No Internet Connection

Haven’t been able to update the blog for the last couple of days, Chris and Manu’s internet connection stopped working a couple days ago and we couldn’t figure out what was going on with it until this morning. The next door neighbor had a security system installed in their house and the frequency from the camera’s attached to the outside of the house have been interfering with the wireless signal and not allowing us to connect to the internet. But were back up and I need to catch you up on the last couple of days.

Chris’s promotion ceremony went really nice, after the ceremony they had cake and coffee at the reception. That evening was also Chris’s promotion dinner and party, Chris’s Dad was on the grill cooking steaks that were awesome along with all the side dishes. After the party started winding done and it was just close friends and family left we pull out the game of Set, if you haven’t played this card game, you must. We were introduced to it from our friends Ed and Kim back in Germany and just how it was with them, it was with everyone here…A Big Hit!!!

Posted via email from Europerience

Casual Day

Didn’t do a lot yesterday, a little shopping. Chris and Manu have family coming in for Chris’s Promotion Ceremony so Russ and I are checking into a hotel for a couple of days while their family is here. We all went out for a late dinner at the Olive Garden last night, kind of a pre promotion dinner. Slept in this morning for the first time since we started our trip, but who says your supposed to rest while on vacation.

We have Chris’s Promotion Ceremony in couple of ours and I need to iron clothes and get ready…

Posted via email from Europerience

Garden Of The Gods Video

Garden of the Gods

We had a beautiful sunny day, so we spent the day at the Garden of the Gods and Manitou Springs.  The Garden of the Gods Park is a registered National Natural Landmark. Imagine dramatic views, 300′ towering sandstone rock formations against a backdrop of snow-capped Pikes Peak and brilliant blue skies.  It is really something to see, from the Garden of the Gods we headed to Manitou Springs which is hidden between Garden of the Gods and Pikes Peak,  ”Manitou,” a Native American word for “spirit,” describes this beautiful mountain community. Eleven named mineral springs throughout town are fed by the snows of Pikes Peak.  The Ute, Cheyenne and many other natives considered this area sacred (a little history for you).
We walked through the town and stopped and got ice cream for the kids, and the big kids too at the Colorado Custard Company which is famous for it’s frozen custard ice cream…Yum Yum!
After a wonderful afternoon with Manu, Michelle and the kids, Russ and I shot over to Ft. Carson to get hair cuts, more so for Russ because he’ll be doing military stuff on Tuesday.  We all met back at the house and decided to go out for dinner, Manu had been wanting to try this Italian Restaurant called IL Vicino that does the wood oven pizza’s.  And what a great call, the food and service what excellent.  Check out their web site at http://ilvicino.com
To see all the photo’s from the day, go to my Mobile Gallery at http://gallery.me.com/allene.jones 

Monarch

Had a GREAT DAY of Snowboarding today at the Monarch Ski Resort.

Posted via email from Europerience

Panini’s and 31

Had a great evening with Russ, Chris, Manu, Michelle, and Mark. The evening started with Chris’s Famous Grilled Chicken Panini’s on Sour Dough Bread and they were awesome. After dinner Mark, Michelle, and the Kids came over and we opened a couple bottles of wine and played this card game called 31.

Now, I’ll try to explain how you play. You use a deck of cards  and each player gets three cards, and the object of the game is to get 31, each player takes a turn drawing and discarding with the hopes of getting the right cards (same suit) to equal 31 or as close to it. Once you have or as close to 31 as you   think you can get, you must knock on the table before but not after your turn. Once a player knocks the remaining players get a final turn to get as close to 31 as they can, then everyone shows their cards and the player with the lowest amount pays into the pot. You can decide the amount of money you want to play with to make the game more interesting if your gambler. We just used pennies for fun. Now one last important thing if a player gets 31 they don’t have to wait to knock, they can immediatley lay down there cards and every player pays the pot. So that’s the jist of it, it’s a pretty fun game. If you need more information I think you can google Card Game 31. The evening was a lot of fun.

Posted via email from Europerience

Castle Rock

Went shopping today at the Outlet Mall in Castle Rock. Bought some clothes and picked up some souvineers, some of the prices were pretty good and some were like “I thought this was an Outlet Mall where the prices were suppose to be cheaper”. After a few hours of shopping we headed back to Colorado Springs.
For dinner we went out for some authentic Mexican Food, and it was fantastic, but the Margaritas were way to strong, we had to send them back. So the waiter suggested we try a Cadillac which was pretty good. I now know that I will not be eating Mexican Food any longer in Germany, because what I thought was good, is crap compare to this.
We ended up going to bed early, the jet lag finally caught up with us to the point of feeling a little delirious…LOL

Night Good

See….Delirious!

Posted via email from Europerience

Late arrival into Denver

Well, our late departure from Frankfurt caused a late arrival into Denver. Once off the plane we had clear customs, wait for our bags, clear immigrations, recheck our bags, wait in line again at the security check point, then catch the train to terminal B. Once we got off the train we were at gate 24 and needed to go to gate 81, and the mad dash began, only to get to the gate and be told by the ticket agent (who wasn’t very friendly) that the gate was closed.

So we had to go to the customer service and they were able to get us on the next flight that left about an hour and a half later. We finally arrived in Colorado Springs at about 8:30pm, Chris was waiting for us, we grabbed our bags, loaded up and headed to Arby’s…Roast Beef Sandwiches and Curly Fries, haven’t had that in a long time. We got to Chris and Manu’s at about 10:00pm sat up and talked till around midnight and finished off two bottles of wine. Slept Great!!!

Woke up this morning at 7:00am, had a couple cups of coffee, took showers and Manu, Russ, and myself headed out to do a little site seeing downtown and then to the Apple Store to see how to recover deleted photo’s on Russ’s MacBook which was a success. Went to Best Buy a bought a new digital camera, because to one I have just isn’t doing the job any more. I got a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1 and I love it, compact and slim. We had lunch at Wendy’s another fast-food we haven’t had in while, and went to Barnes and Nobles to get a couple of magazines and books.

Had a pretty nice afternoon,

Posted via email from Europerience

Finally in our seats

Finally made it on board, our flight is scheduled to leave at 1:15 and it’s now 1:55. “I think we missed that window”. Seats are OK would have rather had an exit roll. Couple of crying kids close by hopefully it won’t last long.

Well that’s my last post till we get to Colorado.

Cheers!

Posted via email from Europerience

Time to Hurd the Cattle

Well, time to board our flight. They changed our gate on us and we didn’t hear it. So after realizing that there weren’t to many people waiting for the flight we decided to ask.

We were changed from Gate 14 to Gate 20 and this is what we walked into “Mass Confusion”

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”

Posted via email from Europerience

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.