Denver Archives - Page 3 of 3

A Brewery Tour for the Books

Published on February 17, 2015 by Cheryl LockLeave a comment

Hey friends,

As I mentioned yesterday, Chris and I used Valentine’s Day as an excuse to cash in on a Christmas gift from our soon-to-be-brother-in-law and take a walking brewery tour around Denver. Since we had only been to one brewery before the tour, it really was a fun thing to do on a Saturday.

The tour started out at Rock Bottom which, as it turns out, was the very first Rock Bottom in what is now a chain of over 30 breweries around the country. Each place has its own brewmaster, though, and we started out with the Fire Chief and the Mochaholic.

After Rock Bottom we took a little stroll over to Wynkoop Brewing, which I think was my favorite of the four breweries that we visited. The brewery opened in 1988 and was one of the first in the area. Its success encouraged other breweries and restaurants to set up shop in downtown Denver … and the rest is brewing history.

After Wynkoop we headed over to Falling Rock, which unfortunately I don’t have photos of — but we really enjoyed this place. It was less high-brow than the others we visited, with its dark lighting and postered walls and super tasty beer. We got pitchers of the Dry Dock Double IPA (my favorite), the Bull & Brush Brown and the Avery White Rascal. Plus this place is basically right around the corner from our apartment, so that’s always a plus!

After Falling Rock it was off to our fourth and last stop — Breckenridge Brewery — where we had the Agave Wheat and the Ophelia. We actually ended up sitting at a table with two couples who were visiting Denver for the weekend, so we all ordered some beers after the tour ended and hung out watching the rugby (yup, rugby) games for a little while.

It was a pretty successful outing, to say the least. And now we can say that we’ve been to a couple breweries in the area which, I’m pretty sure, makes us real Denverites.

So thanks again for the awesome gift bro-in-law! We’ll have to take you on our own little brewery walking tour when you’re in town 😉

Bis bald, friends!

Life Recently: The One Month in Denver Installment

Published on February 12, 2015February 13, 2015 by Cheryl Lock2 Comments

January 12 to February 12 — Chris and I have officially been in our new home state for one whole month, friends. And so far … there have been a lot of ups and downs! It’s been an adjustment period, getting used to the differences and finding a place to live and getting settled and back to work regularly. Three months off is a looonnnnggggg time my friends! But we both feel incredibly lucky to have been able to do that, and we’re looking forward to getting our routine settled here in this new place.

Some positives have included spending time with and getting to know a little bit better some family that lives out here, lots of gorgeous mountain views and sunrises and sunsets, a fun rooftop at our new apartment and, of course, lots and lots of snowboarding.

So cheers to one month in Denver — and here’s to many more wonderful ones!

^^ This was our very first night here. I was feeling sad because of our apartment situation (no use crying over spilled milk here), and a friend asked me to send her a photo of what we were doing our first night in Denver. At the time it felt silly to snap a photo of us in our pajamas, eating take-out Chinese (which was delicious, by the way) and drinking beer, but now I’m glad we have it.

^^ Our very first night in our (second) new apartment, we headed up to the roof with some beers to watch the sunset. I think it was looking over this new mountainous skyline that I felt for the first time like we could maybe make this whole moving thing work.

^^ My brother-in-law’s sister (ya got that?!) invited us out our first Friday here to the National Western Stock Show and Rodeo, and it was one crazy (silly) experience, let me just tell you ….

^^ Someone’s finally learning to settle in, even if it is on Chris’s brand new chair. Let’s keep those claws where I can see ’em, Penelope.

^^ We’ve had lots of early morning rides to the mountains since we’ve been here, which I can’t say I’m all too fond of, except for this sunrise. This sunrise over the mountains makes it all okay.

^^ Our first trip to Vail. We’re so fancy.

^^ Believe it or not we still haven’t been to many breweries (we plan to hit some up this Saturday for Valentine’s Day … how romantic!). We did, however, make a Friday night of it at Rock Bottom Brewery a couple of weekends ago …. thanks for the gift card Mom and Robert!

