25. Apr, 2016

25. Apr, 2016

25. Apr, 2016

25. Apr, 2016

25. Apr, 2016

WEDNESDAY 11-06-08 

We went to see the nice ladies at the Welcome Center on our Rest Area site when they opened this morning. We wanted to establish if there was any dedicated RV parking in Denver. After lots of helpful leaflet gathering and chats we established that there didn’t seem to be, although there was a Park & Ride service and they might have RV parking there. So off we went and managed to find the Park & Ride site fairly easily but not the RV parking area.

Denver was the first place we’d visited which didn’t have parking spaces for RV’s, buses and other oversized vehicles. The only space we could find belonged to the ‘Cracker Barrel’ store and restaurant next door to the Park & Ride and fortunately the manager there kindly agreed to allow us to park in his car park provided it was only for a few hours, and that we wouldn’t park there overnight (GPS: N39.912826 W104.992399). 

We climbed on to the city bus for a long ride in to town, a total of $3 (senior’s rates). From the bus we hopped on to the free hybrid powered shuttle service which runs up and down 16 Street Mall which is laid out with lots of trees and apart from the shuttle buses which run in their own allocated roadways is pedestrian only. This was the heart of downtown and at the end of it the very impressive State Capitol Building. The city was a pleasant mixture of old and new. The new being numerous skyscrapers, none of which were too tall as to become overpowering, and the old being Victorian-era buildings, of which there were many. 

This was a very pleasant city to walk around, it was sunny and warm, and after lunch at 'Panda Express' we’d seen about all we wanted to by mid afternoon. 

Back at the RV we were trying to decide where to park up for the night. I’d spotted a Rest Area on the I70 running westward from here, and it was not too far from our only planned visit tomorrow - Buffalo Bill’s Grave, located at his request on top of Lookout Mountain outside of Denver.

Unfortunately we had decided to move off during rush hour, and before we knew it we were lost, and hemmed in by motorists in a hurry to get home. The attitude of motorists towards RV’s here seems to be similar to that in Las Vegas. Eventually I just pulled out of the jams and heavy traffic, and in to a shopping mall announcing that we weren’t moving anywhere until the rush hour had passed. So we sat and had a ham salad for dinner and at about 19:15 programmed the Satnav with the Wal-Mart store in Golden, the nearest town to Lookout Mountain. Damned if the roads weren’t still busy, and the drivers were still in a hurry, and still not letting me change lanes easily. Eventually we arrived here at Wal-Mart, Golden, but that’s the last time I’ll be on the roads after 17:00. Strangely we hadn't seen any other RV’s today, maybe they know something we don’t. 

Hopefully we’ll get a good night’s sleep, and fingers crossed that the wind doesn’t get up so strongly again, if it does the skylight won’t rattle as I’ve been up on the roof and taped it down to the roof itself. Last night the wind blew from the mountains, but tonight we’re IN the mountains, so it’s anybody’s guess. I’ve identified another parking location within the car park should I need to face the vehicle in a different direction to fend off the wind during the night. 

LOCATION TONIGHT: Wal-Mart car park, Golden, Colorado