The Stoufer Family: Day 1 in Denver, CO 7/3/10

After 6 months of planning (mostly Marc's) vacation day finally arrived!! Marc worked on Friday and out flight was scheduled to depart Grand Rapids at 5:31pm. We left home to get to the airport with plenty of time to check in and not hurry and be stressed. When we got there there was another flight that was delayed by 1 1/2 hours so they all the agents were busy rebooking people. We had checked in online the night before so all we had to do was get our luggage tags. But because of the rebooking problems, we ended up waiting almost 15-20 just to get our tags!!! So, we hurried through security (which with 2 kids is a pain in the neck!), just to get to our gate and find out that our flight was delayed 20 minutes. When I went to the counter to get our gate check tags, we told me we would get into MN about 7:00 and our connection was supposed to leave at 7:30. Our original plan was to get food in MN and eat it on the plane kind of as a distraction. Since it looked like that wasn't going to happen, we grabbed food in GR and ate it on the way to MN. As it turns out, he was saying we would land at 7:00 EST not CST, so we would have had time. We landed in MN with just enough time to go from one end of the airport to the CLEAR other end, grab a drink, and go to the bathroom. By the time we did that, it was time to board. But, whew, we finally made it into Denver!! Both kids did GREAT on the plane rides. Marc did some homework, read, listened to music, and ate airplane snacks. Samantha read books and ate snacks.

By the time we landed, got our luggage, got our rental car, drove tot he hotel, and checked in, it was about 11:00pm Denver time, which meant it was about 1:00am Michigan time. We were beat! We ate a quick snack and went to bed. I think both of our kids have internal clocks that tell them to get up at 7:00am no matter what time zone we are in. ;-) They woke up about 7:30 Saturday morning. Of course, before we got ready to go out for the day, we had to have some play time on the bed. ;-)

After a leisurely breakfast in the hotel, we drove to the Denver Zoo. I love zoos so I was excited! The first thing we see is a statue of 2 adults and 1 baby giraffe and a sign saying that there is a baby giraffe in the zoo!! I was super excited!

It was hot and crowded! We had heard that since Denver is so far above sea level and closer to the sun, it feels hotter.....they were right! Since it was so crowded Samantha was stuck in her stroller for most of it. :-( We didn't expect to stay long, but we stayed about 3 hours! It was a lot of fun and I am glad we went! :-)

After we left the zoo we went and had lunch at Steve's Snappin' Dogs. They have been rated Denver's #1 hot dog place for a long time. They were pretty yummy!

After lunch we went to Hammond's Candies for their free factory tour. It was about a 20 minute tour. We got to see a guy molding and mixing the candy for candy canes/lollipops. It was fun to see how it is made. They pride themselves on being an old fashioned, hand-made candy store.

On the drive back to the hotel, we had an awesome view! In the distance in front of us were the mountains. A few times we cold actually see the white tips of them. Marc thought it was very cool that the white part was snow even though we had been sweating all day. :-)

After a quick potty break at the hotel we hit the street running...well walking. We walked down to the 16th Street Mall. This is a pedestrian mall that has a very fun atmosphere. We walked through the mall on our way to our next destination.

We took another pit stop on our way because we were given bad directions and had to walk a LONG way in the hot. We were tired and thirsty so we got some really yummy smoothies to refresh ourselves. Silly Daddy had the idea to see how they tasted together. :-)

Our final destination was the Downtown Aquarium. In the entrance there is a cute little back drop to get a picture taken in front of...so of course we did!

The Aquarium was much less busy! I am sure Samantha was really happy about that because she got to walk the majority of it! She was totally enthralled by he fish!! Every time we turned a corner and saw a new tank, she ran up to it all excited, pointing, and saying "Oh, more fish!!!"

I had to get a few posed pictures of the kiddos. We stood at this tank for awhile because the fish were very active!

I had seen on their website and heard from some friends that there was a walk through tunnel tank. I was excited when we came across it and there were no other people around....that meant we could get some good pictures of the kids in the tunnel without getting strangers in the pictures!!!

Close to the end of the aquarium was a big tank with all kids of fish, sharks, and coral in it. Gee, I think that sounds like a photo op. ;-)

One of our favorite tanks was the Nemo & friends tank. All the fish in the tank were characters from the movie, including the sea anemone. :-)

At our local zoo there is an exhibit where you can pet a sting ray, but is costs like $8 to do it. :-( I was excited to see that there was a tank with about 10 sting rays in and we could pet them for free. At first Marc didn't want to do it, but we convinced him that it wasn't going to hurt him. I was surprised to feel that the sting ray was really kinda slimy.

After petting the sting rays it was time for dinner. The Aquarium has a themed restaurant in the same building. Imagine Rain Forrest Cafe, but not on acid. ;-) There were large fish tanks, sometimes with scuba divers feeding the fish, all around the room. There were fish lights hanging for the ceiling. the booths looked liked shells. It was kinda pricey, but we figured, what the heck, we are on vacation! :-) The food was pricey and mediocre, but the kid's dessert were cheap and awesome! We got 2 of them. One of the was an ice cream and cookie sandwich with mini m&m's and sprinkles for Samantha to "dip" the ice cream part in. Well, Samantha enjoyed the m&m's and sprinkles at least. ;-) Daddy and I enjoyed the ice cream and cookie.

The other dessert we got was a shark shaped rice krispie treat. It came with a paint brush, some decorator's gel and some mini m&m's. Marc used his dessert-eating time up decorating so we brought his back to the hotel and we will eat it another night. :-)

On our walk back to the hotel after dinner, it had begun to just barely sprinkle. We had heard that storms were supposed to roll in (they never did). we found a shorter way back then the way we took. As we were walking we saw 1/2 of the sky in front of us was dark and cloudy and the other half was sunny. And right in the middle was a rainbow. It was really pretty. A few minutes later we see a double rainbow!!! I have never seen a double rainbow before. It was really cool to see!!!

We had a tiring, but great first day in Denver!! Marc pedometer said that we walked 19 miles today...and man were our feet tired!! ;-) If all the rest of our vacation goes as well and is as much fun as today, it will be an awesome vacation!