After we got back from the Smoky Mountains, we had a couple of days back on campus before Emma had to move out.
It was a strange time for me, as I had just arrived a week ago and didn’t really know anyone, but Emma and all of her friends had spent the past six months getting to know each other, and they were all about to go their separate ways. It was pretty emotional, even more so because pretty much everyone in her halls was an international student, and so she had made friends from literally all over the world, many of whom she didn’t know when she’d see again.
Even though I turned up as everyone was getting ready to leave, it was only a few days before I was off again with Emma, to Denver, Colorado. We had to get up stupidly early to catch our flight, but the view when we were coming in to land was almost worth the 5am start!
Since Emma is a poor student and I’m a poor graduate, we were keen to save as much money as we could on our trip. I had previously used (and loved) Airbnb, but I had never used Couchsurfing before, as it almost seemed too good to be true – there are people out there who actually let you stay in their house for free?! But as it turns out, there are.
I’m not sure how comfortable I would feel doing it on my own, but as I was staying with Emma the entire time, I felt as though there was an extra level of security. Also, the website itself is designed to stop anything potentially dodgy happening, as everyone who stays with a host gives a review of their stay, and has the opportunity to say if anything weird happened. As we found out, it is also a lot easier to find hosts if you are female – for some reason it’s a lot harder for guys to get accepted, even though almost everyone we stayed with was male.
Aside from the obvious benefit of getting to stay somewhere for free, Couchsurfing is great because most people who host do so because they want to make friends and show people around their city. This meant that we got to see a lot of things that we definitely wouldn’t have done otherwise (more on that later).
One other point I would make about Couchsurfing is that it is an awful lot less stressful if you give yourself more than a day to find a host – we were desperately trying to find someone to stay with in Denver right up until we were actually at the airport about to fly there! We ended up staying in a hostel on 11th and Broadway instead, which was pretty good as we were really close to the art museum and quite a few bars and clubs.
We were in Denver for around 5 days, which gave us time to relax and explore the city, as well as hiring a car for a day and driving up to the Rocky Mountains. I know Denver is the mile high city, so I was expecting it to be slightly colder than Tennessee (where it had been about 30C), but by the time we got up to Sprague Lake in the Rockies, it was definitely not May weather!
We walked around the lake, which was beautiful. Emma wanted to go off on a proper hike, but neither of us were prepared for snow (it had been warm in the city) and I was mildly terrified that a bear would jump out at us, and I was not ready to fight a hungry, just-out-of-hibernation bear! In all of the pictures of the lake, you could see mountains for miles, all reflected in the crystal clear waters. When we went, the view was still wonderful, but it was a lot more overcast and you couldn’t really see that far.
Once we had had our fill of snowy mountain views, we decided to head back to Denver. However, the weather had other ideas and it continued to snow the entire way home. By the time we arrived back at our hostel, there was a couple of inches across the entire city.
Luckily, it had pretty much gone by the morning, so we were free to explore the city. We were staying literally a block away from the art museum, which I had heard great things about, so I dragged Emma along to look at some art.
The building itself is composed of several different architectural styles, the most recent addition being the Frederic C Hamilton wing, designed by Daniel Libeskind and opened in October 2006 (above). Although a lot of people we spoke to around the city seemed to hate this design, I absolutely love it. The titanium panels are designed to reflect the Colorado sunshine (although as you can see above, there wasn’t much sunshine when we were there), and it reminds me quite strongly of Frank Gehry’s design for the Guggenheim in Bilbao.
The inside of Denver Art Museum (or DAM, as it is commonly known), is just as modern and impressive as the outside, and they have an incredibly diverse and impressive selection of historical and art historical exhibits on display.
This was one of my favourite pieces in the museum, and it summarises the ethos that they seem to have at DAM. Called ¿Being Home?, it is a site-specific artwork that has continued to grow since its inception in 2009, and centres on notions of home, and how people in Denver and further afield understand the meaning of what ‘home’ is to them. Taken from the DAM website, the exhibit is described as follows:
Rupprecht Matthies’ ¿Being Home? is a community-inspired, interactive artwork that grows with each installation. In 2009 and 2011, Matthies collaborated with immigrants at Denver-area community organizations, including the African Community Center, the Emily Griffith Opportunity School, and Centro San Juan Diego, to gather words evocative of notions of home. The resulting words—transformed into mobiles, pillows, and wall pieces—are in 13 languages including English, Spanish, Arabic, and Kareni. Combining contributions from the two previous installations, ¿Being Home? reflects the life experiences of the artist’s co-creators as well as commonalities shared among people across the world.
The museum itself seems incredibly welcoming to all, and does not seem afraid to embrace modern technology in otder to encourage visitors. I have never seen a museum use iPods and tablets in such an innovative way, and there are interactive features scattered around the entire museum. Quite often, I feel as though these interactive elements are a bit gimmicky, designed to entice school trips and amuse small children whilst parents can walk around undisturbed, but DAM really managed to integrate them seamlessly (and I may have had a go at a few of them myself!)
After the museum, we went to Coors Field for a proper baseball match. Denver’s team are the Colorado Rockies, and they were up against the LA Dodgers. Apparently the Rockies had been having a bit of a rocky season (sorry!) and they were expected to lose against the Dodgers, who were top of the league. I say ‘apparently’ because no matter how many times someone explained how baseball works, I just couldn’t make sense of it! Luckily, despite how much Americans protest that baseball is in no way like any British sport, it was enough like rounders and cricket for me to understand the concept of hitting a ball and running around a pitch.
It was pretty rainy and miserable when we were watching – the game had been postponed for about 45 minutes before we even arrived, and it was touch and go if we’d even see any baseball at all. In the end though, they decided that it was sufficiently dry for the game to start, and so we sat and watched some ball (with obligatory overpriced snacks).
Sadly, the rain kept coming down, and after an hour or so, the match was cancelled due to rain, and we all had to go home. It was rescheduled for our final day in Denver, so after we had checked out of our hostel, Emma and I found a bar in LoDo (Lower Downtown, the cool part of town) and watched the rematch.
There was so much more we could have done in Denver, especially if we had the car for longer, but if you don’t have access to a car, then I would say that 5 days is a good amount of time to see a pretty decent amount. Even though it rained or snowed every day that we were there, I would still absolutely recommend a trip.
thisisisrachel 