Marchara/Ferrarand vacation 2018

After planning vacations together for almost 5 years now and having them cancelled for one reason or another (a niece is born or said vacation destination is ON FIRE), the Ferraras and Marchands finally went on vacation together. After approximately 18 months of talking, planning, consternating, waffling and second guessing, we did it! I must admit, I was scared.  I have grown quite fond of the Ferraras, and I was scared that #900 square feet would prove too much for our friendship.  But, it really could not have gone any better.  There was never a dull moment!  We saw so much on our trip, and I think we made some amazing memories.  Best part....we kept our friendship with the Ferraras.

Dinosaur at a bathroom stop.  They wanted it to look like the 

dinosaur was running and they were holding on.

Our first night in Salida.  We went to an awesome pizza place 

and relaxed by the Arkansas river.  This little red caboose is

a Ferrara tradition when they go, so naturally we had to take 

a picture here too!

Our first full day in Colorado, we went to St. Elmo...an adorable 

little ghost town with fairly tame chipmunks and ground squirrels.  

Everyone thought it was so cool to feed them.

 The Great Sand Dunes-this place was incredible.  There were mountains of 

sand, or more accurately, crushed granite.  The kids had a ball playing in the 

sand and collecting granite remnants.  The guys attempted to climb to the 

top of the sand dunes, but they were unsuccessful at reaching the top...next time ;) 

 We took the kids to play on a dune.  It was hard to hide from the fact that the sand 

was so hot! Gary ended up carrying some kids up on his back.

This was a jam packed day! We started the day on the Royal Gorge choochoo.  We ate
breakfast on the train and took a nice relaxing trip through the Royal Gorge.
Then, we stopped by a local winery for a quick wine  tasting, ate lunch at a local diner
(with the best pie EVER) and finally went to this cool dinosaur experience.  The
kids were whipped after this day.

Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs

Horseback riding

White water rafting

We LOVE Salida!