Colorado Trip
 

We are planning a 12 day trip Denver - Colorado Springs - Canon City - Nathrop - Aspen - Glenwood Springs - Breckenridge - Denver. July 13 - July 25, 2016. My son and I took an 8 day rafting trip last summer now the girls want to come plus Brendan my son is veru interested in going to scholl somewhere out west so we plan on visiting the University of Denver and looking for other colleges that have a swim/dive team as he is a top diver in CT. The Univer. of Denver looks to be a great school academically. He is only a sophomore but being looked at already for his diving. He plays several sports and soccer use to be his favorite but now diving has become his top pick.

So from your comments I think we will go directly to Boulder spend our 1st day and night there and then head to our tour of Univers. Denver the next day and just take a peak for a few hours at the Garden of the Gods on our way to Canon City.

We raft the Royal Gorge on Friday the 15th so that is our first real adventure of the trip. From there we head up to the Mount Princeton resort for 2 nights. Day 1 there we are renting a jeep to head to St Elmo and spend the day Jeeping. We are renting a jeep because Brendan and I did this trip last summer and had a blast but I rented a big Tahoe SUV 4 WD for our entire trip but I think it will be too wide for some of those trails plus the rental place most likely has rule against off-roading. The Jeep we rented last time was from a place in Buena Vista but I think we will have to get 2 jeeps we bounced around a lot but we are boys and do not mind. I do not think my wife and daughter are going to want to sit in the back of a jeep all day,....thoughts?


Next day we will hang out at the resort and enjoy the hot springs for awhile we then head to Aspen for two nights so other than the Maroon bells we need some suggestions for that area.

Then from there we head to Glenwood springs to see and do what is around there and we overnight. The Canyon, Hanging Lake,???

From there we head to Breckenridge for 3 nights so I welcome suggestions for that area.

After that we are going to wrap up our last 2 nights somewhere between Breckenridge and Denver. I see that there may be some good rafting around Idaho Springs or is it better in Breckenridge we could always spend an extra day in Breckenridge if there is a lot to do there. Then we could spend our last night in Denver on the 24th before we have to head out Monday afternoon @ 4PM back to CT.

Thank you and I look forward to your suggestions

Dave

I was never a rafter, but I lived for years near Idaho Springs. Come late July it may be a trickle depending on the spring snow. My daughter lives in Denver and right now it is very warm.

Isn't there good rafting near Buena Vista on the Arkansas River? Perhaps do some research on that.

After Breckenridge, I would come straight to Denver and spend a day or two there. I tend to thinks it's quite a nice city and you have little time there on the front end.

An alternative would be to go up the back way into Rocky Mtn National Park.... But I would do Denver.

My son swam for Carolina. Maybe he needs to look at the heels ��.... Of course, given his age, he can't meet with the coaches, etc. given NCAA recruiting rules.

This appears to be the third thread you have started about the same trip. Many of us have already commented on your questions on the previous thread(s). Why are you discounting that information and/or repeating your questions?

I wondered the same thing.

I understand the change of plans and I will respond on this thread.
There is a good bus service between Glenwood Springs and Aspen (41 miles). Lodging will probably be cheaper in Glenwood Springs.
Glenwood Springs has a great hiking/bike trail along the Colorado River through the Glenwood Canyon.
Glenwood Springs also has a gondola ride up to Glenwood Caverns. It also has the world's largest hot spring fed pool.

tomf: FWIW with maybe the exception of the lodging comment, this is the same advice you gave the OP on one of his/her other threads. it's like deja vu all over again. :)

Actually the reason I posted again is because I had questions and needed more information. Thus I took all of your suggestions and if you look back at my two prior threads I needed more suggestion on what to do in Breckenridge as well as more suggestions in other parts of the trip. Thus I thank each of you for you comments and asked for more and not one responded so being new to this website and not knowing how it completely works I thought I would summarize my plans and ask the question in a new post so thanks again and sorry if I did not follow protocol.

Also in my other post I said nothing about looking at colleges. I want to thank Julie EC for her comments and yes I know he can not talk to the college coaches until July of his Junior year But we need to narrow where he want to go. He has a college coach now. The Coach of Trinity's Dive team also coaches his high school team, he also has attended Indiana's University Dive camp and will be there for 2 weeks prior to our trip to CO and he just got back from training in Fort Lauderdale, FL at a training camp International Swimming Hall of fame.

Most all of the colleges with Swim/Dive teams are in the East, Midwest and south. There are hardly any out west but he really like the west and wanted to look at a couple of schools. So that is the main reason I re-posted as well. Does that help clarify a little more "bitter"

Thanks again Julie for your comments. It is greatly appreciated my daughter is actually at the University of South Carolina in their honors program. She is in her second semester as a freshman and absolutely loves it there and doing very well. My son will be looking at UNC as it is a great school and the campus is beautiful. Any other colleges that son looked at or was interested in let me know.

Thanks

Dave