green Mountain Falls.  This place is like a postcard.  There is a small downtown area with local shops and restaurants, a beautiful church (named Church in the Wildwood...it had Ryan and I singing the Cokesbury hymn), and a pond with a gazebo island and geese just hanging out all over.

The town is nestled in the valley with houses dotting the bottom of the mountain.  The trailhead is up the mountain past the houses and you have to park downtown and walk through town to get there because they don't want a bunch of hikers parking all over their quiet residential streets.

We finally made it to the trailhead!

We came upon a small waterfall almost immediately.  This hike is looking good so far!

The trail was pretty steep and took us up the mountain quite a ways.  The views were beautiful.

Caleb found a tiny cave

We made it to the top!

No Calebs were harmed in the taking of this photo

Toward the end of the hike, we came upon another waterfall.  This one was much bigger!

We continued on the trail until it seemed to vanish.  We figured out that the trail crossed the waterfall creek.  The water was cold!

On our way back through town to our car, we spotted a little fox.  It was so cute (and at a safe distance)!

We also saw a deer in someone's yard and more deer at our own cabin when we got back.  Deer are everywhere here!