Madrid 2023

To be completely honest, Madrid hadn't been on our must-see list. I know, don't hate me and I know every European city has it's own vibe, but we've been to Barcelona (loved!) and Madrid was on the list, but so are so many other cities! The end goal for this trip was Portugal.

Yet, since I wanted to make this trip happen using points for flights, I started getting creative in my searches when I couldn't find flights from Denver to Lisbon for the point price I was willing to pay. Thus, Madrid came on my radar as a major city we haven't been to and that is relatively close and easy to get to Lisbon.

We flew Lufthansa from Denver through Frankfurt to get to Madrid. I thought I'd found the perfect flight, a 3 hour layover in Frankfurt, enough to give us a cushion of time for delays as well as initial customs. Of course, our flight from FRA-MAD ended up getting pushed back, so we had a 6 hour layover in Frankfurt instead. Not ideal IMO (I'd planned on us using the sleeping pods at FRA that I'd found online, but in reality they would have required us to go through two more security lines and we decided it wasn't worth it). But hey! We survived!

We arrived at Madrid airport around 8:00p local time Monday, 5/22. Knowing that we were going to be arriving this late and jetlagged, I had prearranged a private transfer from the airport to our airbnb through our airbnb. While I'm glad we didn't have to think, only to look for someone holding a sign with our name, we TOTALLY got ripped off. The ride cost us $60eu and an Uber would have been $30 or less. Oh well.

We booked this airbnb about 2 months ahead of time. We chose it based on location, private outdoor patio, air conditioning, and honestly the elevator as a positive too - again knowing it was 5 floors up and we were travelling with two young kids.  The airbnb was fine... but I don't know that either of us would recommend it? The layout is a bit funky. Both kids were a bit scared to share a room away from ours as we originally planned, so I ended up sleeping with Parker upstairs with the low slanted ceiling and Ben/Grayson on the main floor. The first night, the main floor bedroom smelled overwhelming of airfreshner and the next night we realized that was probably to cover up a mildew small. Anyways, on to the city!

How We Spent 3 Nights/2.5 Days in Madrid

Night 1

That first night it was late and we were all starving by the time we checked into the airbnb. We were right off of Plaza De Sol, so a well populated location. The downside of not having researched too much was that we had no idea where we wanted to eat and it was 10p, so places were closing. We ended up eating at Tapa Cafe Madrid, which as you can guess from the google reviews, was so-so. 

Day 2

The next day we all slept in until 11am. I had debated booking a tuktuk tour for us, but ultimately decided against it, not knowing how we'd all be feeling. We decided to go with the back-up plan: Madrid City Tour hop on/off bus. Once we were all awake and ready to go, we opted for a coffee shop breakfast. Feliz Coffee was perfect for the job. Once fueled, we continued walking to Museo Nacional del Prado to buy tickets (which we could have done online) and hop on the bus.

San Jeronimo el Real

We've never done a hop on/off bus before, but I have to say, it actually worked out quiet well! Kids under 6 are free. A one day pass was $25eu and two-day was $30eu, so we opted for two-days. We rode around the city for several stops, until inevitably someone wanted water and someone needed to go to the bathroom. We got off at Plaza de Espana and hopped in a Faborit for a drink and bathroom (which also had some delicious light-meal food. The kids got smoothies). We wandered over to the plaza and found the most amazing playground by happenchance, Parque infantil Plaza Espana. I would say this is a must visit if you have kids toddler age or older. My kids were beyond excited for a playground (and this was the favorite of our entire trip).

From there we wandered more, looking at the Real Palace (from the outside), finding gelato, and then hopping into Taproom Madrid to avoid some rain. We were all feeling pretty good at this point that we decided to go to an "early" flamenco show. 

I had researched flamenco show options ahead of time. Knowing Madrid is a late night city, I had bookmarked a show I found via Airbnb experiences that started at 6:00p. I also got lucky that I had found the same show via Viator. Airbnb wanted to charge for the kids, whereas Viator listed kids under 6 were free. On top of that, Viator sent me a $25 off $50 booking. So in the end, we all 4 went to Essential Flamenco for $50, including a drink for everyone.

The show was an hour long, which was close to too long for the kids, but it held their attention. I'm glad we went (and also glad we didn't do a full-on production with dinner and show)! From there we walked over to Las Bravas, a spot I had bookmarked in my research, for dinner. But it was completely closed. Instead we ended up at Bandida Tapas. We got there at 7p and the restaurant was fairly empty, but the time we left it was full.  It didn't seem the most welcoming of kids; but the food was good and we managed just fine! We stopped at mas que cervezas on the way home, which is an excellent beer and wine shop.