^^ A very sweet apartment-warming gift from my sister and her fiancee. You can’t really tell from this photo, but I think I can finally say that our apartment is really starting to come together. And yes, that’s Chris peeking from around the corner.

^^ Seeing as how we spent about 10-years’ worth of a travel budget last year alone, we don’t plan on taking too many crazy trips this year (other than back to the East coast for wedding stuff, of course, and hopefully a couple other drives out to Yosemite, Montana and the Grand Canyon). That’s why I love times infinity our travel wall, cause if you can’t actually travel, it’s still super fun to relive past adventures. Trips represented here include: Australia, New Mexico, London, Peru, the Galapagos Islands, the Bahamas, Niagra Falls, Banff, Rome, NYC, Virginia, Iceland, Key West, the Great Barrier Reef and Venice. Sigh. I love ’em all.

^^ We don’t even have to go to our roof to see fabulous sunsets — this one was taking place right outside our living room window. (Ah, to have a living room window. These are things you can easily miss out on when you live in Manhattan!)

^^ We’ve made the most snowboarding treks out to Keystone, by far … but look how pretty it is? Can you blame us?!

^^ Another glorious rooftop shot, this time at dusk.

^^ And the sun sets on downtown Denver.

^^ Some family was visiting from the East coast this week and we went to spend a day with them in Keystone. They stayed at the lodge right at the base of the mountain, and OMG you guys … how amazing is this place?! I’m trying to figure out how we can win the lottery and move here. Simply gorgeous.

And that’s about it friends … 31ish days in a nutshell. It’s been a whirlwind. It’s been fun and sad and frustrating and amazing. And such is life, right my dear people?

Bis bald! And a very Happy Valentine’s Day to you all!

A Partial Cross-Country Trip, From New York to Colorado

Published on January 29, 2015January 11, 2019 by Cheryl Lock9 Comments

Hiya friends,

I know this post is about three weeks late, but sheesh 2015 started with a friggin’ bang, did it not? I feel like we’ve barely had time to sit at all since we arrived in Denver. I did want to throw up just a couple of photos of our halfway-cross-country trip from New York to Colorado, though, as well as give a little bit of info on some of the places we stayed and ate. We didn’t have a ton of time to spend in each place (I think the longest we stayed was about 20 hours in St. Louis, although many of those hours were spent sleeping), but I really feel like we still got a good idea what each place was about … and we loved ’em all!

Oh by the way, in case you were wondering, our route took us this way:

We made stops in:

Columbus, Ohio at the Red Roof Plus Downtown
St. Louis, Missouri at the Hilton St. Louis Downtown at the Arch
Kansas City, Missouri at the Holiday Inn Kansas City SE- Waterpark

All the hotels were great (especially the Hilton in St. Louis — totally walking distance to the Arch!), and pet-friendly to boot.

So without further adieu … a bit of our cross-country trip in photos:

^^ We hopped into the car on Thursday, Jan. 8th, all four of us as a family. Everyone was all, “Oh my gosh, you’re taking your cat and your rabbit in the car with you? For four days? Across the country?” And we were all, “Ummm, yeah. They’ll be totally fine!” And guess what friends — they really were! Totally rocked it, is what this kitten and bunny did! Good job guys – we were very proud of you.

^^ Helloooooo Ohio! Unfortunately we only spent a couple of waking hours here, but when we checked out TripAdvisor for a suggestion on where to eat, it turned out the highly rated Flatiron Bar & Diner had received pretty great reviews and, wahooooo!, it was basically right in our parking lot! I ate a delicious fried oyster po’ boy and Chris had the gumbo and we had some beers — it was just what the doctor ordered after 10 hours of driving.

^^ Penny and Nugget had no trouble making themselves at home in our hotel rooms — especially the Hilton in St. Louis which was super swank.

