I’ve been meaning to write this post for a while, but we’ve had a busy couple of weeks and it just didn’t happen!
As I mentioned earlier, Andrew and I took a trip back to Ouray, Colorado, for our second anniversary. We had not been back to Ouray since our honeymoon, so this trip was very special. It was a blessing to return to the place where we spent our first week of marriage, visiting the same sights, eating at some of the same restaurants, and soaking up the same beauty of God’s creation.
I am a firm believer that married couples should try to “get away from it all” at least once a year to reconnect with each other and focus on their relationship. This can be hard to do with young kids, but even if it’s only for one night, it is so important! We are very thankful that we were able to take this trip, and that we could spend 3 whole days together without the distractions of work, internet, and daily life.
Driving into town. Ouray is a very classy mountain town.
Our first night there, we went back to one of our favorite restaurants, a Mexican place called Buen Tiempo. We had very fond memories of the food and the great time we had there together, so it was fun to go back. There’s my sweet hubby…love him! We got the fried ice cream for dessert again, and it was absolutely amazing! I can almost taste it. After dinner, we went for a little walk around town, and the sweetest thing happened! A boy, probably 8 or 9, walked past us on the sidewalk, and he smiled, patted his tummy, and said, “Congratulations!” Andrew and I were both so amazed that such a young boy was so thoughtful. It was probably one of the sweetest things a stranger has ever said to me.
On our second day, we had breakfast at a fun local place in Ridgeway (just a few minutes from Ouray). The food was fantastic and the restaurant was quite charming. Ridgeway is where some of the rich and famous of America have vacation homes (hello, Oprah!). After we finished breakfast, we headed to Telluride, which is a fancy skiing town about an hour away that has lots of shopping, restaurants, and bike trails. Needless to say, we didn’t actually buy anything in Telluride! The second picture is from the beautiful drive to Telluride.
Telluride has a free gondola that takes you up to Mountain Village, a super nice little town with shops, restaurants, and 5 star hotels. We rode up and explored a bit. It was a Sunday at the beginning of the summer season, so there weren’t very many people around yet. The gondola ride was a teeny bit scary for me at first, but it was a fun way to get to the top (the first picture is the view of Telluride from the gondola, the second is Andrew on the gondola, and the third is Mountain Village).
After a very fun (and hot!) day in Telluride, we headed back to Ouray and soaked in the natural hot springs at our hotel. We stayed at the Box Canyon Lodge and Hot Springs, and they have 5 hot tubs that get water directly from the natural springs in Ouray. We made sure to get in the coolest one, and it was quite lovely! They have the hot tubs situated on several patios behind the hotel, and there are lots of lovely trees all around. Not too shabby!
When we finished enjoying the hot springs, we headed out to dinner. One restaurant came highly recommended (I can’t remember the name), so we walked over and had a lovely dinner on the patio. We picked a good night to go because there was live music that we stayed and enjoyed for a while!
On Monday, we knew we wanted to go to the Hot Springs Pool, but we ran into some rain and had to wait it out for a while. That was okay because we ended up going to a local coffee shop and splitting a sandwich and a latte, and reading together. A little later in the afternoon, the weather cleared up and we were able to go back. Unfortunately, this was about the time when Andrew started feeling really sick.
We got all dressed up to go out to dinner. Unfortunately, Andrew got sick and had to leave the restaurant. It was a bummer, but the silver lining was that we ended up spending the evening together watching Tangled in our room.
The next morning, we made one last stop at the Box Canyon Falls where we had a picnic on our honeymoon. We hiked up to the falls a bit, then took a few pictures and headed back to the car to drive home.
Our trip was lovely and a much-needed escape! We are so thankful that we were able to go. Thanks for sticking with me through this long post. ;) – Diana
