Set me up a sasparilly Miss Kitty I just killed me a mountain lion

Happy New Year, here is my update from Xmas. Sometimes I get disheartened doing the blog on the basis that there do not appear to be words enough in my vocabulary to describe some of the great scenes and adventures. So mainly pictures again which I hope give you a sense of Christmas in Colorado. We drove again, up through Amarillo and New Mexico, then back via Kansas and Dodge City, and Oklahoma.

But I have to starting with a question for you to ponder - why the hell did Tony Christie even want to know how to get to Amarillo – Sweet Marie must have been a helluva girl!

Yes ladies and gentlemen - snow in texas - purely evidential this


Minihaha - That looks like a volcano.
Page turn in "Aberdeen Angus' guide to smelly cattle farms"
National geographic man - It is

Hurrah....

The first of the Rockies - Raton Pass which was closed the day before.

Christmas Eve - Day Break over Pikes Peak - colorado Springs - 7.30 am. Our view from the house we stayed in. The owner's view everyday! Check out VRBO.com Vacation Rental By Owners

It was so tedious watching the light change.

Garden of the Gods - inhabitant

Kissing Camels rock formation

Living proof that Americans can't count. Here are the Siamese Twins except there are three of them......

Being a little disingenuous there...who me??? From the other side this is the view through two of them

and the real point...

Coooooooooooooooooeeeeeeeeeee

AAAAAAAAAAAAAWESUUUUUUUUUUUUUM (squeakiest yankee voice possible)

This is all sayloons and casinos - Cripple Creek - still gold mining country and on the "backside" of Pikes Peak in the middle of nowehere.

The area is littered with wooden huts with mine shafts etc.

Victor the next town along has none of the glamour and is just a set of houses with people working mines and hoping to strike lucky.
Xmas day did not start off so sunny. The house you see is the one we stayed in.

We decided Xmas afternoon to go walking in the Cheyenne Mountains, after calling home to the girls who had successfully cooked Xmas Lunch, coped with my mum and washed all the pots and made it down to our friends to Skype,all by closure of Betty and her annual message.
The thin patch in front of the boulder is the path of compacted ice we were walking.

The Road goes ever on...

My bravest moment....there is a very large drop behind me.

This walk was meant to be a round trip for 3 miles and after high point we had headed right into forest. After 2 hours we bumped into only the second group of people who had a felt tip style tourist map but with GPS it all made sense to P who worked out they were walking in the opposite direction to where they thought but also managed to work out that ours was no round trip. It was 3.30 pm and we had seen a variety of paw marks in the snow and the woods were dense. So the only thing was to turn round and go back 'cept we had the same icy path to get down and did not fancy it in the dark,so we ran for a while.......and by the time we got back to the car in the valley it was dark.
Back in our palatial home complete with home cinema, full size ping pang table and that football thingy on rods P decided to check the route again and just general info. As I carved our roast beef which fortunately I had put on a slow cook he announces that the Cheyenne mountains is home to the mountain lion and black bear and their busiest times are dawn and dusk.....the mountain lion buries its kill to marinade a tad but gets very upset if anything/one goes near it...
The advice with black bears is to look big..........................................
YEAH RIGHT PEOPLE I DO THAT SO WELL.....
Boxing day - first to climb Pike's Peak and then head home
8,000 feet up looks like this, there is a lake under there somewhere.

We got stopped at 10,000 because road closed but they were working to open it

11,000 feet


13,000 feet and stopped at that point

Coing back down



What we think we might end up doing to our car!

And so off to Dodge City in Kansas which has to be the smelliest place and highest concentration of factory beef cattle in the US. Fitting you may think to end on a pile of s...e