Day 3

With no major plans for the day, we started with a walk to a coffee shop for breakfast to see what the day had in store. Alchemy Coffee was incredibly quaint, but also delicious (my best iced latte of the trip). The clerk was so friendly; he chatted with the kids and made them little chocolate milks on the house - plus gave them a cookie to share when we left. From there we walked up to Plaza Mayor to look around and over to Mercado de San Miguel.

It was a beautiful building, but inside was a bit intense and chaotic for us. Ben doesn't do well in crowds in America, let alone a foreign country with a different language and wrangling two kids. We weren't all that hungry, but there was no where to sit either. We grabbed a few pastries and found a spot outside to eat.

We continued to walk around the city and explore, but decided we should get to Takos for lunch. Ben's friend had visited Madrid in recent years and Takos was the only food recommendation he offered. He was right. There was a line when we got there (waiting for it to open) and a line when we left. They have delicious street tacos if you're in the mood!

After lunch, since we had the bus passes, we decided to hop on the bus again to Retiro Park. This was another highlight of Madrid for our family. We explored some of the gardens and statues, got a drink by the pond, and then waited inline to rent a paddleboat. It was a picturesque afternoon!  We got back on the bus, found some empanadas (not really memorable), and walked to Oso Brew Co (to be honest their beer Ben bought in cans the night before was better than what they had on tap!)

We went to Brew Wild Pizza Bar for dinner. This was a spot Ben had found in his beer research and they had the coolest/yummiest "volcano pizza"; almost like a calzone, that they sent on fire. I would recommend giving it a try to break up all of the croquettes!

Day 4

Departure day already! We had enough time before our check out to grab breakfast. We walked over to a different part of town we hadn't been to and got a real sit down breakfast at Nomad Cafe. It was as delicious as it was adorable. I would definitely recommend!

Remember how I said above that we got ripped over paying $60eu for our transfer from the airport to our airbnb? Yea, we ordered an Uber to pick us up and take us to Madrid airport.... it cost $19. Sigh.

On to Lisbon!

Europe 2023: Madrid, Lisbon, and Algarve

 I don't have a great history of blogging consistently anymore... but there are some things that are worth documenting, and our recent trip to Europe is one. We returned from a 15-day stay in Europe a few days ago with the kids (newly 4 and 5.75) and I'm attempting to capture while items are fresh in my mind. As you probably recognize by now, I'm a wordy talker and writer, so I'm trying my best to keep this succinct.

Trip Itinerary

• Sunday 5/21: Depart from Denver (we flew Lufthansa, booked on points through United), and flew through Frankfurt to get to Madrid)
• Monday 5/22 - Thursday 5/23: Madrid (3 nights)
• Thursday 5/23: Fly 1.5 hours to Lisbon
• Thursday 5/23 - Monday 5/29: Lisbon (4 nights)
• Monday 5/29: Pick up rental car at Lisbon Airport and drive 3 hours south to the Algarve region of southern Portugal
• Monday 5/29 - Saturday 6/3: Carvoiero (5 nights)
• Saturday, 6/3: Fly 3 hours to Munich
• Saturday 6/3: Stay in Munich (1 night)
• Sunday 6/4: Fly back to Denver

We booked the trip this way for a few reasons. The biggest driver was that we wanted to go to Portugal for the majority of the trip, but we wanted to fly using Chase Ultimate Rewards points (see old post here and happy to talk points with anyone, anytime!). Denver has somewhat limited options of where to fly into for Europe. I looked at "positioning" flights, ie. flying to a large US hub airport and then directly to our destination, but even then, I didn't find many "good" options for the points I was willing to spend to get to Lisbon. Thus, when I found decent flights to Madrid from Denver (with a Frankfurt layover), and knew that we could easily (and cheaply) get from Madrid to Lisbon; it seemed like a worthwhile option.

I also knew from my research that I wanted us to end our trip at the beach. I figured we would enjoy the hustle and bustle of the city for a few days and then enjoy the downtime of the beach following. This was the perfect approach for us.

