Colorado...

[hillbilly]

We finally arrived in the states. The only hiccup was when customs in SF confiscated the wife's 'nam prik'.

I have been touring the Rocky Mountain Parks, going to baseball games, driving up to Pikes Peak and eating BBQ. Have visited many of the fancy shopping malls in Denver, but today's budget shopping will only allow a trip to WalMart! Might post some pics when I get back to Thailand in about 2 weeks.

Finally found out what broadband really means...

[dirtydog]

Hey you missed out, they doubled the speed for everyone that uses maxnet last week

[blackgang]

^ Pigs ass they did, I got average DL of 9.0 KB/sec about 15 mins ago for a 4.80 MB DL.

[dirtydog]

Got to be a member of maxnet for a year to qualify for this special blackgang

[keda]

Deal me in then, been with the robbers a couple of years now and the only speed increase experienced so far was down to the upgrade.

[buad hai]

Finally found out what broadband really means...

It's a spoiler, isn't it?

[Sir Burr]

Hillbilly,
Who's watering the plants?

[Marmite the Dog]

Who's watering the plants?

Allah has been doing it this weekend, except the kunt went ott and drowned them all. Fekkin' useless!

[KID]

HILLBILLY--- there is a restaurant named casabuanetas in Denver-- Mexican cuisine, made to look like an old pirates cave, has cliff divers etc. -- check it out

[Jet Gorgon]

Going to Mesa Verde, Hillbilly?

[sabang]

I've been to Colorado a few times.

Stayed in Denver for a week, actually quite near where that Littleton school massacre happened.
Downtown Denver is pretty mundane, but Larimer Square is worth a look- an inner city urban redevelopment, used to be the rough part of town, now trendy.
There always seems to be an older Upmarket hotel in US cities, and In Denver it's the Brown Palace- I like these sort of places. Great bar there, and a real gentlemans boutique in the old style- dropped a few quid there. My friend worked in Denver as a stockbroker for many years, so I had the best tour guide.
Denver seems to be largely nice middle class suburbs, with a fair sprinkling of upmarket areas. I don't know where they hide their poor, or their bellhops and burger flippers. No ghettoes here that i could tell- shame really, I always like to have a beer on the wrong side of the tracks 'cus thats often where the best pubs are.
Had a nice evening drinking & smoking joints at this lady real estate agents place- she's quite
succesful. She took me out on her verandah, and told me that the big ridge we were looking out on was the Continental divide. Great stuff. Only in America would a lady twenty years your senior openly try to seduce you. She didn't get her wicked way, but I liked Suzy. She came to see us in HK a couple years later.

Round Denver you've got a few things-
Red Rocks ampitheatre, a natural rock stadium. Nice area too.
Silverton and a few places up that way are ex-mining towns, lovingly preserved for tourists to come and spend some money. Quaint, touristy, these places have served as the setting for several Westerns, real nice mountain terrain too.
The drive out of Denver through affluent Evergreen and then to Conifer is well worth it. If I lived there, I'd go for Evergreen.
The Fort restaurant has a superb view over Denver, and is a great restaurant with prices to match. The bison steak is possibly the best steak I've had. Bill Clinton and some economic heavyweights booked the place out for a night or two during some big economic summit not too long after.

Driving from Denver, Glenwood Springs is kinda quaint, got stoned & lounged around in the natural springs for a coupla hours. Later had a nice Cajun meal, looking across a broad valley. Embarassed myself in the Basement bar of the Holiday Inn there 'cus I was stoned and they were playing this country blues music on the jukebox. Y'know "I gawt back from 'Nam and My dawg dieed" kinda stuff. I found it hilarious. Seemed a strange kind of Bar for a Holiday Inn anyway- more of a downbeat locals hangout.
Lunch in Vail, a manufactured, plastic ski resort. Fine for skiing but no character methought. But had a fantastic blackened hamburger in a roadhouse out of Vail on the way back- best burger I've had, and a half pounder.
Breckenridge- now thats more like it. Old mining & ranching town thats preserved it's character- now a ski resort. Spent a couple of nights there & found a great bikers pub. It wasn't ski season- actually it was quite warm. Nice place.

Boulder- clean pretty PC college town. More San Fransisco values than SF. Bikes or foot only in the central precinct, smoking frowned upon, deer grazing in your back yard. Almost too nice really- at least SF's got Tenderloin. Booner would luv it!

Aspen is Aspen, 'nuff said. Come skiing here if you've got the money, and rub shoulders with the rich and shameless. Pretty place, some history left- much nicer than Vail. But still too many trendy boutiques and all that crap. I went for a ski trip there, but someone else was footing the bill. Stayed at the Ritz Carlton, shameless. Saw an absolutely hilarious spoof show by some long standing troupe' in an old, historic theatre there. Bluddy great- real take the piss out of America stuff. Yanks have a good sense of humour too, & nice to be reminded.

So thats my sketched memories of Colorado. I could sure think of much worse places to live, and of course I only saw a fraction of it. You could spend months getting to know the place- but the eastern part of the state is flat farming country, more like Nebraska really than tourist Colorado.

Look forward to HB's TR, which of course will have photoes too.