Hello Colorado!

Made it! After a long 3 day drive, I made it to Colorado! The drive was very long and we drove about 700 miles per day! It was nice to see so much of the country. Pennsylvania had beautiful mountain highways but from Chicago to Denver it was mostly farms and windmills! It was cool to see so many wind farms throughout Iowa and Nebraska. But, needless to say, I was happy to have finally reached Denver for more than one reason! 

It was nice having my mom drive out to Colorado with me and help me get settled into my new apartment. In between prepping for work and getting settled, I have had some time to explore a little bit.  The first adventure was a trip up the Mount Evans Scenic Byway drive. This is a road that takes you up 14,130 ft. The roads are narrow and winding with absolutely NO guardrails. It is a little nerve-racking to say the least but absolutely worth it! The views from the top are incredible, even on a cloudy day like we had! Once you get to the top, you have the option of climbing up another 100 feet or so to get to the  "true top" (14,264 ft). While driving up, my head began to hurt and continued at the top. Luckily, that was the only issue I had with the altitude. I also experienced some slight shortness of breath with walking to the top. Both of these symptoms disappeared while we were descending. 

The next adventure took me quite further into the Rockies. One of my graduate school clinical supervisors had rented a cabin with her husband for a couple weeks and invited my friends and me out. Their cabin overlooked the two tallest peaks in Colorado, one of them being Mount Elbert. Although it rained a majority of our stay there, the views were incredible and it was great visiting with them! We did have some altitude issues while we were there, nothing major though, just some headaches, shortness of breath, and fatigue. We were able to explore the town of Leadville, at 10,000+ feet. 

While driving out to Leadville, we passed many signs for ski mountains including Breckinridge, Aspen, Vail, and Copper Mountain to name a few! This is getting me very excited for snowboard season! I'm thinking the next adventure will be hiking and exploring Red Rocks, the amphitheater right outside Denver! Any other suggestions?

Here is a collage of pictures of my adventures so far! I made this using Pic Stitch. 

I will be starting my Clinical Fellowship year very soon, so stay tuned for posts about that! To make sure you don't miss a post, enter your email in the "Follow By Email" tab at the top right of this page!

Adventure Awaits! 

Taylor