We could have stayed one more night in Carvoeiro; but I figured flying back to Denver on a 10 hour direct flight from Munich was going to be long enough and I didn't want to add another flight to that day (which would have also been an early AM flight), instead we opted to fly Faro to Munich the day ahead of time and use credit card points for one night hotel. While we wish we would have had more time to explore Munich, this approach of a quick stopover worked well for us.

Because I have no shame and get excited about travelling on points, our international flights would have cost us $8,200 cash. Instead we paid 262,400 points + $629 cash (for taxes and fees). Wohoo!

While several aspects of this trip were heavily planned, the general daily itinerary was not. Our kids are used to shuffling around and keeping busy at home/in the mountains, but I wasn't sure how much any of us would be up for or what would keep their interest. I'm going to break each city up into it's own post to share what we ended up doing while there. Check for links below (once created)

Madrid

Lisbon

Algarve

Munich

View from breakfast of our Lisbon airbnb street

Icelandic Babymoon - Part 1

We got back from our Iceland and while everything is fresh in my mind, unlike Italy, I'm going to share it with you.

We talked about doing a birthday/babymoon trip and debated back and forth on how much time to take off and what our budget was. It came down to either a trip to southern California (with time split between San Francisco and redwood forest) or Iceland.

My friend Breanne introduced my to travel hacking (this is a great post by her about credit cards; she and her husband quite their jobs and traveled the world for seven months!). Even though we went to Hawaii last year on credit card points, we had enough points racked up to get our flights and three nights hotel for Iceland for free!

It was a quick trip, Sunday to Saturday, five and a half days and five nights, but the perfect amount of time to feel like we got a good experience of Iceland (and so nice to have a day off before going back to work tomorrow). Here's what we did!

Day 1 - Reykjavik
We landed around 6:30am on Monday, May 1 after a seven hour direct flight from Denver via Iceland Air (side note: Iceland Air does not serve a complimentary meal, so plan ahead). After reading many reviews, it's recommended to go to Blue Lagoon (the tourist hot spot for blue thermal fed waters) landing in Iceland or leaving Iceland; since it's near the airport (the airport is about 45 minutes or so from Reykjavik). I followed a coworkers advice and prebooked us a reservation at 8:00am.

Leaving the airport, we picked up our rental car (booked with Auto Car Rental via Guide to Iceland. Note: most rental places have both gas and diesel cars. I opted for diesel as it's typically more fuel efficient and cheaper) and were on our way.

I had put my swimsuit and a change of clothes in my carry on bag, but I forgot about flip-flips and ended up having those in my suitcase so we bought flip-flops (at $14 a pair), which really were not needed. If you go, I'd recommend to remember to bring your own or forego using them.

Being there at 8:00am (opening hour), turned out to be a brilliant idea; there was barely anyone there! Once in the lagoon, for the first forty minutes, it felt like we barely saw anyone and had the place to ourselves. (Note, make sure you put the provided conditioner in your hair when you pre-shower. The waters are supposed to be great for your skin, but will dry out your hair).

 

21 week, 4 day bump

After being at the lagoon for two or three hours, we decided to head into Reykjavik. We arrived starving and went directly to a brewery (surprise, surprise), Bryggjan Brugghus, for lunch. Mr. HaHa said the beer wasn't really memorable ($18 for 3 tasters), but the fish and chips were good (although heavily fried).  From there we ventured "downtown" to the main square and grabbed lattes at Stofan Cafe (I had bookmarked this spot but after checking out other cafes, I would say this was our least favorite latte; although the location and coziness are perfect).

Next up we checked into our hotel, Reykjavik Residence Hotel.  I'd put a lot of time into researching hotels and in the end I decided on Residence for the reviews as one of the top hotels in the city.  Although it didn't include parking or daily breakfast, our room was surprisingly spacious (a one bedroom apartment), extremely clean and fashionable, and a superb location.  Parking ending up not being as big of an issue as I feared.  The hotel has three parking spots, which are first come, first serve.  The Monday we arrived, May 1st, turned out to be Labor Day, so parking around the city was free.  We also learned from the hotel that paid parking was free 6pm-9am.  As a last resort, there is a parking garage across the street. We were given one voucher for free 24-hour parking. The hotel also has an associated restaurant, Port 9, which we were given a voucher for one free meal, which was delicious!

