Day 7: Picnic - Pizza - Pictures

 Today's itinerary was simple.

Picnic. Pizza. Pictures.

In that order.

But before I get to that, let me give you a little backstory to this trip. My parents both grew up in different parts of Colorado. I never personally lived here, but the summer's were for Colorado. I'd spend weeks of my summer bouncing between grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, cabins in the mountains fishing, jeeping, playing in the ice cold water panning for gold and so many other cherished memories.

Last year my parents proposed an idea of a road trip to one of their favorite places on earth.

Colorado

They enlisted the help of my nearly-professional sister and her husband to help with the details.

Now, I am a natural homebody. Adventures are not my typical cup of tea. And quite honestly when my siblings families both said they would be flying and mine (ahem, Rainy and Josh) said, "Let's drive! It will be a fun adventure!" I died a little bit inside. But I also know that I am a person that has to be pushed out of her comfort zone in order to fly a little bit. And I really do like to fly once I'm off the ground. So I and the rest of the kids obliged. Because let's be honest, we didn't really have a choice with the overly excited and motived older sister and dad, lol.

So here we are.

Josh was a beast and got up for jogs in nearly every state we went through. His Strava account maps our journey through a whole different perspective. I did take several hikes (and short jogs) with him or alone too. This morning we decided to hike up the Chalk Cliff Trail. These were the cliffs right outside our cabins that hid Mount Princeton from our view while we were so close.

My grandparents owned a trailer near this ranch so the first little adventure with my family (aka the "Picnic at the Lake") was chock full of nostalgia and memories. We all packed up a picnic and headed to Cottonwood Lake for the afternoon. (This is just one of the handful of lakes I frequented as a kid)

This was one of Zeke's greatest highlights. He caught some absolutely breathtaking footage with his drone and through his camera lens. I have a few sweet moments I captured myself.

We got home, showered up and ate a hearty dinner of pizza then headed up toward the cliffs for photos. Our photographer was amazing. Now, I don't know a ton about photography but I've done enough weddings and events to know that this one was phenomenal and efficient. She captured my family in a way that we will forever cherish and her photos deserve their own post. Because, I couldn't pick just one!