I traveled back to Cincinnati once again this weekend, but this time it was for a bachelor party weekend. I arrived late Friday evening in Dayton where my brother picked me up and we headed down to his pad. We were both fairly tired and had to get an early start the next day, so decided to head for bed after watching a bit of TV.

Saturday, after running some errands for a good chunk of the morning, we met up with my dad and some others to take a canoeing trip down the Little Miami River. Though the authorities have been trying to crack down on drinking while floating down the river, we didn’t run into any problems doing so. It was a great six mile trip that ate up most of the afternoon and into the evening hours. Since we ended up with an odd number of people, I opted to take out a kayak for myself, which I thoroughly enjoyed and would love to do again.

After that we went back to my brother’s, cleaned up, and started up the grill. Lots of others who didn’t go on the canoe trip came over and we had a great little party out on his back deck. Eventually the party moved indoors as the weather got a little questionable. We had lots of games of Rock Band, a beer pong tournament, and lots of good times. A big thanks goes out to my brother, dad, and all else who attended. Oh yeah, thanks to my mom too for dropping of all kinds of good sides and appetizers!

After our exciting rafting trip, we decided to explore the area a bit on Sunday. We were camping very close to the Royal Gorge, so after some breakfast we decided to go see the Royal Gorge Bridge and Park. Built in 1929, the bridge is highest suspension bridge in the world, standing 1053 feet above the Arkansas River. The first thing we did upon entering the park was to walk across the bridge, which is made of wooden planks stretched across the steel supports. Because of this, there are many small cracks along the way where you can actually see all the way down to the canyon floor below. It’s a bit scary, to say the least.

Besides the bridge there are a number of other attractions in the park, including the worlds steepest incline train to the canyon floor, the worlds longest single span aerial tram, displays of elk, bison, and bighorn sheep, among other presentations, thrill rides, and shops. We did nearly everything available, though I was even more afraid of the aerial tram than the bridge, so we skipped that one. We were able to see most of it in a few hours, though I’m sure it’s possible to spend even more time inside the park. Though pictures likely don’t do it justice, I really wish I had my camera with me, but as I mentioned earlier I forgot to bring it along.

This is going to be a busy week. My boss is on vacation and I’ll be covering many of his tasks for the week. I’m hoping that it won’t be as bad as it has been before when he took extended vacation, since there is another individual in the office who will be doing some tasks, but I guess only time will tell. So far it’s been a really busy day.

Our Memorial Day labor day weekend (I always mix the two up) was good though. We were back in Cincinnati for the wedding of one of Kim’s cousins. Kim was a bridesmaid in the wedding and we’ve known her cousins husband for awhile as well, so it was nice to attend their big day. And since a good number of her extended family was there it gave us a little taste of what our wedding will be like. Everyone better get their dancing shoes out and be ready to swing all the way into party mode! I took some pictures throughout the day and I hope to get them online sometime soon. I’ll be sure to post a link.

I just read that my beloved Frontier Airlines is going to start charging for the second piece of checked luggage, just as United has already done. Personally, I think it’s a dumb move as the free luggage could be viewed by some as a reason to fly Frontier over United. It won’t matter to either Kim or me as we are both ascent level members, which will retain the second piece for free, but overall I don’t really agree with this decision.

At least we don’t have to use American, which is now charging for any checked luggage. And I guess we better get used to these additional charges, as this is likely just the beginning. If gas continues to rise the airlines are forced into finding new ways to make additional money. There will be no more free food, though a bag of peanuts hardly counts as food. I heard one analyst say that it could go so far as to start charging people for their seat based on their weight!

As you may already know, I love flying on Frontier Airlines. Kim loves it as well, and we both flew with them so much last year that we both are Ascent Level members. Well, nearly two weeks ago Frontier filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. At first this was a huge concern as a few airlines that also recently filed for Chapter 11 have completely shut down, including ATA, Aloha, and Skybus. And I am still very concerned, but it seems that things are still going as planned for Frontier. Though it appears that they have canceled at least one of the flights between Denver and Indianapolis, and prices seem to be incredibly steep.

