My husband and I have great friends who are living in Denver, Colorado at the moment. We have always wanted to go to Colorado so we planned a trip out there to stay with them for a weekend, and booked a few extra days just the two of us to explore on our own! Here’s everything we ate, drank, did, and what I packed (4 days with just a carry on!) while there…

Day 0: We arrived on Friday night and went straight to a brewery, Lowry Beer Garden in Denver. No elevation issues at all, but we were exhausted since Colorado is 2 hours behind North Carolina and it was a Friday night!

Day 1: Our friends live near Cheesman Park, where we went on a walk and saw more of Denver residential area. Then we went to Larimer Square where we had a drink and listened to live music. This was our main Denver city day, where we walked around everywhere. We saw Union Station, had an amazing cocktail at the Terminal Bar (it was a lavender gin drink that was just as tasty as it was beautiful), and saw Coors Field. We then went through the Dairy Block, and finished our evening with dinner and drinks at Ace, where we also rented a ping pong table to play. That evening we spent at their apartment and watched a movie; a very low-key ending to a busy first day in a new elevation and time zone!

Day 2: We got up early and headed to Boulder to do the Shanahan Trail, which was not too difficult and 4 miles. This was a STUNNING trail with wildflowers and some shade as well, something we quickly learned is rare for Colorado hikes. After the hike, we went to our new favorite brewery, Four Noses. We sampled almost every beer and loved almost every single one of them! Mack and I want to move to Colorado mainly for this brewery- no joke. We ordered burgers from a food truck at the brewery because I was even more of a lightweight in this higher elevation than I am normally- which is dangerous! We went back to their place and got ready, and spent the rest of the day in downtown Denver again. We went through the art district, went to a few different bars, and rode electric scooters to the Blue Moon Brewery. By this time we were exhausted again so we decided to order Chinese and chill out the rest of the night. This was the night that Mack and I got our hotel since our friends had to work on Monday, so we checked into the Brown Palace which is gorgeous and I highly recommend staying there in Denver!

Day 3: Mack and I picked up a rental car, and headed to Red Rocks Amphitheater. We got to see the amphitheater and then did the Red Rocks/Morrison Slide hike which was 100% in the sunshine right before noon. Keep in mind- we went to Colorado in the last week of July. Humidity was NOTHING like North Carolina, but it was still hot and the sun is still strong! After the hike, we went and visited Red Rocks Brewery for a quick beer before heading to lunch at a random place called Lariat Lodge Brewing. We went for the beer, but the atmosphere was a little “mountainy” for our taste and we were pretty sick of beer by now! We ended up going back to the hotel to freshen up, and our friends hosted us for dinner and drinks which was so nice. There was a cigar bar in our hotel that we visited when we went back, and then we went to sleep- the next day is an early day!

Day 4: This day was wild- we had planned on doing the Manitou Incline Hike early in the morning but found out the night before that you have to make reservations. The only reservations were at 1:30 pm, so we decided against doing the hike and started our day at the Garden of the Gods. This was such an incredible place to visit, but it only takes about an hour if you really go slow. We ultimately decided we were already in Colorado and we really wanted to challenge ourselves with the Incline, so we went ahead and made the free reservations for 1:30 and headed into the town of Manitou for brunch. We found a little hole-in-the-wall breakfast place that had really good reviews, and the waitress almost scared us out of the Incline hike. We decided to go ahead and try to find parking even though it was 11 am and we didn’t have reservations until 1:30, so we drove up to the parking lot. It took us a few tries to find a parking spot which was so lucky, and we decided to chance it and check in with the reservation desk at the beginning of the Incline hike. They didn’t question our time, and it was such a blessing because doing the hike was hot enough at 11 am- I can’t imagine how much harder it would have been if we had started at 1:30! This hike was such an experience- if you’re in good shape, we 10000% recommend the hike to you if you go to Colorado! After completing the Incline, which took us 1 hour and 31 minutes, we went to yet another Brewery, Cerberus Brewing. We then returned the rental car back in Denver and had dinner reservations at the Mexican restaurant across the street called La Loma which was DELICIOUS. Then we visited the cigar lounge again and called it an early night.

The last day was spent on a plane- we left Denver at 6 am!

Colorado was one of our favorite trips. Everywhere you drive is gorgeous, and everyone was so friendly. Not to mention the humidity levels (or lack thereof) are just a dream to a North Carolina native.

Here’s everything I packed:

xoxo, jess