COLORADO:

Rocky Mountain Oyster Tour!

By: Mike Marino

Rich in history and lore, Colorado has a wealth of old mining towns and ghost towns. You can get a dose of the howdy pard Wild West in Glenwood Springs where legendary gunfighter Doc Holiday spent his last days and hung up his guns. His memorial is located atop Lookout Mountain as his ghost guards the bustling burg below. Hell, you can even mosey into the local saloon and enjoy a brew and a Doc Burger at Doc Holidays bar downtown. Can't miss it. Big neon six shooter lights up the front of the building brighter than a super nova in outer space!

Up on Cripple Creek, as the song goes, you'll find an old mining town, dressed up today like a dance hall girl on Saturday night in her best gambling garb. The town sits at 10,000 feet and the sounds of slot machines mix with the silence of the cool mountain air.The streets are lined with numerous casinos, eateries, gift shops, museums and is host to a not to be missed annual Wild Burro Festival.

Cusine and culture are alive and well, and towns like Boulder, Denver and Colorado Springs offer the very best in the magic kingdom of Colorado food and drink. Juicy steaks to succulent seafoods to a variety of vegan delights, the carnivorous among us and the vegetarian alike will find something to please the palate of even the most discriminating foodie. If you dare, you can go where many have gone before, and get an intoxicating plateful of Colorado's most exotic foods...Rocky Mountain Oysters. Don't know what they are? Heres a clue. Colorado is host to the annual Bull Testicle Festival!

Colorado is a glutton for culture, and it feasts on art like a flock of buzzards devouring roadkill on the highway. Denver dotes on and nourishes the artistic nature, so as a result, a myriad of museums and galleries shed a plebian spotlight on the arts, and they adorn the Mile High City like a strand of beautiful pearls. They give a urbane character to the urban landscape and illuminate her with the Rocky Mountains acting as a willing backdrop to a brilliant bravo performance of culture. If you're not careful you could overdo it and suffer from a Mile High Art Attack!

One town that seems to encapsulate the best of the best of Colorado is Estes Park, just one hour northwest from Denver. So, grab your credit card and your Birkenstocks. It's time to gas up and hit the road as we explore a portion of Colorado where Cowboys and Cappucino Rock n' Roll!

ESTES PARK

What began as a small ranch in 1859 by Joel Estes and his family, has since mushroomed into an atomic explosion of tourism on steroids! Estes Park began it's life as a resort when an Irish Earl built the first hotel in the region to lure royalty to the Rockies in 1877. The summer population soon expanded exponentially, and when F. O. Stanley of Stanley Steamer fame, opened the doors of the famed Stanley Hotel in 1909, the gold rush of tourism dollars was on! Today, Estes Park and azure Lake Estes, is an enclave of 5,400 hundred year round citizens who bask in the beauty and majesty of the surrounding mountains, and are more than willing to share that bounty of beauty with visitors from around the world every summer. It's ground zero for Colorado cuisine taken to artistic heights, and is home to the Katherine Hepburnesque elegance and romance inspiring Rocky Mountain National Park.

Downtown Estes Park offers an almost orgasmic shopping experience with unique boutiques offering everything from kitchenware, books, mountain themed decor, and a Christmas store for year round holiday celebrating. Those of the tie dyed persuasion, can spare change shop at a local store that offers up an eclectic mixture of everything from Bob Marley t-shirts to rock n' roll gonzo ganja wear and accessories.

Restaurants feature a palate pleasing experience with a taste of Colorado wines on their menu's. and the town can even boast it's own microbrewery. Restaurant fare ranges from seafood to please the saltiest nautical dog to steaks cooked to absolute perfection. Munchy merchants offer up candy confections, and numerous ice cream parlors offer pile high cones of decadent double dip delights. In Estes Park, especially in the realm of food, you can get anything you want, except Alices Restaurant!

Lodging is largely rustic and romantic. Log cabins with knotty pine ambience sit on the banks of the Big Thompson River so you can hear the river rush by on crisp, star laden nights. Lodges, motels, hotels, and bed and breakfasts can be found along the river, in town and tucked away off the roadways in neat little ponderosa pine hideaways for maximum privacy. Prices do vary, but for the most part, Estes Park is a dream come true at a budget most can afford. Visit the Estes Park Website at:

Estes Park, Colorado

http://www.estesnet.com

THE STANLEY HOTEL

The Stanley Hotel, with 138 guestrooms is perched on a hillside overlooking the town of Estes Park and the surrounding valley and mountains. Visitors from around globe come here to stay and play, and to be pleasing pampered in style and fashion. F.O. Stanley built the hotel in 1909, and began ferrying tourists to the area, and to the hotel, in his own invention, The Stanley Steamer. In the lobby, you can see one of those original infernal internal combustion contraptions on display for a touch of history.

There is an outdoor courtyard for dining and enjoying a drink while basking in sunshine and invigorating mountain air. Indoors, you can enjoy a taste tantalizing meal with regal presentation. The Stanley is also one of the most haunted hotels in America, so you might as well belly up to the bar and hoist a few to the ghosts and other unseen astral spirits that may take a "shine" to you.

The Stanley Hotel is also famous as the inspiration for the Stephen King classic "The Shining". Though not the original film location for the Jack Nicholson vehicle, it was for the King produced television version, and is also the hotel where King stayed to write a portion of the book. Everywhere there are reminders in the form of photo's and of course, "Shining" merchandise galore in the souvenir shop in the hotel lobby. If your staying there, or merely visiting, they do have ghost and history tours daily, so make sure you take advantage of that. Then in you best Jack voice, "Heeeeere's Johnnnny!!" If you happen to see two little ghost girls by the elevator and a kid on a bigwheel talking to his finger...run like hell!

Visit the Stanley Hotel Website at

http://www.stanleyhotel.com

The industrial age helped usher in an era of protection and preservation of America's natural resources and spectacular beauty in the form of National Parks. Rocky Mountain National Park with elevations from 8,000 to over 14,000 feet is one of the crown jewells of the American park system. Established in 1915 just 6 miles west of Estes Park, RMNP is a eco-gem of flora and fauna unique to the area.

Home to elk, moose, mule deer, bears, bighorn sheep, coyotes and eagles it is also a labyrinth of over 360 miles of hiking and backpacking trails. Along the roads and trails there is a treasure trove of fly fishing, hiking, biking and horseback riding opportunites. Waterfalls and true tundra await the traveler along winding, switchback mountain roads including the Trail Ridge Road, which at 12,183 feet tops out as the highest, continuous paved road in the United States. The cost to enter the park is $20.00 per carload, and that price is good for one full week where you can enter and leave at your leisure. You can get more in depth information on the park and activities by visiting their website at: Rocky Mountain National Park http://www.nps.gov/romo

In Colorado you'll find colorful characters and charming charisma. Wild West history and the hysterically offbeat from Buffalo Bill Cody's grave overlooking Golden, Colorado to a bronze bust of Alferd Packer, America's pre-eminent cannibal serial killer center stage in the cafeteria at the medical university. Colorado is cowboys. Colorado is culture and cuisine...and yes, Colorado is cappucino! Above all, the Rocky Mountains rock n' roll with more altitude and attitude then invaders from Mars high on big plate of tender and juicy Rocky Mountain Oysters!

Mike Marino is a freelance writer of travel and pop culture and the author of the pop culture book THE ROADHEAD CHRONICLES Contact:

dharmabumroadie@yahoo.com