Went hiking with my friend Amy up Boulder Canyon to find a place for her to experiment with her camera as part of her Photography Class homework. We found a short trail (10 minutes?) leading us up to Boulder Falls. It was a bit chilly that day — you can see some snow in a few of the pictures, and you can even see me holding a disc of ice that I fished out of the stream. Other fun things to look for in these photos are a rainbow created by the waterfall spray, and the figure of a large face appearing on the cliff just above the waterfall.
Tags: Boulder, hiking, nature, pictures, waterfalls
My couch surfing host in Boulder, Dave, loves rock climbing and bouldering, so he organized a big group of his friends to get together for some outdoor fun. Three cars of people drove up Boulder Canyon for about 15 minutes to a pullout across the road from the canyon river. We took the short hike up the canyon to a rock face overlooking the forested valley below. There were already a few other groups of people set up with their gear, including a few more of Dave’s friends. Here are some photos of the canyon valley and rock climbers.
Tags: Boulder, rock climbing
While driving through Boulder today, I decided to take an alternate route to where I needed to go. I drove down College road into the University of Colorado campus. There were so many students walking around and crossing the street, I probably stopped 10 times for 30 seconds each in the course of a mile. It was crazy and felt like I was driving through a flock of birds that fly towards you instead of away.
There are an incredible number of south-east Asian restaurants in Boulder — lots of great Thai food in particular. This town has an insane number of coffee shops and Thai restaurants — I’m not complaining though because I’m getting to eat more curry and noodle dishes than I have in many years and I’m stocking up because it may be a long time until I get to a place like this again.
Tags: Boulder, delicious food
Sky-watchers in North America can expect to see up to 30 meteors hourly tonight as the annual Leonid meteor shower peaks in the wee hours of Tuesday, Nov. 17. Earth will cross the first meteor-producing stream on this date starting at around 1 a.m. PST, experts predict.
Click here for general information about tonight’s meteoric show
Click here for plenty of links of where and when to watch the sky
After leaving Aspen, I headed northeast to Denver where I stayed with my friend Amy who recently moved there from Atlanta. But even though I spent a couple days at her place, I only once ventured into Denver — to eat a delicious meal at WaterCourse, a 100% vegetarian restaurant near downtown. Perhaps the reason that I wasn’t able to explore more of Denver is that I was caught in a tractor beam of awesomeness by Boulder, a very cool town about 30 minutes north of Denver.
One goal of this trip is to find the next place to move to, and Boulder is now at the top of my list! (The only other place on the list so far is Durango.) I really like Colorado in general, but I really love Boulder… let me count the ways.
- The outdoors — hiking, biking, camping, rock climbing and bouldering, skiing, snowboarding, and probably 10 other cool sports that I have yet to discover. People in Colorado (yes, I’m generalizing) love being active outdoors, and so do I!
- There are more Thai restaurants and coffee shops than streetlights. Count them! I’m a big fan of food, and I could easily spend an entire year’s salary enjoying all the delicious restaurants in this town.
- The people — lots of really friendly, intelligent, and open minded people. Many younger people because of University of Colorado. And there’s also a strong sense of community(ies) there too. I met so many people who I could easily be good friends with.
- Walkable town — You can easily live here without driving because everything is so close together that you can walk or bike anywhere, and there is good public transportation when you need it.
- Everything you need without going totally mainstream — Although there is a mall in town with the typical Target, Macy’s, REI, etc., there are tons and tons of smaller shops where you can find anything you need at a reasonable price.
- They have a movie theater with 16 screens — enough to satisfy my love of movies. You know I’ll be there at least a couple times a week!
- Great local entertainment — tons of cool hangout places, weekly outdoor movies during the summer, local music scene plus a couple theaters where you can find big name acts all year round.
- Proximity to Denver — I’m sure there’s lots more cool stuff in Denver that I have yet to explore. Plus Denver has an international airport and a great place for some cheap flights.
So in a nutshell, Boulder might be my next home. But I still have all of the west to explore still, so it’s possible I could find another place that I like better… we’ll see.
Tags: Boulder, Denver, places to move to
