We were on a mission to get Madeline her 50 states by her 50th birthday. Nebraska was one that was missing. Although I kept thinking I might get to Omaha on business, it wasn’t happening, so we planned a trip to Denver, drove up to Sidney, NE, and then spent some time around Ft. Collins, CO.

7/13/13-7/16/13 Colorado/nebraska

Sidney is known for one thing… the world headquarters of Cabela’s. We went to the store there and took the photos of the stuffed animals. In town it was very obvious which house belonged to one of the Cabela brothers.

A couple of hours outside of DIA airport, we already knocked off Madeline’s state, and then we spent the afternoon and night in Sidney.

The town had a little museum that displayed some military artifacts, as well as just some old time technology and other things.

We drove down Poudre Canyon Highway, which was very picturesque. Rafters were out on the rapids in the river.

After leaving Sidney, we headed west into Wyoming and then south down into Colorado and Fort Collins. We made Ft. Collins our base for the next three days. The town was really pretty and had some good restaurants, particularly in Old Town.

Loveland, Colorado is a cute little town on the way to Estes Park with a ton of street art. All of these are statues just sitting out in the public places throughout town.

On our drive to Estes Park, we just didn’t have time to go to the dam store

The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, inspiration for Stephen King’s “The Shining”

Past Estes Park, we went into Rocky Mountain National Park this first day and then again the next day. The first day was very cloudy, foggy, sometimes rainy, and sometimes sunny. We did see some elk, though, and some longhorn sheep, and Madeline got to play in the snow.

While driving, we saw this old car in front of us and so I told Madeline to switch to sepia mode on her new camera. The result  was this cool photo.

The second day in the park, we drove on Old Fall River Road, a dirt road only wide enough for one-way traffic. We saw falls, marmots, some cool meadows, and more elk.

We haven’t been to a tremendous number of national parks, but RMNP is definitely a beautiful one.

Goodbye Denver and Nebraska