Coincidently or not, Southwest just announced that they will now be operating a couple of daily nonstop flights between Denver and Indy. On top of that they’ve started introductory pricing for these flights at $140+ round trip. Given their wonderful rescheduling policies (no fees ever), we’ve already booked a couple of flights for this summer. I don’t think we are going to beat the prices we got, but if we do there is always the option to reschedule the flights for a later time. I haven’t flown with Southwest in a long time, so I’m actually curious to see how their newish boarding procedures are. So if any of you in the Cincinnati/Indianapolis area are planning a summer trip to visit us in lovely Denver, be sure to check out Southwest for your flights.

I’m in Cincinnati and the weather officially sucks! While Denver is a nice sixty degrees outside, I’m sitting near a window watching the mix of snow, rain, ice, etc. falling from the sky. We arrived in Dayton last night and immediately traded in the Ford mustang the rental car company gave to us for an Equinox which is nearly identical to the one Kim has in Denver. No way were we going to drive in a rear wheel drive car with the weather forecast for the next few days being as dreary as it is. If it is going to snow a ton, at least we could get some accumulation on the ground, but that isn’t the case so far. It’s just a wet sloppy mix.

Anyone up for a last minute trip? Next weekend, Jan 17th-20th, we are going to Steamboat for a few days of snowboarding and/or skiing. Currently it’s me, Kim, our friend Tracey, and her brother going. We have room in our rented condo for another one or two people. The cost is $150 per person for three nights in the condo (Thursday, Friday, and Saturday). Plus we have some free lift tickets included along with some buy one get one free coupons, so lift tickets shouldn’t cost much. Let me know if you are interested, it will be a great time!

Happy New Year! Here is a list of all of the places I visited last year, with at least one night spent in each place.

• Denver, CO *
• Breckenridge, CO *
• Bethel, ME
• Silverthorne, CO
• Cincinnati, OH *
• Kansas City, MO *
• Boulder, CO
• Salt Lake City, UT
• Midway, UT
• Monticello, UT
• Ann Arbor, MI
• Sunset Beach, NC
• Noblesville, IN
• Honolulu, HI
• Geneva, NY
• Madison, IN
• Playa del Carmen, Mexico

* Visited more than once on nonconsecutive days.

See also: the list from 2006.

It’s official, Kim and I both have reached the Ascent Level on Frontier! We earned this by flying over 15,000 miles in one calendar year. And our miles keep on coming with another flight scheduled before the end of the year for Christmas. One great thing is that we now earn a 25% bonus on frequent flier miles. Other benefits include:

• Free DIRECTV® service
• Priority check-in and boarding
• Preferred seating assignments
• Priority lines at most airport security checkpoints

There are other things too, but these are what I’m most excited about. Free TV being at the top of my list. Flights have never seemed so quick with 24 channels of TV on my own personal screen. And we get all of these benefits at least through the next calendar year. I’m pumped!

You would think with all of our traveling that I would be better at the Travler IQ Challenge, but I’ve only made it to level eight so far, out of twelve. Give it a shot and see if you can get any further. When they start throwing out African countries, I just start guessing.

My apologies for the late update. I have a good excuse though, I’ve already sorted through all of the pictures from out trip and posted those online. Check them out in the gallery.

Now for an recap of the events. We flew into Cancun on Thursday morning. After avoiding the masses of people who wanted to “help” us, we eventually found the ticket booth for ADO, which provides $8 bus trips to Playa del Carmen. Once we finally made it to the resort we met up with everyone else and soon after went out for dinner and then for a stroll along Quinta Avenida (Fifth Avenue). We ended up in a bar to celebrate Doni’s 40th birthday.

The rest of the weekend, we didn’t leave the resort all that much. Our days consisted of laying on the beach, soaking up the sun, and occasionally some beach activities. I wanted to see some Mayan ruins while we were there, and fortunately they offered a bike tour to some, so we took this trip on one of the days. Another one of our afternoons was spent playing a bocce ball tournament and then with a little boogie boarding.

The trip definitely flew by and before we knew it, we were on a ferry to Cozumel for our flight back to Denver. When we left Mexico it was in the mid 80s and when we landed in Denver it was 14 complete with snow and ice. Talk about a dramatic change. For more details on the trip check out Phil’s site and his recap.