Well, it turns out that one of the best things to do is finish your math book, but that is only if you have math to do. For me, I had to finish my math book because I am starting Algebra 1. Yes, I am eleven, and starting Algebra 1, #beautiesofhomeschooling. Some different things to do is visit a lot of national parks, stay at hotels, and do lots of Duolingo. I was road-tripping across the country with my Mom and Dad, while all of my three siblings were off at camps. KariBella was on an Outward Bound adventure, Ethniemay was in France learning French, and Zebaniah was in Spain learning Spanish. So that left me to chill with my parents.
First stop, we went up to my Dad’s parents’ cabin to see all of his siblings, which was fun. We only stayed there one night, and then we were off to Aspen.
Things to do In Aspen
We were staying with some friends of my mom and dad, who lived in Aspen. When we arrived we got all settled and had a pretty early bedtime, because tomorrow we had a long day of white water rafting, where we would ride down the River on a guided tour/adventure.
But before that, we went out to a nice restaurant named Bousq for my moms birthday. They had very good food, and it was I think five courses. We went to bed right when we got back preparing for the super long drive to the Great Sand Dunes.
Rafting Browns Canyon at Aspen
The next day we got up and got into swimsuits because we would be getting very wet on this trip. Aspen Whitewater Rafting Company had wet suits that we could use, but it was very hot outside, so we wanted to stay cool but not freeze.
We drove down to the Aspen Whitwater Rafting office, and there we meet our guide. Her name was Adare, and the way she told us to remember it was a truth or a dare, which I thought was funny. Anyway, usually you go with another group, and there are like two rafts. But luckily for us, we were all alone, which meant that we had to do more paddling, but we did not have to share the juice boxes with anyone else.
The ride up was a little skeptical because we were going up a super winding road, which also happened to be super narrow. Since there were usually more people, we were riding in a 15-seater bus, so with only three of us, there was plenty of room. I was originally planning to do some math on the way up, but throwing up was not the ideal situation in the middle of nowhere on a 2-hour drive. Also, I was learning Spanish on Duolingo, and Adare was super confused when she heard someone yelling in Spanish, “Hoy, hoy, HOY!!!”. So I moved up to the front seat (AKA shotgun) and chilled there for the rest of the drive.
Adare told us about an old mining town that used to be up where we were but was abandoned because of all of the avalanches in the winter. before we go to the river we stopped at their mid-way office to pick up the rafts. I thought that that was smart that they left them there because then they did not have to go on the winding road with a trailer. Once we had gotten the rafts securely fastened to the trailer, we drove the remaining 30 min to the river, where we got a tutorial on how to paddle.
The highest class rapid that we did was a level 3 or 4, I do not remember exactly, but technically I was not allowed to do class fives, but I had ridden the Grand Canyon, which had the largest rapids, like ever. Anyway, we got about 3/4 of the way through and stopped for lunch. After putting some food in our faces, we were more ready to take on some rapids, but sadly, we had kinda gotten through most of them. But there were still two really big ones at the end that we would have to go through.
When we had finally gotten through, the bus was waiting for us there, because this company drives the bus down to the drop-off point, which I thought was a smart business. Anyway, I had a lot of fun on the rafting trip.
When we got back into town we went out to a nice restaurant named Bousq for my moms birthday. They had very good food, and it was I think five courses. We went to bed right when we got back preparing for the super long drive to the Great Sand Dunes.