Chipmunks & Milkshakes

I love Ghost Towns.

I also love Muenster cheese.

Back to Ghost Towns...

Yesterday we went to St. Elmo, Colorado near Buena Vista. St. Elmo is the oldest intact Ghost Town in the West. I know this because I read it on a bulletin board yesterday. I try to stay informed. You should too.

These first few pictures are the view on our drive into St. Elmo. You should know that the drive is directly into the mountains with no outlet and it's a dirt road. This is why you should not have husbands drive.

Upon arrival, if you look to the left, you will see a block of railroad ties piled and laid out with people feeding chipmunks. Aren't they cute?

Evan didn't quite grasp the concept that we were feeding the chipmunks and he was not to be eating them. Don't panic. It's not like he doesn't know any better because we feed him chipmunk at home. Sheesh.

Dawson is the Chipmunk Whisperer.

Let's take a stroll through the Ghost Town now.

This is a bridge.

The bridge has me, Evan and Dawson on it. We are smiling.

I wonder if the bridge is an antique? I've never seen one sold in an antique store before. Someone should check on that for me.

I would like to call this "The Bubbling Brook". This is because I was watching Anne of Green Gables the other day and she inspires me.

The pictures below are of the old St. Elmo Schoolhouse. I found it fascinating!

Dawson was running to attend school. Or because I told him I would race him but I lied.

Now, The inside was protected by glass. They had collected items that would be used during the time period the school was used. I was sad that the items weren't original to the school, however, I could understand why people would want to pillage and plunder a school instead of a bank.

This shot of the Aspen leaves is just Jason being fancy.

This picture is of the St. Elmo Hotel. The last time it was in use was in 1880. I know because I read it on the paper that was taped to the window. I try to stay informed. The 1880's were kind of void of color, in my opinion. I wanted to go in there. So I broke the glass in the window in the far right corner. NO! Do you seriously think I would do that? I really do want to know what it looks like inside. If the private owner of this hotel would please read this blog and contact me to let me know I can go, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks.

I know many of you are impressed right now as you gaze on this photograph that I can read Italian. The flyer says: "If you can read this, you can read Italian".

Evan fell asleep just as we were leaving St. Elmo and he fell asleep grasping one of the the little rings in front of him. I unbuckled my seat belt and strained to reach back there with one hand and get a picture of him. You can tell by my angle that I managed to also squeeze myself and my sunroof into the picture. That's how flexible I am.

On our way home we always stop in Buena Vista at this little dive and get a peanut butter marshmallow milkshake.

Jason waits patiently in line at Hamburger Alley. Only it's just a sign saying Hamburger Alley. It's not really Hamburger Alley.

And this is Evan waiting patiently while daddy waits patiently. I don't know why he thinks he can eat our camera. We only feed him chipmunks.

St. Elmo's Fire

Colorado never sounded sweeter to a little boy named Dawson. Let me tell ya, he made out like a bandit. You should have seen his face when he saw his room for the very first time when we arrived at Gramma G & Grandpa's house. His very own McQueen bed. A picnic table AND his own TV with a DVD player. This included about 5 new Veggie Tale movies that Gramma G purchased brand new just for him. Jason and I considered kicking Dawson out of his room and taking over, until we decided to put our 42" Plasma flat screen tv on the dresser in our room. Then we felt better about Dawson's posh set-up. Needless to say, he never seems to grow bored here. Though he has created a nasty habit of asking for a new toy every time we got to Wal-Mart. I could have started that, but I won't admit to it. I just want him to be quiet while I shop! Is that so much to ask?

Our first weekend in Colorado Springs we decided to take a one day trip to see the Aspen Trees, because this is the time of year that they change color.

The trip took us to a ghost town by the name of (insert scary music) ST. ELMO.

Of course this led to numerous question asked by Dawson about when he would get to see Elmo which led me to cover my ears and ignore because he wasn't accepting my explanation of the name of the town, which led to him yelling.

On the way, however, we met an interesting sight:

Yes those are wild donkeys meandering along the road.

We pulled over because Greg said they were tame and Dawson and I wanted to be friends with them. Jason on the other hand, was afraid of them and jumped in the back of the truck to pet them:

This little diva here, was quite needy:

I call this picture "The Big Eye"

The highlight of St. Elmo, although it's considered a ghost town, is feeding the chipmunks. I took two good pictures of the Aspen trees:

Then I was on a mission to take Dawson to feed the chipmunks.

I was determined to feed the chipmunks Dawson's leftover goldfish crackers. Some lady sitting on the log behind us got annoyed by that and handed us her bag of sunflower seeds and said she was done feeding them anyway and then left. I am still positive to this day that goldfish crackers are a rare chipmunk delicacy and they would have loved to sink their little teeth into the morsels of goodness.

This final chipmunk picture is one that Jason took because he thinks he's clever:

For the record, I did NOT sit on this chipmunk! I didn't even know one had snuck up behind me. I like to believe it was hiding in the shadow of my wings..

Ending with a few cute shots of Dawson playing by a creek that Jason took him too after the feeding of the 5,000.