For the first time in our foreign travels, we took a nap on our first day there. Usually we try to power through jet lag, but we're usually also drinking, which helps :)  We took a two hour nap and then debated on dinner.  Iceland is relatively affordable to fly to and for accommodations; but food and drink is expensive!  Our fish and chips at lunch were $25 a plate. We weren't quite ready to spring into more fish for dinner and ended up at an Italian restaurant, Italia Veitingahus, for dinner. Both of our meals were delicious, contrary to reviews our service was quick and good, and the $30 spent on each entree seemed well worth it.

As we walked around after dinner, we began to realize how small the city is and how walkable it is.  We walked to Kex Hostel, which is known for it's trendy bar. It looks out over the bay and offered gorgeous views of the setting sun. Given the time of year, the sun doesn't start setting until 9:30p or so; it really throws off your internal clock, but it much appreciated for site seeing.  We also found the beer list to be long and more affordable; most beers were $10-$12USD.

 

Day 2
We went to Sandholt bakery and had breakfast consisting of pastries and lattes ($27 USD) then with clear skies (it was extremely foggy our first day) we continued up the street to visit Hallgrimskirkja, a church with a tower that offers views of the city and bay.

 

There was no wait so we paid our $9 admission and hopped on the elevator ride going up eight stories. It was extremely windy, but beautiful! The colors used for buildings in other countries always cease to amaze me and Reykjavik is no exception. We lucked out that the fog had cleared from the bay and we were able to get a glimpse of the water and mountains beyond.

One of the must-do's on our list was a whale tour and puffin tour. We prebooked tour tickets with Special Tours. I chose them based on reviews and the fact that if whales are not sighted during a tour, you're given a free ticket to come back and try again.  Unfortunately, the weather Tuesday morning was incredibly windy and foggy that we received an email that the tours for the day were cancelled; we had the option of postponing or receiving a full refund.

From the church, we walked down to the bay, stopping in Harpa, the concert hall and conference center to take in the views, explore some shopping, use wifi and public restrooms, before walking to the harbor to request our tour refund. Because of the wind and the rain, it was pretty cold so we stopped in Cafe Haiti to relax over a cup of coffee and warm up before walking to Svarta Kaffid for lunch.

This spot was one of our favorite traditional Icelandic meals. They offer two daily soup options, meat and vegetation, served up in a bread bowl for 1850Kr.  Perhaps it was the cold or the rain, but the meal and ambiance hit the spot!

Having most of the afternoon to kill, we decided to do some shopping. I bought an Icelandic wool sweater from Nordic Store as well as an art print for the nursery before we stopped into Eldur and Is for a crepe (fyi; google maps operating hours are not accurate, we sadly found out our first night that they are not open until 11pm).

We explored more of downtown, walking to park/lake downtown and City Hall, before stopping in Skuli Craft Bar; you guessed it, a craft beer bar.  The bartender, Viking, was extremely friendly and we had a great conversation.  As mentioned previously, food and drink are expensive in Iceland since the majority of it is imported. We noticed several bottles of beer from some of our Colorado favorites, like Crooked Stave sours. They were selling the bottles for 5000kr ($50USD) and higher! Viking explained to us that by the time they pay 18% import tax and 24% liquor tax; what is a $20 bottle in the US, quickly becomes a $50 there to make some profit. We were surprised (and happy) to learn that they offer a daily happy hour with three rotating beers; which takes the price down to $5-7USD from $12-14.

We had dinner reservations at Ostabudin, so we left Skuli and made a quick stop at another craft beer bar, Micro Bar before heading to dinner. Micro Bar was in a basement with a cool vibe, but certainly a different personality bartender. One nice feature is that they offered half pours of beer.

With food being so expensive, we tried to strategically select our meals and their pricing. Having had a more traditional lunch, we opted for cheese plates for dinner. You guys! These could likely be the best cheese plates we've ever had. We shared two: small cheese plate (three Icelandic cheeses; bleu, Gouda and a soft brie-like) and prima donna plate (salami, serrano ham and an aged cheddar); they were fantastic! And better yet, "affordable" at 5400Kr ($54 USD). Highly, highly recommend!

After dinner we went back to Sandholt bakery to grab some pastries to have for our Golden Circle drive the next day. Sandholt also had affordable craft beer on tap; 4 taps for 8000Kr ($8 USD); including one of our favs, Brewdog's Punk IPA (sold at other bars there for $14+).  Last stop of the night was to check out Mikeller and Friends, an outpost of the Denmark brewery. Another cozy spot and nice bartender to chat with; but watch out for the prices. Most beers were $18 USD a pint!

Next up; Day 3 - Golden Circle (with some added stops worth making!)

