Day 8: Garden of the Gods

Our two days in Colorado Springs was incredible! We got to spend time with great friends and experience a once in a lifetime experience, rock climbing and repelling at Garden of the Gods. After I graduated from college in 2003, I spent a summer in Colorado, just south of Denver, working for an organization called Youth for Christ. I remember thinking while I was here just how beautiful Colorado is and how it would be a great place to live. Spending 8 days driving through Colorado brought all those memories back to the surface.

We feel so blessed to have great friends here whose true passion is to take people on adventures. They got a babysitter for all the kids on night one and all the adults went to an Escape Room. I had never done one before and it was a blast!! I will definitely be doing it again back in California!

Day 2 was a face your fears day for sure. While I’ve always been adventurous (I’ve been skydiving and bungee jumping) in the last couple years I’ve developed a fear of heights. Our friends Joe and Anne love to rock climb and wanted to take us rock climbing at Garden of the Gods. Not one to turn down a trip to Garden of the Gods, I decided to go with the flow….

Garden of the Gods Park is a registered National Natural Landmark. It has dramatic views, 300′ towering sandstone rock formations against a backdrop of  Pikes Peak and brilliant blue skies.

That was until I saw the rock we were climbing. I figured since we were “newbies” we would be doing an easy climb and repel, nope. Joe was confident we could manage a 225ft climb! You guys!!

My hands and feet are sweating just looking at these pictures again and typing this blog post. I don’t even remember being this high up on a narrow rock, hanging out. The views were incredible! Brayden loved every second, Katelyn struggled through this experience. She experienced some intense fear of heights and had some anxiety at the top, which is why she’s not in the photo.

I’m most proud of her today. She was scared climbing, at the top and with the thought of repelling, but despite that, she kept climbing. Gosh, you guys we could learn so much from her bravery. How often do we face fear and quit before we experience the full journey? She cried the whole way up, but she was determined to keep putting one foot in front of the other. She never once asked to go down, she just expressed her fears as she climbed. By the time we repelled, she was all smiles. She did it! Not only did she face her fear, but she conquered it! I know this will be a memory that she’ll remember as she grows older.

Side note: is there a harness out there that doesn’t accentuate all the fat rolls I work so hard to suck in?! haha

Thank you Joe and Anna for this incredible experience!! I’m so glad we did it! Joe runs an amazing organization called Save the Storks. I’m telling you friends, we have the privilege of knowing so many people doing incredible things.

“Save the Storks exists to partner with pregnancy resource centers and give abortion-vulnerable women a choice that will change their lives forever. We partner with resource centers all over the nation, providing them with powerful tools and training to more effectively connect with those women in their communities. With the support of people like you, we have built 43 Stork Buses (with 4 currently in production and 8 fundraising), and helped save over 4,000 babies.

Through our partnership with pregnancy centers, we provide the tools and resources they need to get closer to those who need their services. Our Stork Bus minimizes the distance between pro-life professionals and the women who most need them, and our various consulting packages help pregnancy centers understand how to better utilize their staff and resources to reach a greater number of women.”

We stayed at Great Wolf Lodge in Colorado Springs. It was so fun! More to come on that…. Next stop Denver and Boulder, CO.

xo, Alissa