Final Destination, Ouray, Colorado

We left Mesa Verde on Thursday after lunch with about 125 miles to drive to Ouray, Colorado. If this had been a class on trip planning, I would've failed because, while I knew that Ouray was at an elevation of close to 8,000 feet, I failed to notice that one has to drive over not one, but two, nearly 11,000 foot passes. Woops! Here we are at the second and highest pass - Phew! Made it!


We arrived in Ouray in time to join the bride and groom for pizza and beer at the local pizza joint. On Friday after doing some obligatory laundry at the laundromat (a word that has now been added to Sofia's pretend/playtime vocabulary), we went to the local community hot springs. Very nice and relaxing. On Saturday we took a nice walk around town and up to a waterfall.


Then the wedding festivities began... The welcome dinner, hosted by Tom's parents, was held Saturday night at another bed & breakfast across the street for all of the 27 guests of the wedding.
Chris and Sofia

Shealyn and Sofia (photo by Geoff Smith)

Me (Alexis), Susan (my mom), Erin (the bride), Shelden (my sister) (photo by Geoff Smith)

Sunday the wedding was to be held at 3:00 at "Inspiration Point", about 20 minutes northish of Ouray. The weather had been perfect the whole time we were there, always with some clouds hanging around, just in case it might need to rain. So, there we were at 2:00 on Sunday, everyone piling in to cars, dressed in our finest, and it was POURING. The locals were confident that everything would be ok at the ceremony location so we went ahead. They were right - a bit chilly but a gorgeous location.

Sofia, Shealyn & Maia before the ceremony
The ceremony went off without a hitch... oh, except for one smalllllll detail.

I'm afraid Sofia's career as a ringbearer is over. She had to be coaxed to walk down the aisle (or dirt path as it was) by Faith, the maid of honor. Well, I suppose worse things could've happened. She perked up and had an absolute blast dancing with Grandpa and others at the reception. The reception was held back in Ouray at and old, superbly renovated hotel.

And here they are, the lovely bride and groom, following the ceremony:
(Photo by Geoff Smith)

So that's our trip! We had a great time. Our drive home was pretty much miserable because we had to drive 1,000 miles in two days and that is just too much, even for two grown adults, let alone the little people. Next time (haha) we'll plan a more leisurely route the whole way. We do think traveling to the northwest next summer might be in the cards, so we'll see... If you haven't already, check out our flickr site, which has more photos of the whole trip (click on the Colorado button along the right side).