Day 1 - Denver, Colorado — Travelling bryans

31st July 2019

We had a good sleep - Oli and I slept the whole night, Andrew was awake for about an hour at 3am, but managed to go back to sleep. So all in all, we seem to have cracked the jetlag really soon.

Let’s talk a little about Denver. Known as the Mile High City, it is the capital of Colorado, and dates back to the Old West era. It is called the Mile High City because its official elevation is exactly one mile (5280 feet or 1609.3 meters) above sea level. With an estimated population of 716,492 in 2018, Denver is the 19th-most populous U.S. city.

We had a recommendation from a friend for breakfast which was a 20 minute walk from our hotel, so we decided to walk to explore. The area we are in (E Colefax) is not that bad, but there are few odd looking people that may have not had many lucid moments for a few decades hanging around. Certainly not bothering us, but not looking too great either.

We walked to the restaurant, passing the Denver Public Library, the State Capitol Building (the parliament) and we walked through Civic Center Park.

We arrived at The Delectable Egg in one piece and chose from the extensive egg menu.

Andrew had The Crab Cake ‘Benny’ (eggs Benedict), I had the ‘Orange County’ (avocado, tomato omelette) with hash browns and an English muffin, and Oli had the Rooster Surprise - 2 scrambled eggs, bacon and pancakes. All absolutely delicious and probably enough food for the whole day.

We then walked to the Molly Brown House. When searching for ‘things to do in Denver’, this came up on every Google search. Margaret (Molly) Brown was a woman born to a poor family in the 1860s, she married a man who was a hard worker, and by some freaky twist of fate became millionaires in the 1890s by mining gold in a place near Denver called Leadville. They bought a mansion in Denver, which is where we visited today. It is a modest Victorian detached house surrounded by apartments in a quiet area, and is now a museum. The Browns used their vast wealth to travel, and Molly was one of the survivors of the sinking of the Titanic. This was how I first came to know of her.

We were met by Kim, a friendly and happy tour guide, who showed a small group of us around the house, showing us how the Browns lived, and explaining the various facets to this interesting family. They set up many charities and raised money for lots of deserving causes.

Molly was also part of the suffragette movement and quite a force to be reckoned with. From her humble beginnings, she used her money to make life better for many less fortunate. The house was taken over after she died and had many uses, but the man that eventually sold it to Historic Denver made very little money on it, as he recognised the importance of preserving it. It has been lovingly restored and the tours are just the right length. Would recommend this to anyone visiting Denver that likes architecture, strong women, or good stories!

For our next stop we walked back toward Downtown, the the area known as The Golden Triangle, which has a lot of museum and art galleries, but also an area where there are desirable Victorian properties. Much of the city was bulldozed after the depression and rebuilt with new homes, so these older houses are now sought after.

We headed to the Kirkland museum. There are a few museums in the area, and rather than try to visit them all, we chose the Kirkland, as it has mainly art deco and art noveau collections. The lady at the desk was most welcoming and passionate about the museum and keen for us to know more about the namesake - Vance Kirkland (1904–1981).. We knew nothing about him, and after seeing his art, I can say it’s not hugely my thing. Once you learn more about him, however, you can really appreciate it. Such as numbering his own works, and signing on more than one edge of the paintings, so that the buyer could decide which way up to hang it - truly abstract!

His studio was moved (and I mean literally moved) in 2016 to the side of the museum and is now part of the visit. He painted in dots and would hang above the canvases on straps in order to get to the middle of the canvas.

I have to say, this museum was one of the most welcoming we have been to, and if you are looking at interiors from 1910 onwards, it is second to none.

Denver is having some really hot weather (37C today), so to be in the air con was rather nice too!

We left and walked to the nearest Seven11 to get a Slurpee each (fans of Stranger Things will understand) and then walked past the Denver City & County Building (1932) which is one of a group of very grand looking government buildings.

We passed the new extension of the Denver Art Musuem, which looks like Rennie McIntosh may have had a hand in it.

Aware that we didn’t want to walk too much and that the heat and altitude were really draining, we walked down 16th Street, hopping from shade to shade. 16th is the main shopping road, so we also ducked in and out of the air conditioned shops. Oli and Andrew had a burger to fill a gap, and we then made our way to LoDo (Lower Denver).

The main reasons were a book shop and seeing Union Station in the daylight. Neither disappointed. The bookshop is called ‘The Tattered Cover’. It was AMAZING. So many wonderful books on old bookshelves, chairs to read in, coffee... just wonderful.

We took some photos of Union Station and then visited the Wynkoop micro brewery and Andrew tried some of their pales ales, I had some wine, Oli, a coke, and we played cards and chatted about the day.

We rounded off the evening with a delicious pizza in the Lucky Pie, and took a taxi back to the hotel. There’s a storm brewing and we’ve seen some amazing lightening.

We leave early tomorrow to catch the Amtrak Californian Zephyr train, so may be off line for a while.

Denver has been really lovely - with more time we could have ventured further afield, but for now we will bid it farewell and off to the next stop. The next two days is all about the journey.