Grand Junction weekend...

CITEL, (who have been fantastic support this year) organised a weekend down in Grand Junction to see the changing of the colours...or Fall as it is known here, Autumn at home. You never see such distinct seasons at home, so it has been a real treat to experience 4 absolute seasons.  We have seen the colours changing over the past few weeks and it has been a beautiful sight, so were looking forward to the weekend as well as catching up with the great group of people we have met this year.  (We are very fortunate we came this year, as next year there is 1 exchangee from Australia going to the US and vice versa).
Joshuah chose to stay at the house and after rolling his ankle and hearing it pop twice on the Wednesday night when he was playing basketball with Stu, it was probably a good idea to rest his foot, eat pizza, have the TV to himself and sleep in!! AND we know how much he enjoys travelling in the back of the car, with us, looking at the scenery, stopping to take photos!!
So we headed off on a cold overcast day, with the thought of driving over Guanella Pass which we couldn't do earlier in the year as it was snowing.  As we got higher up into the mountains we thought the same thing might happen again, but miraculously, the weather semi cleared and we were able to drive on it.

The colours were outstanding, and even the grey skies couldn't take away from the beauty of it all.
Next destination....Loveland Pass. By this stage it was getting pretty cold and sparse snow had started to fall and as we made our way up the Pass we could see it was getting even heavier....

 Snow on the aspen...

 and by the time we got to the top it was really heavy snow, strong winds, bloody cold...but FANTASTIC!!

The drive to Grand Junction is through beautiful country and as much as I hate the I70, the road structure is pretty impressive, with tiered roads meandering through gorges.

 We passed through Vail, which is an expensive resort town to stay and ski in and most of the homes which are HUGE, seemed empty, so they must be holiday homes for the "richies"!!  A bit like our second home...Windy!! (ha!).

The drive to Grand Junction is around 6 hours, but it took us forever as we had to keep stopping to admire the beautiful scenery, which changed constantly with the sun and clouds.

An evening gathering had been organised in Palisade (about 20 mins from Grand Junction) and as we were a bit early we stopped to watch the sun go down over this truly remarkable landscape.....

We had a great night which included watching half of the AFL Grand Final on a mini iPad.  It kind of lost some of it's appeal watching it on something so small, but it was so good to watch the game and listen to the commentary...I hadn't realised how much I missed it.  I was nonplussed about who I wanted to win, but if I had to choose it probably would have been the Hawks.  Stu was going for the Dockers.  We drove into Grand Junction that night to stay with our lovely lady who put us up...Linda Reeves.  How lucky were Stu and I to be able to stay with Linda.  She had the footy set up for us for the 2nd half, wine and beer, a beautiful welcoming home and was a great listener.  Thankyou Linda. We really, really appreciated your hospitality and friendship.

Who won?

The next morning we were up early to head to the Fruita Fall Festival.  Fruita is a town just out of Grand Junction and we really just wanted to see the Parade.  It was interesting to say the least....

 and the only reason we knew it was finished was when the street sweepers appeared to pick up the horse poo!  We had a choice of things to do on the Saturday and Linda very kindly offered to take us up to the Grand Mesa and the Grand Mesa National Forest to see the trees changing colour.  What a day!  Beautiful blue skies and sunshine and not a cloud in the sky.  A truly magnificent Western Colorado day!!

Stuart, Jennifer and Linda

Linda was probably questioning how right CITEL got it by allowing Stuart into their State and teaching their kids after he came out of the Visitor's Centre wearing this.....not quite the "foxhat", but close enough!!

We had lunch at the local ski resort and listened to live music before heading back into town to get ready for another evening of great conversation, good company, delicious food and abundant beer!!
Sunday morning was spent up at Colorado Monument where the wonderful CITEL people had organised to meet everyone for breakfast. Here are some of the Australians on exchange this year...a good looking bunch of people!

Warren and Sue and kids William and Astrid, Bruce and Jane, Jen and Stu, Candice, Sharon and Lindsay

and I wasn't really aware of a rivalry between the East and West until these two got together...funny blokes!

and Stu and I with our very dear friends Lindsay and Sharon....

We had a great brekky....hot coffee (thanks again Linda), fruit, yoghurt, juice and cinnamon rolls.  A perfect way to end a perfect weekend.
 I know I keep saying how beautiful the country is, but Grand Junction truly offers everything! Everywhere you look the sights are breathtaking and on a "grand" scale! After everyone went their separate ways back to their houses we drove the rim around the Colorado Monument.  It was reminiscent of the Grand Canyon and Canyonlands NP.

We could have spent longer there, but still had a long drive home, so reluctantly left,

and made our way back up  the Loveland Pass to see how much snow was still around from 2 days ago.

So another amazing weekend in the US!  We were so glad to meet Linda and only wished we had met her earlier.  She was a fabulous host, made us feel so welcome and at home and it was so nice to spend time in her beautiful home with lots of Australian artwork to enjoy! Thanks Linda....see you soon!