Color Colorado

Come visit Colorado with Grandma Joy, Grandpappy Happy and the grandchildren.

Denver is the capital of Colorado.
It is called the " mile high city".
If you climb thirteen steps up the capital building you will be able to see exactly one mile above sea level.

The National Western Stock Show is the world's largest rodeo which is hosted in Denver. Here the cowboys drive cattle down the street.

Colorado has lots of natural beauty.
The well known Pikes Peak mountain is one of them. It is 14,115 feet tall.
Some say from the top you can see
four states.

Today you can take a Cog Train to the top of Pikes Peak. A cog train uses a gear, "cog wheel" to power the train.
It can climb much steeper grades than is possible with a standard locomotive with friction type power in most trains.

In 1893 an English Professor from Wellesley College, Katherine Lee Bates took a horse drawn wagon to the top of Pikes Peak and was so impressed with the beauty of our country, she wrote the song
" America the Beautiful ".

Can you sing " America the Beautiful "?

It is a beautiful song about how beautiful our country is.

Zebulon Pike was an Army officer and explorer.
Pikes Peak was named for him after an 1806 expedition he led up the mountain.

The Black Canyon of Gunnison National Park has the steepest mountain descents in North America.
The drops average 43 feet per mile through the entire canyon.

Garden of God has beautifully formed red rocks.
Among them are Balanced Rock, which teeters on top of another rock, and steamboat rock which resembles a steamboat.
The minerals in the soil is what makes the pretty colors in the rocks.

Mt. Evans Highway is the highest paved highway to drive, from 8,700 feet to 14,240 feet at the summit.
In Denver the temperature can be 90 degrees, while at the top of the drive it can be 40 degrees.

The city of Boulder owns Arapahoe Glacier. It may be the only city to own a glacier.
A glacier is a river of ice. The ice melts and Boulder City uses the water.

Royal Gorge Bridge was the highest suspension bridge in the world until 2003 when China built the Beipanjiang River Bridge.
Royal Gorge Bridge is still the highest one in North America. It is 955 feet over the Arkansas River.

The Colorado mountains are known to have some of the best skiing in the world.
John and Jeffri love to ski.

Grandpappy Happy likes to take Leslie and Evan on a sled ride and build snowmen.

The gold rush of the 1850s brought lots of people to Colorado.

After the gold and silver mines were gone, the towns that sprang up as a result of them, became ghost towns.
There are many ghost towns in the mountains of Colorado.

The U.S. Mint in Denver produces half of the coins distributed in the U.S.
First an engraver has to engrave what is on each coin before it is printed.

The U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, is an accredited college for the education of officer candidates for the U.S. Air Force.

The Colorado state flower is the Rocky Mountain Columbine.
It comes in different colors, but Colorado adopted the color blue-violet with a white cup and yellow center.

The state tree is the Blue Spruce.
Colorado school children voted to name it the state tree in 1892. But it did not became the official tree until 1939.

The state bird is the Lark Bunting.
The males are black with white wing markings during the summer but in winter they are grey-brown like the females.
They migrate into Colorado in April and fly south in the fall .

Colorado state insect is the Hairstreak Butterfly. It is small, only 2 inches in width. It has purple wings with black borders, orange accents in the corners and blue on the underside.

The state reptile is the Western Painted Turtle. It looks like it has been painted,
especially it's under-shell, feet, neck, head and tail. The colors are yellow, orange, red and gray.
It lives in ponds, lakes and calm water with muddy soft bottoms.
It hibernates in the winter.

The Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep is the state animal.
They are named for the big curved horns that the males have, and for their agility and perfect balance.
They live very high in the mountains.
They are a grayish-brown color.

Grandma Joy and Grandpappy Happy always stand and place their hand over their heart when the American flag passes to shoe respect and love for what the flag represents.

The Colorado flag has a blue background.
The stripe in the center is white with a red c with a golden circle.

The Barbie doll was created in Denver by Ruth Handler in 1959.
Just about every little girl in America wanted a Barbie doll.

The Eisenhower Tunnel is 11,000 feet high and is the highest auto tunnel in the world.

It is fun to visit the Dinosaur Beds in Colorado and see all the old dinosaurs and plant and insect fossils.
Colorado has 26 species of dinosaurs .

Native Americans were the first residents in Colorado.
At Mesa Verde National Park you can see homes which the Indians built from
1 AD. to 1300 AD.

You can visit the ancient Anasazi Indian Cliff Dwellings.
Many had to use ladders to enter their homes.

Four Corners Monument marks the only spot in the United States where four states come together in one place. The marker is the exact spot where you can stand in all four states at the same time.

Visiting other places is always fun, but there's no place like home.




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