Random Observation/Comment #722: Just as I rather buy a business class flight when bringing Evie, I totally rather go glamping than roughing it.
Observations about Glenwood Springs:
- Incredibly beautiful and easy i70 drive (even better if you take the Aspen route) – Take your time driving out there.
- Cute small town with lots of great food – There’s not a lot of places to park, but it looks like a bustling area on weekends.
- Super close to hiking trails – No shortage of hiking opportunities within a 10 minute drive.
We didn’t have a lot of time to do the exploration of the city. Overall, I really love this level of glamping on the side of the mountain. It’s low stress and filled with amenities needed to transition Evie into not sleeping in her own bed.
How “glampy” is it? We were 5 minutes from town and could still hear the highway, so it was full-on glamping.
Some tips for glamping:
- Treat your car as an extended backpack – There’s no shame in just throwing everything in the car and having it next to you during the camping. This means you can pack a large rolling suitcase if you know the car is going to be right next to you.
- You might as well bring an air mattress – We brought these self-inflating cots that were a little flat. Since you’re glamping anyway, bring the whole air mattress.
- Buy groceries near town (we stopped at Wholefoods across the street from Outer Range – mostly because I wanted to go buy beer from Outer Range) – It’s okay to get some breakfast muffins
- Don’t arrive too early to the campsite if it doesn’t have shade – Normally, we would show up early camping and make sure to set up so we could chop firewood and start cooking before it gets dark, but this camp ground we had a lot of space and not a lot of shade. We were happy to show up around 6pm so we didn’t let the tents (and our heads) bake in the sun.
- Make sure the kids are happy – This was actually the first night Evie s
I am also glad we went with our instinct to end the trip early. Vinessa was feeling sick Saturday night and I wound up sleeping all day Sunday.
Itinerary
Friday
1pm – Start drive on i70 heading West
3pm – Outer Range – Yummiest stop ever! I should have bought most of this on the way back because I didn’t have refrigeration, but I still loved trying all the new Friday drops. Love the fried chicken. I get why someone would drive 1.5 hours just for lunch. We also bought some groceries at the Whole Foods across the street.
6pm Setup Camp at Ami’s Acre Campgrounds – This was the glamping site and they allocated 3 spaces for us.
7pm cook dinner – Camping grounds had a shared propane grill for us to use and make some eggs/sausage sandwiches
9pm – Roll around for a while trying to be comfortable – Our cots deflated a bit and Evie was pretty miserable.
Saturday
8am breakfast
Most groggy and feeling super hot by the morning
10:30am start hike up to Hanging Lake
Super pretty 1000 ft up and 2.6 miles round trip for Hanging Lake
11am beautiful hike continues
It’s a long hike up and it’s always good to take breaks and remember to drink water
12pm still hiking and tough spots
7 bridges and a huge rail hike up later…
1pm gorgeous Hanging Lake and hike up to the left side to get to the hidden waterfall
2pm back down to earth
Super hard hiking back down with Evie on my backpack
3pm super tired late lunch
Beer from Casey’s Brewing Taproom – Highly recommended and delicious beers
Smoke – Decent chicken BBQ, but I had a salad because I wasn’t feeling well. I never have salads.
5pm – Decided to go home early because I had altitude sickness and everyone was feeling a little off
930pm – Finally home
~See Lemons Love Hiking Hanging Lake
