The Last Day

So, today was the last day of our trip, and Lacey made it amazing. It started out with waking up in the very best hotel we've stayed in yet. We both went on the computer for a while and then decided we were hungry. This was the best of the Continental breakfasts, as far as I was concerned: egg melt sandwich things on English muffin halves, sausage pieces (not very good), biscuits, cinnamon rolls, fruit salad, yogurt, cereal, oatmeal, several kinds of juice, coffee, etc. I'm not sure Lacey liked it as much as I did.

We came back to the room for a while while Lacey worked on a surprise and I just messed around on the computer. We decided that we really like this hotel, so we signed up for another night -- two nights in the same place! Wow! Of course, my luggage seemed to have known that we made this decision and proceeded to somehow expand its contents all over the place, which was not fun when it was time to put it all back together tonight.

We left the room in the early afternoon and went for a bike ride. Lacey's been travelling with her bike, but I needed to rent one. The little bike place was cool -- people just coming in off the road asking for bike service and the place taking care of it pretty quickly. The bike they gave me was a little more complicated than I'm used to, but I did okay with it. We decided to take the country route, riding by the river, under tunnels. Denver's amazing in that they have these bike routes, and all kinds of people are riding all over the place. We went a pretty fair distance -- just over 8 miles. I felt like, if we'd been in flatter ground and lower altitude, I could've gone much further. Again, Lacey was very patient with my pathetic pace and said she was glad that I gave it a shot. When I went to return the bike, the guy made a mistake on entering the information, so he gave me a $10 discount because he said it was easier than fixing the mistake. Definitely not something that would've happened in Detroit.

Afterwards, we picked up some sandwiches at Subway and did a cursory cleaning of Lacey's car. Then she had a surprise for me: she took me to this place where they do indoor skydiving! From the outside, it looked like it was a huge, high building where this is done, and I was a bit concerned about what she was getting me into. And, signing waivers never really fills me with confidence about such ventures. However, once we were allowed upstairs, we saw that it was really just an air chamber, which, in some ways, was a little disappointing, as I'd thought we'd be "flying" together. There was a kid in there having some lessons, and it was interesting to watch. (I overheard his mother talking to someone and she said he wants to skydive but can't until he's 18 and has some kind of experience, so that's why he was taking these lessons.)

We had to go into a classroom where we watched a video about how to position ourselves, and then they made all of us (Lacey, me, 2 little kids who'd done it before and a terrified woman who apparently got talked into it) lie on this board thing one at a time so they could check our position. Of course, it's a lot different on a board than in a chamber with wind of 120 mph. After the classroom thing, we had to put on knee and elbow pads, jumpsuits (I had purple and Lacey had red), earplugs, helmets & goggles. Then, one by one, the instructor took us into the chamber. It was really an odd feeling -- kind of like swimming in air.(Although the instructor later commented that it was more like scuba diving. But, since I've never done that, either, I went with the reference that I know.) It was an incredibly creative, sweet, fun and exciting surprise, and I was really touched that Lacey did that for me, in another attempt to get me out of my comfort zone.

After that, we came back to the hotel again for a little while. Then, we went to Ted's Montana Grill, which is a chain from Montana that is owned by Ted Turner. It's an environmentally friendly restaurant that does things like use paper straws instead of plastic ones and monitors its energy use. They have their own butcher and serve mostly chicken, beef and bison. We started with an amazing artichoke dip that came with very generous slices of parmesan crusted ciabatta bread and strawberry margaritas that had sugar rather than salt around the edge of the glasses. We each ordered bison burgers (mine had cheddar cheese, bacon, onions and mushrooms), and I got a sweet potato for a side. It was really, really good, but, after the appetizer, I just wasn't that hungry, so I brought the rest of it back to the hotel, hoping that it will travel well on my very long day of flying tomorrow.

This trip has really been one of the very best of my life, starting with Lacey coming what was definitely out of her way to get me, talking until 3am that night even though she was exhausted, to all of the planning and driving and planning special surprises for me along the way. We -- well, I, anyhow, 'cause I know Lacey's tired of being on the road -- really enjoyed being in the car, and somehow, we never really seemed to run out of conversation. Now, I understand what the freedom of the road is all about. Thank you, Lacey, for inviting me to be your Tagalong.