Boulder

I end up in Boulder a couple of times a year for meeings. The disk drive industry is concentrated in three places in the U.S.: Boulder/Longmont Colorado, Rochester/Minneapolis Minnesota and San Jose California. The Pearl Street mall, which is the University of Colorado student shopping district, is a good place for a walk.

The Boulderado Hotel
The Boulderado is an old hotel that has been restored and expanded reciently. Near the Pearl Street Mall, it is one of my favorite hotels.

Cripple Creek

I got into Colorado Springs at about 4pm so I decided to go to Cripple Creek, the old mining town turned gambling center. I've been to Central City near Denver a few times so I thought it would be fun to see Cripple Creek for comparison. It was about a hour and a half drive up into the mountains. On the way I passed the Pike's Peak Cog Railway station in Manatou Springs. There were some nice mountain and alpine meadow views on the way.

Cripple Creek itself was a lot like Central City, an old town that had been gutted in the gambling boom. Unlike Virginia City Nevada, there is no big casino competition for the old mining towns so the gambling interests stripped off all the old time quaintness to make room for more slot machines. Virginia City depends on old timey charm to draw people. Central City and Cripple Creek are slot machine grind joints, and not very loose ones at that. I think the Colorado casinos are the tightest places I've gambled, even more than the Indian casinos, on par with day cruises from Ft. Lauderdale. I lost $150 (^30).

Cripple Creek and Central City aren't as scummy as Atlantic City but at least Atlantic City has air. Cripple Creek is over 9000 feet high.