Colors of the Mountains - Part 1

My trip unofficially started with me waking up to my cell phone's beep early Saturday morning at 4am, courtesy Ricky. After snoozing for a while, I got ready and called for the cab to go to the bus stop. Apart from the initial anxiety of missing the bus, the entire journey went through pretty well. I even watched Madagascar on the plane. On reaching Denver, I came to know four friends had already reached while three were yet to arrive. We ate and waited and once they arrived had to wait a bit more for their missing baggage and the car rental.

By the time we moved on it was afternoon. We tumbled into two SUVs and finally our vacation officially started! Colorado is a beautiful state. Though most of the part is barren, at least that's how it looked from the airplane, it is also the home to the world's longest mountain range, The Rocky Mountains. The places we visited were amazingly beautiful and spectacular. The mountains surrounding the valleys, the cool climate, the winding roads..they all reminded me of my home so much. They were so many things that were comparable to Sikkim. Of course, The Himalayas look more stunning and majestic than The Rocky Mountains anytime. But on the other hand, the vastness of the area....miles and miles of open space with mountains stretching till far away in the horizon, cannot be found in the cramped space of Sikkim, Nepal and the surrounding areas.

Our first stop was Colorado Springs. Colorado Springs is a beautiful town a little bit south of Denver, about 2 hours away. As the name suggests, it is filled with natural hot springs all over. Unfortunately for us, we couldn't see a single one as those that were easily accessible were within resorts (and hence expensive) and those that were inexpensive were not that easily accessible.

So, we went to another tourist attraction, The Garden of the Gods park. This is a natural park formed by red sandstone rocks. The huge towering rocks against the backdrop of bright blue sky and green mountains is indeed breath taking and spectacular. Some of these rocks were named as per their formation. Like Kissing Camels which looked like two camels kissing. Then there were the Siamese Twins and the Balanced Rock. My words wouldn't do justice to the beauty of the place, so please go ahead and check out the pictures that i have uploaded.

We were lucky to catch a marriage party there. The entire gang in their tuxedos and gowns looked so pretty and so much in contrast to the surrounding. We also caught glimpse of quite a few rock climbers.

We then moved on to The Cave of the Winds (yup! same name as in the Niagara). As the name suggest this is basically cave formations in the mountainous region. Since half of us had already had enough of caves, we decided to wait in the lobby which again had a spectacular view of the mountains, while the rest went ahead into the caves. For people going in the caves for the first time, it is a nice experience. You get to see another amazing aspect of nature and can check out from the smallest to the tallest stalactites and stalagmites formations. However, I have been to similar caves twice already and two visits are really more than enough...you tend to get bored.:-)

At the end of the day, the Cave of the Winds people put up some laser beam show. After indulging in so much of natural beauty all day long, the hi-tech show was not as appealing. We decided to call it a day and moved on to the hotel to rest the night. Each of us were so tired coz of the long day, everyone fell asleep almost immediately, blissfully unaware of each others snoring (guys basically) :-)

Garden of Gods
Originally uploaded by Pukuli Colors.

Coming up next, Pike's Peak, Native Indian Dance and Nepali Food!!