A beer budget ‘vacation’ with champagne views!
Just a short time ago, a two week vacation was a big deal for us. We would painstakingly sift through our list of places we’d like to go, people we’d like to see, things we’d like to do. I imagine it was something like a dog lover going to the animal shelter and seeing a dozen adorable animals they’d like to take home – but knowing realistically they can only pick one! Every trip we considered looked up at us with adorable puppy eyes, silently pleading, “Pick me! Pick me!”
Prior to April of 2019, time and money were always the limiting factors. Since we stepped away from full time work, we’ve (more or less) removed time as a limiting factor. Now we have to make sure we have the long term means to finance our wanderlust. During the month of July, we took what for us was a pretty typical low rent, beer budget ‘vacation’ with champagne views and accommodations.
We spent two weeks wandering around southwest Colorado. We explored a new mountain range. We spent some quality grandparent time. We helped renovate a historic building. We spent time getting to know our future daughter-in-law. We spent days and days high in the rugged San Juan mountains enjoying the always breathtaking views. It was a perfect, inexpensive, sustainable way to spend two weeks.
After several days wandering around the mountains, we joined the George family and several friends for a work weekend up at the St Paul Lodge and Hut. Chris George Sr. purchased the St Paul mine and with virtually no money, but loads of ingenuity, converted the head house and a miner’s cabin into a backcountry ski lodge. Chris and Donna have recently handed over operation of the lodge to their children. You can learn more of the fascinating history/location here https://stpaulhut.com/about-us/ . We spent a fun weekend, making some major upgrades to the systems, and just enjoying the unbelievable ambiance of the place.
After the work weekend was over, we met up with Katie Jo – our soon to be daughter-in-law. Having found herself with some rare downtime during her psychology PhD program, she decided to join us for a week of wandering, camping and time with Aaron, Vanessa and the wee ones. Katie is developing into an accomplished ultra athlete, so we did our best to challenge (and share) with her some of our favorite hikes and climbs. I think we succeeded.
Two weeks of no stress bliss with family and friends in one of our favorite places. Truly a champagne lifestyle on a beer budget, and another wonderful chapter in the story of our retirement…with more to come.
