The week before Vegas..sorry, guys!

Okay, so it's been over a week since my last post.  Sorry!!  For those of you who were hanging in limbo, just waiting for my next post, the wait is over!  Just kidding :-)  Anyway, we're not dead yet.  Unfortunately (or, fortunately?)  we have been completely without WIFI for the  past week (or electricity, for that matter) and have been unable to update you with our travels (gasp!).  Tonight, I will do my best to fill you in on the last week, and do "best of the best."  Tomorrow, with any luck, I shall finish the rest of the time up to, and including, Las Vegas. 

So, when we left off, I had just gone to a concert at Red Rocks in Denver.  Ray Lamontagne was fabulous, and we had a most excellent time with my cousins...

Denver

The next day, my cousins left for St. Louis, and we headed over to Eric's cousin's house.  We spent two days there, and had a blast playing hide-and-seek and exploring Denver.  The time we spent in Denver was really split: my cousins live in the suburbs; whereas, Eric's cousins live in the city.  It was nice to see both sides of the spectrum.

While in Denver, we went to the botanical gardens.  We took a ton of great photos, and got to see lots of plants that usually only live in the desert.  The gardens definitely gave us a taste of things to come, as most of our week was spent in the desert.  Eric also became our unofficial photographer.

On our last night in Denver, we met up with an old friend of Eric's for dinner.  We had a great meal, and continued to explore the city afterward. The coolest thing about Denver was the pianos all over the city.  Eric sat down and played a few, but there were many more.

Dinosaur National Monument

When we drove from Colorado to Utah, it literally snowed.  It was one of the most bizarre things I have ever experienced.  Fortunately, the snow did not last long, and did not get very deep, which made our trip through the Rockies pretty easy.

Dinosaur National Monument was a pretty crazy place.  Although we were not able to collect fossils, they were certainly in abundance.  We saw fossilized fish scales, and dinosaur femurs and vertebrate.  Unfortunately the "quarry" was out-of-service due to the previous night's rain, so we could not see the park's largest collection of fossils.  However, we did have a great time camping in the park.  Surprisingly, we are getting pretty good at cooking over a fire, and have actually made some awesome campfire meals.

Anyway, I am absolutely exhausted and don't want to cheat you out of a proper account of the past few days.  I am off to bed, and will update you in the morning. For now, we are safe and sound in Vegas :)