Bill's Trips 2019

Marilyn, Maria, and Brendan as we stopped in Glenwood Canyon at a rest area to view the Colorado River. We spent our final day with Brendan and Maria White, our good friends who live in Gypsum, down valley from Vail.  We drove there to pick them.  Graciously and thankfully, Brendan offered to drive for the day which meant that I would be able to enjoy the scenery rather than focus on driving on unfamiliar roads.  Almost as soon as we left, I saw the wisdom in this since we drove through Glenwood Canyon on I-70.  It is spectacular.  As Brendan said, if there were not an interstate running through it, Glenwood Canyon would have long ago beeen designated as a National Park. Brendan grew up in Buffalo and attended Miami University (Ohio) on a track scholarship.  Shortly after that, he moved to Brendan gazing with affection at the Maroon Bells Colorado and began working at Vail on the ski mountain and doing a lot of skiing, mountaineering and running as in marathons and extreme

View of the ski mountain from Ford Park Sunday morning after breakfast with the BeadforLife group, we checked out of the lodge and spent the day exploring Vail.  We began with Ford Park which was adjacent to the lodge.  Named after President Ford and Betty, this park contains playing fields, playground, picnic areas, and an ampitheater name for the President.  But the jewel is an alpine garden named for Betty.  The Betty Ford Alpine Gardens  " is an internationally acclaimed botanic gardens known for its alpine horticulture, education and conservation....[It] is the highest...botanical garden in the world situated at 8,200’ (2,700 m) in the central Rocky Mountains." (Quotation from website)  Spring is usually the best time to visit a garden and this one is particuarly beautiful at that time of year.  However, we were there in late fall (for the maountains.)  The aspen on the hillsides were mostly bare and the alpine plants had generally tucked themselves in for the winte

Every two years, we travel to Colorado for a meeting of the BeadforLife Community Partners.   These are people from all regions of the country who represent BeadforLife through selling the stunningly beautiful jewelry made from recycled paper by women in Uganda and who tell the BeadforLife story to groups, large and small.  We have been Community Partners for six years and it has become a major part of our personal social ministry.  In a later post, we will sahre more of its work and success in eliminating extreme poverty. But for now, we want to share our time in Colorado.  The meetings lasted a day and half but we arrived a day early and stayed  three days after to enjoy some of what Colorado has to offer.  We arrived in Denver just as the first snow storm of the season was ending.  We had spent almost two hours on the ground waiting for the Denver airport to reopen.  It has closed due to snow, blowing snow, and only quarter mile visibility.  Our bags were delayed almost an hour du