^^ Like I mentioned before, the Arch was only a couple blocks from our hotel, so we just had to head out at night to catch it all lit up …

^^ And it did not disappoint!

^^ That night we grabbed some drinks at the Hyatt, which was right across the street from our hotel (we had cheated a bit and ordered room service for dinner, which was FABULOUS!). I got this beer based solely on its name (obviously), and it turned out to be totally delicious.

^^ We purchased tickets online the night before and headed out (in the frigid cold, I might add) the next morning to head up the Arch and see the sites. It really was a pretty fun experience, but be warned clustrophobes … this is maybe NOT the activity for you! I wouldn’t consider myself to be claustrophobic, but even so, the tiny little vessels that carry you to the top of the Arch had my heart racing — and Chris and I were in there alone! (On the way up we were alone at least … we shared with two people on the way down.) I can’t imagine how it would have been if the intended six people were squished together in there!

^^ But the views are pretty spectacular, so you kind of forget about the ride up (and down) once you’re up there.

^^ This is the Old Courthouse, where the slave Dred Scott sued for his and his wife’s freedom in 1846. This statue stands as a monument to the couple — and everything that historic case stood for — outside of the courthouse today.

^^ For lunch we headed to Schlafly Brewery, which was really super amazingly fun.

^^ Chris has poutine, beer soup and lots of regular beers for lunch. He was a happy boy.

^^ This is Pen and Nuggs making themselves comfortable in our Kansas City hotel. Unfortunately we didn’t take too many photos in Kansas City (or I tried, I should say, to take some of the adorable downtown area, but they came out horrible). But we really, really loved it here! The downtown area is super cute, and we ate dinner at Fiorella’s Jack Stack Barbecue, which was so fantastic, even for me, a vegetarian. We ordered fried mushrooms and Chris had steak (obviously), while I got a salad and some of their BBQ shrimp on the side to add in. It was heaven on a plate.

^^ After four days of driving and 1,836 miles covered (plus lots of McDonald’s, Burger King, Taco Bell and Subway for lunch), we had made it to Colorado, my friends, and our final destination — Denver — was in site.

And that’s it in a nutshell, ya’ll! It was a wild, fast and furious couple of days for us, but it was super fun, and we wouldn’t have had it any other way!

Bis bald, friends! Chris and I are off to the mountains again today — I hope everyone else is making the most of the lovely winter months, as well!

The 52 Project: January 12, 2015

Published on January 12, 2015April 9, 2015 by Cheryl LockLeave a comment

Road_Trip ^^ Well friends, after a road trip that included driving 1,787 miles through eight states with stops in three cities in those states (Columbus, Ohio; St. Louis, Missouri and Kansas City, Missouri), Chris, Penny, Nugget and I have arrived in Denver, Colorado — our new home. Well, we’re not actually in our new home quite yet, because it isn’t ready for us yet, but we’re at least here, in this new city, and ready to get the ball rolling! Here’s to a fabulous, fun, fruitful 2015 ya’ll!

The Year 2014: A Review

Published on December 30, 2014August 27, 2019 by Cheryl LockLeave a comment

Well, friends, it’s been quite the year! When I’m old and grey and looking back on my travels, this will certainly be one of my favorite years to reference. Here’s how our adventure-filled 365 days played out:

Continue reading “The Year 2014: A Review” →

Our Final Days of Spring Break 2014: Denver, Colorado

Published on April 24, 2014 by Cheryl Lock1 Comment

Denver. Ah, Denver. Our third and final stop on our short little tour of Colorado.

You see, we’ve heard lots of amazing things about this city. We have a handful of friends and family members who live here, and they just seem to love, love, love, love, love it.

Like … really, they love it a lot.

So we had high expectations, to say the least.

We started our tour of Denver with a quick drive around the city to familiarize ourselves with it. We drove through Cheeseman Park (so cute!), and stopped off in the Capitol Hill area to take in a few of the more touristy aspects …

^^ Cheesy tourist photos — they’re kind of a must … am I right?!

