Estes Park, CO. PFR'09

As the Perkins family all start to post their accounts of the fantastic PFR'09 I find myself compelled to share the Leander Perkins Family account of PFR'09.

Originally Dan and I planned on camping our way up to Estes and back but with Dan's schedule keeping him in court up until our departure we decided to shed that layer of complication and just find pet friendly accommodations on our North bound route.

Diego, our Explorer (Dora's replacement) got a check-up before we started the long trek up IH-35. Day one was our long day as we drove all the way to Hays, Ks and stayed in a clean but microscopic Baymont Inn. AJ and Reese are fantastic travelers :) Each stop along the road was met with compliments for our "well-behaved, beautiful" dogs! Ha! I can go with the "beautiful dogs" business but...

Day two of driving was fairly short with a quick 5hr jaunt from Hays to Denver for our visit with the Stapleton Perkins family.

Dan and Steve rode in a group ride (Copper Triangle) on Saturday and Laura and I got pedi's on Sunday. I laughed about how the ladies in the salon complained about the 'heat'...16 degrees cooler with no humidity felt like heaven to me!

On Monday we arrived in Estes and dropped AJ and Reese off at Linda's pet care (no dogs allowed at the reunion cabin as per the Y-camp rules). Wow. One word for the Fairchild cabin is wow. Oh, another word is HUGE! What a wonderful space to host a family reunion! Two stoves, two microwaves, two dishwashers, two fridges, plenty of counter and storage space! Wonderful! The view was amazing and now I wish we would have spent more time sitting outside and enjoying that view.

Dan and I went into town daily to play with the dogs at the bark park. I'm not sure who had more fun...us or the dogs! On Wednesday we took Caroline into town with us and took Orvis to the park as well. Swimming and running was just what the boys needed!

Not only did I get to go on my very first hay ride this trip, I also rode my first horse! Frank (named after Frank Sinatra...one blue eye) was a great horse and even let me drive some of the time. Dan's horse, Bill, wasn't as agreeable and didn't let Dan drive much at all! I heard a lot of "whoa Bill, don't crowd Frank" from behind me.

We missed the Sprague Lake hike but tried a hike of our own up Emerald Mtn. Unfortunately the trail we were looking for was closed off for revitalization so we stayed on the available trail and eventually circumnavigated all of Emerald Mtn. After four hours we were ready to get back to the cabin. It was a lovely day with my Danno.

On Friday the party ended. Courtney and Cliff had to zip back to Texas with the girls and get Cliff on a Sunday plane for the work week. John and Darby loaded up the boys after a fun morning of zooming around and playing and followed Steve & Laura to Denver for an overnight visit before loading onto a south bound plane for Texas. Dan and I stayed one night in Broadview with Max and Caroline soaking up the phenomenal view. Cousin Julie and her fiance came for dinner and we talked and played Boggle for what must have been hours!

Dan's final adventure of our vacation culminated as he jogged across the finish line at the Boulder 5430 Triathlon. Laura and I camped out at the reservoir beach with Will and Alex for the morning. The boys played and played and played in the water with their trucks! It was fantastic. Max and Caroline arrived in time to watch Dan cross the finish line and to catch up with Steve after his foot injury.

So, back in the car for the long drive home. As much fun as we had we were ready to get home. I think the dogs missed their cats (hmmm?) but I know they missed their Mommoo (I know I missed her).

I took more photos than are in the slide show but I wanted to share my favorites (there are so many) with you. I've never embedded a slide show so I hope it works!