Memorial day adventure *photo heavy*

I know it's already Thursday and this is a bit late, but with kid's now on summer break and things just getting accomplished slower, the blog sharing kinda takes a hit.

But it's better late than never, right?!

Ok so let's move on, shall we.... can you tell that I really struggle at blog intros. LOL.

Last Monday, being that it was a big holiday and it's our first time not attending a ward breakfast at the park or going to family's house for swimming or get together, we decided to do some sightseeing instead.

We first headed down southwest to Bishop's Castle. Mitch heard about this place last Sunday from a brother in the church, so he researched it online and we headed out to see it first thing Monday morning. Here's some photos....


Here's Marcus in a big humungous chair, located in the front side of the mansion.


let me give you a little background about this place......there's this man (his last name is Bishop, hence the castle's name) that decided to build this castle on his own. He's been working on it for years and continues to work on it through donations of people that visit. Touring it is free but they caution us (very highly with liability paperworks to sign and everything) that since it is an ongoing construction site that we are touring it at our own risk!

It's an interesting building but I WAS NOT impressed! Not only did it scared the HECK out of me knowing that the only way for me to see anything inside is to climb these metal steps THAT let me add gives me that fine view of how far I am from the ground, but it was just not tour friendly with all the debri and construction equipment around.

Here's my family going up the steep stairs. Mitch tried so hard to get me to go up but I know my limitations and THIS one is one of them. Oh and did I mention that it was SUPER WINDY TOO!!!

I did go around the castle and took pictures of it from the ground. :)

Yeah, you won't see any photos of the inside of the castle nor photos looking down. This family photographer wasn't about to scare her pants off just so we can take shots like those.

this little castle box is where people can put their donations. There's also a little gift shop to the right of this box where we can buy souvenirs and what not, which also helps Mr. Bishop continue to build the castle.

and here's my family up in one of the floors.

then another level higher. This is about where the kids decided that they've had enough heights. Mitch took them down and went all the way up to the top of this tower. It's funny because he said that once he got to the top, he's not usually scared of heights but because the wind was blowing so hard, he got a bit scared up there. The wind was blowing hard that the metal frame which is holding him was swaying.

Because this trip was not like what we've imagined, we tried to make the most of the rest of the day by going to the Dinosaur Resource Center in Woodland Park, about 15 minutes from the Springs. Here's some photos of that....

It's interesting to note that this place have been extracting fossils from all areas of the northwest then making cast replicas of them (in this same facility) and those fossil replicas are donated to all sorts of museums in the world.

this is a prehistoric turtle. I'm so amazed at how huge it is compared a fossil of the biggest turtle we have now.

fossils all over. Hanging on the ceiling and on the glass cabinet displays.

after our day trip we were famished. On our way home, we stopped by our favorite BBQ place in town- Rudy's and got some fine BBQ meat to go. Oh how I love their food.

So that's our day. Packed with driving and seeing sights and most of all, spending some fun time with the family.

Thanks for stopping by.

Till next time,

Grace