After hanging around on our own for a while, we met up Thursday evening with my brother-in-law’s sister and her fiancee. (Did ya catch that?) Anyway, Rachel and Steve have lived in Denver for a bunch of years now, and they are two of those people I mentioned before who just love, love love it there 😉

They took us to the Vine Street Pub & Brewery for dinner, which was super chill and relaxed. We went outside with beers from the bar and watched people playing Cornhole while we waited for our table … it was that relaxed.

And that was about it for Thursday, since we didn’t get into Denver until around 1 anyway. Friday, however, we had quite the touristy day. We woke up early so that we could head out to the Red Rocks Amphitheater, which was simply stunning.

^^ We were shocked at how much exercising went on here!
Seriously, people everywhere running up and down the stairs,
jumping the rocks, running every single row … fascinating!
I guess if you have to work out, you can’t have a
better backdrop then at Red Rocks, right?

Red Rocks was about an hour outside of Denver, and we spent a couple hours there just taking it all in. So by the time we made it back into the city, we were starving!

Thank God for Mexican food when you’re starving … am I right?! And Rio Grande in the LoDo section did not disappoint.

We sat outside under umbrellas in the 70-degree weather (hello, summer!), eating our burritos and drinking our margaritas. [A word to the wise: Watch it on the margaritas here. A single drink contains 3.5 shots of tequila! That’s why they have a three drink maximum on the margs, particularly. We should know, we asked ;)]

After lunch I headed across the street to buy an outrageously expensive tee from Patagonia (I was desperate! I hadn’t read the weather beforehand and was wearing two long-sleeved shirts … and I was sweltering!), and then we caught the free 16th Street MallRide shuttle over to Commons Park, where we hopped on bikes from the Denver Bike Share program and rode over the South Platte River to the section of Denver known as The Highlands.

And oh my goodness did we love it here, my friends! And it wasn’t just because of Little Man Ice Cream (although that did help a lot ….)

This whole area had a very relaxed, young, happening atmosphere. It was very cool, to say the least.

So after scarfing down some ice cream (don’t ask me how I did that after eating a ton of Mexican for lunch … I have a superhuman stomach, this is for certain), we hopped back on our bikes and rode as fast as possible back to the LoDo section to meet up with Chris’s old boss for drinks at Freshcraft before heading off to the Washington Park section of Denver to meet up with our cousin and her husband and baby.

Sheesh we really crammed a lot into one full day, didn’t we!?

Anyway, Courtney and Charlie’s place was adorable, and they were so lovely to get a babysitter for the evening so that they could come back out with us for dinner at the Ale House and a couple of brewskies afterwards at Denver Beer Co. (Which, by the way, might have been my favorite brewery of all the ones we visited. It was late when we arrived — in fact we stayed until closing at midnight — but the big garage doors that make up the front of the place were thrown open from the warmer weather earlier in the day, and everyone was hanging out on picnic tables with their dogs. Very fun.)

And that, as they say, was that, my friends. It was a lot to do in one day, but I’m really glad that we got to fit in as much as we did on Friday. I wasn’t convinced that we had seen everything Denver had to offer on Thursday (I mean that’s a stupid thing to even write, because of course we didn’t. It’s impossible to see everything any city has to offer in one day), but Friday gave me a better look at the Denver that I had heard so much about.

And that I really, truly, look forward to going back to.

Okay friends, so I’m off again next week — wahoo! This time I’ll be heading to Washington, D.C. to spend the week with a friend for her birthday. This is the friend I went to Florida with, and the one who when I visit we generally hang out and do nothing but eat and drink and chat. (Except for when she has me crafting like crazy for her sister’s baby shower) — but this time we’ve promised each other that we will get out and about into the city to actually do something historical. Or fun. Or both.

But we’ll just have to wait to see how that goes 😉

Bis bald, friends!