In Love with Italy

We talked about going to Oktoberfest this year, but Ben had a company retreat (to Mexico, poor guy) pop up that was the same time frame. If you recall, we went to Ireland with a Travelzoo trip, so I always keep my eyes peeled on deals.  There had been a lot of Groupons for Italy popping up. Italy has been on my bucketlist f.o.r.e.v.er! But none of the trips I was finding were the time frame we wanted or the cities we wanted.

One day while browsing Travelzoo, I came across Trip Masters. I was skeptical about their low priced packages and flexibility, but after doing some research, I found them to be a legit company. Trip Masters is unlike the other package sites I've seen. Trip Masters allows you to select your flights, city orders and duration, select your hotels and transportation in between.

After messing around a few days, I finally narrowed down the perfect trip itinerary for our allotted time frame:

• Rome: 3 days
• Cinque Terre: 2 days
• Florence: 1 day
• Venice: 2 days

After booking the trip, I realized I had Ben's name wrong from his passport and also decided that the hotel we'd booked for Cinque Terre area was not ideal (we were to stay in the "suburbs", if you will). Trip Master's customer service is outstanding! They're available by chat which is so convenient, that I was able to easily update the name information.  They also allowed me to cancel our Cinque Terre hotel and gave a refund so that we were able to book our own separate accommodations in one of the Cinque Terre Villages. 

Pricing wise, the trip was more reasonable than I ever thought possible.  For our flights, 8 nights hotel (original booking) and 3 trains between cities, we paid only $200 more per person than the cost of our flight outright. Amazing! I highly recommend Trip Masters and will certainly use them in the future!

West Maroon Pass

This past weekend was so incredible, it calls for a post.

I told Mr HaHa, I never want to forget this weekend and after all the rigmarole to coordinate it, I hope this will help other hikers as well.

I don't remember where I stumbled across the West Maroon Pass Trail hike, but once I did, it was immediately added to our bucket list.  The idea of hiking from Aspen's Maroon Bells (a place so stunning in itself) to Crested Butte (which has become a favorite mountain town of ours), couldn't be beat. 11 miles didn't sound that bad and living in Vail, Aspen is just two hours away. 

However, there are quite a lot of logistics to figure out:

• Where to park in Aspen? How to get to Aspen trail head?
• How long would it take? (Aspen to CB is slightly harder due to elevation gains; the hike trailhead to trailhead is 11 miles with ~3,000ft gain)
• Should we camp?
• How could we get from the CB trail head (located at Schofield Park, approximately 13 miles from CB)?
• Should we hike back from CB to Aspen the next day?
• If we don't hike, how should we get back to Aspen from CB?

While Google is great, I couldn't easily find all of the answers to my questions.  We originally settled on the general plan of hike, camp, hike back.  Then I realized that Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness area currently requires bear canisters and it was a unanimous decision that we would just get a hotel in Crested Butte.  

So, Saturday, September 10th, we were on the road at 5am, to get to Maroon Lake by 7am. During the hours of 8am - 5pm, the only vehicles allowed to drive directly up to Maroon Lake are shuttle buses, which be picked up at $8/person from Aspen Highlands ski area and parking lot (which is $5/day). However, outside of these hours, there are an allotted number of day-use and overnight parking spots for public. At the Aspen Ranger Welcome station we were told that overnight parking was full; which I had anticipated but hoped to squeeze in. Because the shuttle doesn't start until 8am (and we wanted to be on the trailhead before), we drove back to Aspen Highlands and called High Mountain taxi for a ride (I'd confirmed the day before that they would be available). 

They took about 10 minutes to arrive and 20 minutes after that (and $41 later with tip, youch!), we were at Maroon Lake trailhead, departing at 7:40am and ran into this big guy.

Can you see him in there? We were scared to get to close; but there he was. A beautiful (and huge) male moose to start the beginning of what would be a wonderful hike.

This is only our third fall living in Colorado and we typically make it a priority to get out a weekend or two and drive from Denver to the mountains for fall colors; but this year living in Vail and watching the action in progress is what I've been looking forward to since I signed my apartment lease last December.

Of everything we've experienced living in Colorado, for me, you can't beat standing in the middle of a forest surrounded by a golden glow and magical flutter of aspen leaves. It is the bee's knees!

I'd been to Maroon Bells only once before, last July. We'd hiked to Crater Lake, which is 1.7 miles one-way from Maroon Lake.  It's listed to have 629 ft of elevation gain; but it warmed us up quickly (which is good because it was about 37 degrees!)

