Colorado-Day 5

Josh's uncle Terry, his wife Karen, and daughter Ashlyn decided to take us up into some Colorado "back country". When he said back country, he meant it. We were gone for like 8 hours that day in a vehicle with 3 toddlers.....the ride home wasn't too pretty. We had a wonderful time though and saw some of God's amazing beauty. I think Terry thought I was crazy because of the way I got sooo excited about all the beautiful colors of the aspen trees. I've always wanted to get pictures of them when they were changing colors and I was just so excited to have that opportunity. Truly a remarkable experience!

We saw some wildlife. We were really hoping to see a moose because Terry had seen some up where we were a few weeks prior, but no such luck for us on this trip. Collin was able to call a coyote out of the woods though with a coyote call, so he was excited about that.

Josh and Carter

Collin checking out the sights....with his binoculars backwards. :-)

We then made it high enough to see the beautiful changing aspen trees. I took sooo many pictures of them, but these are a few of my favorites.

Terry told me of a grove of aspens that he had seen before, so when we came upon it, I jumped out of the vehicle with Karen and we hiked off into the woods to capture some amazing photos. It was pretty surreal to just be out in the middle of nowhere amongst all these beautiful trees. I was getting a little scared that we would run upon something we didn't want to (like a bear), so we started to head back. I fell along the way and really bruised my bum, but it was well worth it. Luckily Josh had his binoculars out watching us and happened to see me fall so when I got back to the car Collin was quick to inform me that he saw me "bust my bottom" out there in the woods. Terry also informed me after we got back that not too far from here was where a little boy got carried off by a cougar once.....geez....wish I would have known that before I walked out in the middle of nowhere! :-)

This field behind us in this picture is the one I walked across to get to that grove of aspens. :-)

We then headed much much farther into the mountains up to Longs Peak. It was snowing pretty hard while we were there.

Carter was not a fan of the cold.

Collin loved it! He was catching snowflakes on his tongue and throwing snowballs at us all.

After our adventure, we headed back to Grandpa and Gigi's for dinner and smores! We all had a great time!