Durango Birthday Trip!

Last weekend, we left the kiddo with Steph's parents and headed up to Durango, Colorado, to celebrate my thirtieth birthday last week! We have a special connection to the city: we honeymooned there in September of 2006, and then we returned to the city in July of 2007 to celebrate our one-year anniversary. Both times, we stayed at what has become our favorite retreat spot, Blue Lake Ranch, a wonderful bed-and-breakfast located about 25 minutes west of Durango, in the community of Hesperus.

We drove up to Durango, a bit less than a four-hour drive northwest of Albuquerque, on Friday morning. We made it there in time for lunch at Steamworks Brewing Company. We really didn't plan much out for our trip, as we just wanted to enjoy some downtime. I did know that I wanted to visit some of the breweries in town though. Steamworks is a good one. They have some great food and some really good beer.

This is me enjoying a glass of the Conductor Imperial IPA. It's a 9.24% ABV beer, and it had quite a kick to it, and a surprisingly smooth taste.



Stephany even enjoyed a 10-oz. glass of Steamworks' Lizard Head Red, a very solid, and very drinkable, red beer.



A shot of the brewery/bar. Durango had a winter festival going on that weekend, so the town and the brewery were quite busy. We enjoyed people-watching for a while, before heading out to drive around town, and then making the drive out to Hesperus to check into our room at the inn.



THIS is what we woke up to at Blue Lake Ranch the next morning. The breakfasts there are amazing! Fresh fruit, yogurt, breads, egg frittata, tamales, homemade jams and jellies, and delicious coffee. It was a feast.







After breakfast on the first morning, we spent about an hour traipsing through the snow around the property. It had snowed quite a bit earlier that week, or the week before, and the temperature was probably around 10-15°. I thoroughly enjoyed taking some pictures there, so I'm sharing some below.













This is the back door of the room where we stayed, the Garden Room at the Blue Lake Ranch House. We enjoyed stepping outside on the porch in the brisk air during our mornings there.



This was our view from the back porch. So nice.





From the Ranch House, you could see down to the lake area. It was totally frozen and covered in snow. We eventually worked our way down there.



The back of the Ranch House.











The wooden gate leading down to the lake.



The lake.



From the lake, we continued moving farther from the Ranch House and headed up to the area near where you turn in from the main road.



It was so quiet there, so serene.





We eventually wound our way back to the Ranch House. Such a beautiful place.



This is the entrance to the Garden Room, where we stayed.



Later that day, we headed into town and had lunch at Carver Brewing Company. We didn't take any pics there, but we enjoyed some good food, and I had a pint of their Colorado Trail Nut Brown Ale, which had a good Newcastle-ish taste to it. This was the second brewery on our Durango-birthday-brewery tour.

After lunch, we took a short walk along the Animas River, which runs through the city. We didn't linger too long, because it was so cold. Thankfully, we had taken some coffee with us from a local coffee shop, the Steaming Bean Coffee Company. The last time we were at this spot was in 2007. We had biked here, and we sat on these rocks watching kayakers and rafters come down the river. We'll definitely enjoy coming back here in the summer time.





There was ice on the river.



Our next stop was Ska Brewing Company, which is located on the east side of town. I had heard of Ska Brewing before, but I had never had any of their beers. Their brewery/tasting room was definitely a bit funky, as is the company, but it was very nice. They had built this very nice facility about two years ago, and the bartender told us they have already outgrown it.



I ordered a pint of their Black IPA, a type of beer I had never tasted or even heard of before. It's not one of their regular beers—I think it's a seasonal beer that they brewed for the winter festival. I was really surprised at how good it was! It definitely had the hoppiness and bite of an India Pale Ale, but it also had a sort of dark, smoky flavor to it, which provided some mellowness. It was a really dang good beer!



On both evenings of our trip, rather than making the drive back into Durango, we enjoyed dinner at a wonderful little restaurant down the road in Hesperus called The Kennebec Cafe. It was a great little place that served some fantastic dishes. We decided that's definitely the way to do dinner the next time we're at Blue Lake Ranch.

After dinner on Saturday, I spent a few minutes taking some pictures around the Ranch House at night. It was so beautiful, and I just couldn't resist the opportunity.











Our trip was truly a vacation for us. It was a time for us to relax, step back from our everyday lives, connect a bit more deeply with each other, and reflect on where we are as a couple and as a family. It was a blessed time, and we are thankful for it.

Nathan