Looking at Maroon Bells from Crater Lake

We progressed on from the lake, making really good time (about 22 minute miles) towards the valley. We passed several campsites and made mental note of how cool it would be to wake up with this kind of views. Next summer!

The farther along we moved, we'd occasionally look back at the views we'd left behind. Absolutely stunning!!

 A few hours in, at 9:30am, the ground was still frozen solid and covered in frost.  We were in jackets and a comfortable temperature, but ready to get in the sunny meadow that laid ahead.

We hit the sun just before 10am and immediately were ready to remove some layers.  This part of the hike had gorgeous yellowing bushes and several small streams to cross over.  Thank goodness for waterproof hiking boots!

Looking ahead, it was hard to see exactly where we'd summit the pass but there were inclines to be seen and a few switchbacks to get us there.

The final ascent

When we made it to the summit of West Maroon Pass my Garmin watch clocked us at 6.47 miles in three hours, which is a pace of 27 minute miles; not bad considering the approximate 3,000 ft elevation gain. The views were 360-degrees of pure natural beauty!

The trail up the valley from Aspen

The wind on the top was a little brisk, but there are enough rocks to block it for a comfortable sit for a snack and to take in the views.  After a fifteen minute break, we were on our merry way down.

The trail from the Crested Butte side is less steep and also shorter (4.5ish miles from trailhead to summit instead of Aspen's 6.5) and in itself is breathtaking.  We were a bit late in the season for wildflowers, but caught a few on their way out.

While going up was shy of 3 hours, coming down took about 2 hours.  Very easy terrain and almost all sun exposure to the sun. At the base/trailhead, there was a parking lot (and if you are desperate for a portapotty, there's one another half mile at a second lot), a stream and some logs for a shuttle "waiting area".

There are two shuttles allowed for pick ups: Dolly's Mountain Shuttle and Alpine Express.  Both run scheduled group pick ups ($15/head to get back to Crested Butte, drop off location of your choice).  I found a lot of recommendations for Dolly's but found their communication (lack thereof) to be terrible, so we ended up booking at 2pm pick up with Alpine Express. Another option is to pay to have your car driven over for you by Maroon Shuttles, but this is pricier than other methods of getting around/back.

We got to the base at 12:30p. We'd planned on the hike taking six hours and it took us under give. With plenty of time to spare before our 2p pick so we relaxed by the stream and in the shade of the trees.  There's no cell service so we used the time to just chat and unwind.  By 2pm; we had plenty of other hikers waiting with us for a ride.  (We'd joked at 12:40p about hitchhiking into town and while the lot was full, we didn't see anyone leaving to ask).

Alpine Express dropped us off directly at our hotel, Elevation Hotel and Spa.  I booked the hotel two days prior to our hike using Hotwire.com.  I would highly recommend using them as there are limited hotel options in CB/Mount CB area and with Hotwire we saved $30 off the nightly rate compared to other sites.

The room was awesome and the hot tub views couldn't be beat.  We were skeptical about staying on the mountain base instead of downtown, but the town's shuttle, Mountain Express, runs every 20 minutes and is a quick (10 minute or less) ride downtown. As always, Secret Stash was a must-have with the appetites we worked up!

 

The next morning we were picked up by our driver and headed back to Aspen via Kebler Pass.  To get back to Aspen, Dolly's, Alpine Express and Travel Crested Butte all offer shuttles, at $60/person. Some have minimum people or price requirements. We booked with Travel Crested Butte, primarily because we could book online but it turned out to be a convenience that we didn't have to worry about meeting a minimum price. We entirely lucked; no other travels had booked so we had a pimped-out Yukon to ourselves!

The drive back to Aspen Highlands took around 3 or so hours. We took the time to sit back, relax and enjoy the views!

The majority of the other hikers who got picked up with us at trailhead were hiking back the next day.  Honestly, neither of us had thought of this.  As mentioned above, we had originally thought about camping (which I'm glad we didn't, we didn't see any sites near Schofield Park) and hiking back; but we never thought about hike, hotel, hike. Another option to consider next year! 

Overall, this tops the charts as one of our favorite hikes,. It was gorgeous from start to finish.  I'm so glad it came together last minute (Although I'd done my research, I did all of our booking Thursday and we hiked Saturday). I'd highly recommend adding this hike to a bucket list!