You guys! I just realized I never told you all about my trip to Denver this past January! Denver is, arguably, one of the nicest, cleanest and most retirement-friendly cities I have ever been to. I think the entire city of Denver was like 30 minutes apart from end to end. The streets were clean, the people were friendly, and I felt an overall higher quality of life while I was there. My boyfriend David and I stayed at The Curtis Hotel downtown, and we loved how colorful and comfortable it was! Not to mention, it was in close proximity to everything, so getting to places was super easy.

I still remember planning the trip to Denver. I was overworked and way past due for a vacation. My main goals were to relax as much as possible and try new things. David and I had an idea of what we wanted to do, but the details of the trip came much later. The biggest activities we had lined up were:

• skiing
• trying sushi
• trying legal marijuana
• building a snowman/playing in the snow

Skiing

I still can’t believe that I can finally say I’ve gone skiing! We visited Winter Park, which I’m told is one of Denver’s more touristy areas. Early that Friday morning, we decided to drive up to the transportation station, so we could park our car and ride the bus up the mountain. Unbeknownst to us, there wasn’t really such a thing, and we ended driving up the entire mountain in our little compact rental car by ourselves! Yes, a couple of Texans drove up a Colorado mountain! Still not sure how we got confused about the bus thing, but driving up there was—terrifying, to say the least. My boyfriend was the driver, and I swear he was going no faster than 20mph the whole time. We told ourselves that if this drive got too ridiculous, we were just going to turn around. Didn’t even care that we dropped almost $2,000 on all the ski gear, classes, etc.

Long story short, the drive got more ridiculous, but we kept going! The lowest temperature we hit was -11° (Fahrenheit). Once we got over our fear, the mountain was quite beautiful! There were whole towns up there! Hospitals, schools, everything! The further up we got, the whiter the sky became.

Skiing is a lot of hard work. I’ll be honest, David and I didn’t even make it to the gondola. We got stuck just walking the skis up the initial pathway. We had heard rumors about the altitude affecting our breathing and bodies, in general—especially since we’re from the South—but those were definitely not rumors. It was incredibly difficult to catch my breath up there. They ended up assigning us a new instructor, and we stayed on the bunny slopes. We also took a lift just to get a better view of the entire ski park. It was magical!

Sushi

OK, let me start by saying ew. I gave it a try, and I just couldn’t. Raw sushi is absolutely disgusting to me. But I TRIED it. And that was exactly what I was there for—to try new things! I forgot what I ordered (you can see in the picture), but the only thing that was saving me was that sauce. The gummy texture and the cold temperature was just too much for me.

I’m not opposed to trying some cooked sushi though. I’ll be sure to let you all know how that goes!

Marijuana

I can’t believe I’m actually including this in my blog post. Marijuana is absolutely ILLEGAL in Texas. Not even medicinal usage is legal here. However, that didn’t stop me from trying it for the first time in Denver, where it is completely legal!

For anyone wondering, this was my very first time ingesting “mary jane” of any kind. No, I didn’t smoke it. I decided to go with edible gummies instead. They were a lot less potent, and plus, I don’t like being around smoke. The gummies cost somewhere around $25, not including sales and recreational tax. It wasn’t much different from buying a large jar of dietary supplements here in Texas.

It was pretty cool! It definitely relaxed me, and I can see why a lot of people use it recreationally. I’ll be honest, I didn’t take any photos or video at all because I was nervous that someone from my job (or my mom) may find out. Now, I’m regretting not taking any videos.

The snow

Ahhh this was probably my favorite part. It was snowing the entire time I was there! And not that dim, thin snow that we get every ten years in Texas, but actual snow that was so high, my whole boot was almost covered in it! David and I stopped in a random neighborhood and found a little dog park to play in. We attempted to make snowmen, but they’re a lot harder to make than we thought! Either way, we had an amazing time!

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Other things we did in Denver

We visited the University of Denver while we were there. I was just curious to see how the campus looked, and boy was it nice! You can always tell a private school from a public school just from how well constructed the buildings are. Walking around the campus gave me quite a bit of nostalgia. I miss college!

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The Denver Zoo was so cool! No lie, I hadn’t been to a zoo since I was like four years old. You can only imagine how child-like I was acting here. It was pretty chilly that day, so a lot of the animals weren’t actually out. But at least I got to see the giraffes, elephants and tigers in person! Did I mention poisonous bull frogs, too?

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David and I went on a date night, too! We got dressed super fancy and went to dinner at Cherry Creek Grill in central Denver. We purposely chose a high-end restaurant, and it was worth it! I ordered some sort of glazed grilled chicken, garlic potatoes and broccoli. The food was immaculate. And the drinks were even better! After that, we went to the Denver Pavilions downtown and saw a movie.

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Funniest part: we went to the “hood” of Denver, which wasn’t actually the hood at all. At least not to us. We were somewhere off of Colfax Avenue, and let’s just say Houston hoods make this area look like Disneyland. But that’s what I loved about Denver! The tranquil nature of the city was, by far, the best part of the trip. David and I can’t wait to go back someday!

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My travel urge is starting to itch, which means it’s time for another trip! Denver was the exact type of vacation I needed to start the year. Can’t wait to share my next trip with you all!

Let me know in the comments what your next trip is!