Flat Stanley Goes to ColoradoBy Madelynne Heydt

Flat Stanley flew to Colorado in February of 2011.

My Aunt Missy and Uncle Bob played with him for a few weeks and then forgot about him. Flat Stanley laid in a drawer and dreamed that someone would take him on an adventure.

Finally that day arrived when Chloe, Lukas, and I walked through the door.

The first thing we did was go to Estes Park, Colorado.

Estes Park is home to the Rocky Mountain National Park.

Its elevation is 7,522 feet. Wow!

The elevation of Grand Forks is 834 feet.

We had a picnic there. It was very cold and started to snow, so we had to eat our lunch in the van. But, we stopped at the visitor’s center and found some brochures.

We found a brochure about the Stanley Hotel. Flat Stanley really wanted to go there, so we did. The hotel was built by F.O. Stanley, the inventor of the Stanley steamer car. The hotel was opened in 1909.

Some people believe that there are ghosts at the Stanley Hotel. Thirty-four years ago, a man staying at the Stanley wrote a scary book about the hotel. It was later made into a movie.

After we left the hotel, we explored the town of Estes Park. Lots of tourists go there. We had ice cream at a candy shop!

Next we went to Casa Bonita.

It is a huge restaurant with a thirty-foot high waterfall that cliff divers jump off of. One thousand people can eat there at once!

We played at the arcade. We also dressed in bank-robber costumes and pretended to be in jail.

Stanley was tired and stayed home. He would have gotten wet from the cliff divers like we did!

The next day we went into Denver to Pete’s Greek Town Café. We ate interesting Greek food like Gyros and Calamari (squid), feta cheese, olives, spinach pie, cucumbers, and baklava for dessert.

Then we went to the Children’s Museum of Denver. We had fun with bubbles, pretending to be firefighters, making bunny noses and ears, and going to the petting zoo on the front lawn.

The next day was Lukas’s birthday and Easter Sunday. We dyed Easter eggs and made Resurrection Buns. They were so good!

We had pizza for supper and got to pick our own toppings. For Lukas’s birthday cake, we had Root Beer Floats.

Flat Stanley had a great time!