David and Jan's Wednesday antics

David and I took a different route on Wednesday and explored the Manitou Cliff Dwellings. As far as American touristy sites go, it's pretty good. Avoid most of the foreign-made unrelated junk in the store, but certainly enjoy the range of freedom you get with this site. The "doors" into the various rooms are open for you to enter, if you fit. I felt like a kid again as I crawled through small door openings into the rooms. Hot day, but pleasingly comfortable inside. David took some liberties with the freedom though... we thought it would be fun if he hoisted himself upward using the wood beams spanning the small rooms. He will post photos I took of him standing up there. After the dwellings we went to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. The animals there don't seem to like each other. I've never seen a bear charge another bear in the habitat, until today. Ditto for the tiger. That was worth a scream. The poor tiger was relaxing in the water in their habitat, and the larger tiger slunk around behind it, easing itself into the water until it was just behind the resting one, and then lunged at it, grabbing its hind leg in its mouth!!! The attacked one responded with a great roar. Good show, guys. Oh, and guess what, Patrick has an example of him at the zoo! Yes, they've got a quaker there in the bird room. He wasn't as neat feather-wise as Patrick though -- a little picked on the head. We missed the trip to the Will Rogers Shrine up there, because they closed the road early but our receipt was validated so we could return Thursday. David hopefully will post some photos of our antics in the kids park... the spider web was just too tempting for David to leave alone. We've got Thursday and Friday to get the rest of the sights in. Our plan next is to visit Cave of the Winds on the lantern tour, return to the Shrine so we actually see it, stop by the World Figure Skating Museum and of course go to Pikes Peak with the group. All in Thursday and Friday. We leave Saturday at noon, so the National Lampoons trip is in full swing.