Barnardo to Boulder

August 3

It took 21 hours to get from Barnardo to Boulder. There were only two hiccups, but they were contributory. The plane was an hour late leaving; we arrived around 8.00 pm but to our British bodies that was one in the morning, then it took a lot of time to pick up the hire car (but not a car as we know it). The guy said, “You wanna take this one?” and left us to it. It took a while to work out how to even make the thing go forward, let alone with its headlights on, then the sat nav didn’t connect. We’d been told that there is a toll road to Boulder but it was just as easy to drive through Denver. It wasn’t! I’m afraid there was a little bit of bickering, and a few sharp words were spoken as it became, to us, 3.00 am then 4.00 am and we got more tired and hungry as we got more and more lost. Then suddenly the sat nav kicked in and our marriage was saved. We found Boulder and our hotel. By this time it was 6.00 am.

August 4

Doing time in America
I’m not going to think about what time it is in England any more, but couldn’t help noticing a Totnesian feel to Boulder. It’s laid back and liberal. The shops sell tie-dyed wraparound skirts, crystals and wholefoods and there’s a lot of grey-haired men with pony tails. It’s the most educated city in the country - 55% of over-25s have a degree. There are 400 miles of cycle tracks and 93,000 bikes for 103,000 people. And we had to come all the way to drink the locally produced Celestial Seasonings Devonshire English Tea.

Everyone is so nice and there’s this good feeling of safety: not having to watch your back or your bag. When we arrived at the hotel last night we asked if it was OK to leave things in the car and were told that the closest thing to car crime here is that someone might dent your vehicle when they open their door.

The hearse with no name
It’s an embarrassingly enormous 7-seater Ford Flex, the size of a hearse. All we need is a gifted and talented child in the back seat in a private school uniform. It isn’t the one we ordered and I am going to give up ironing for a year to negate our carbon footprint. It does 24 mpg. Petrol is about 30p a litre. Where my guilt really lies is that for many summers we drove around Europe with our three children, buried under litres of wine, squashed in the back of an Astra and now we are rattling about in this huge thing and we could fit them, their partners and children in with us.

Here it is parked outside the Bates Motel we stayed in. Our room just behind the door – smaller than the car’s interior. At least we’ll have somewhere to stay if we run out of money………………..

Getting bolder…..
Today we drove it into the mountains (saw snow-capped ones) and got as far as Nederland (known locally as Ned) - another hippy town 8236 feet above sea level. It was 86 degrees. And we went on a tour of Boulder on the Banjo Billy bus, then had a cup of tea at the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse

And our first evening meal in America? Ethiopian of course! We sat outside by a creek and ate with our hands.

A few photos from today are here.