Thanks to the awesome company I work for, I got an opportunity to visit the United States for the first time in my life. And where was it all set to start? The beautiful Colorado! Now, that is one cool place to start it off!
First things first! Well, the flight to the US was itself a totally ‘unique’ experience. Having the route set up as Colombo – Dubai – Houston – Denver that was one long journey! Specially Dubai to Houston it was over 17 hours and the entire journey went on for about 30 hours! Yeah. That’s right! The cycle of eating, watching movies and sleeping continued for hours and hours until I finally reached Houston – the entry point to the country. Now that was one huge airport I must say! Being in this 6th largest airport in the world, I really felt its size when I had to go on a train, a bus and walk for like another 15 mins to catch my plane to Denver. Anyway, after all the plane travel, I finally got in to Colorado once I came out of the Denver airport, and that is where the entire Colorado/US experience begins.
Colorado itself is a big state which is the 8th largest state in the US. It has an area of 269,837 sq km (Sri Lanka’s area is 65,610 sq km). So, although I say I was in Colorado, I really was in a city called Broomfield which is home to the client I was visiting – one of the largest Communications companies in the world, being a Tier 1 network and operating one of the largest backbone networks of any Internet service provider. I settled down in a cozy place called Towne Place Suites operated by Marriott Hotels, and I must say that I really loved the 2 weeks I spent there.
So, how did being in Colorado/US feel? Let me summarize;
Friendly atmosphere
I was really impressed by the friendliness of the people I met on and off. Probably it might be partly because Broomfield being kind of a laid back area opposed to a big city with hustle and bustle. A good natured ‘hi, how are you doing’ is something that is built in to the DNA of the people here. I am not saying that people in my country are not courteous. But, being a complete alien in a new environment, I noticed this to be far beyond my expectations.
Huge roads and landmass
The highway system here is really impressive. The combination of freeways, arterials, collectors, and local roads seem to have been put together with a lot of thought. In a way, this can be expected owing to the vast land mass they have. With all these roads and buildings, they still the mount of free land space is more than the occupied space!
Where did all the buses go?
Well, I was asked to get ready for the travel in a hurry, and therefore the amount of research I could do before my travel was bit limited. I realized this when I started noticing that there is no means of public transport in the area. Why is that? Simple answer - everyone has a vehicle! Luckily my colleague from India knew what was coming through experience, and had reserved a rental car and that made our lives easier. Being used to roads filled with buses and trishaws, it was pretty weird at first to see just personal vehicles on the streets. Thinking about it, I just felt the implied message of this observation is, ‘if you can’t afford a vehicle, keep out of Broomfield’ :)
Remarkable discipline on the road
Now, this is the most important thing I noticed as someone who has been battling with the rest of the vehicles on the way to work using the weapon called ‘the horn’. Everyone was extremely concerned about road rules and the discipline shown on the road was really striking. Here, priority is given to the pedestrian. If a person is crossing the road anywhere, vehicles stop a good 50 yards away to let the person cross the road. I was finding this too good to be true. The usage of the horn is virtually zero, and if one is to blow the horn at some point, it is considered to be a sign of extreme irritation.
No policemen?
I’m sure they might be around at least for the sake of having them. But, I didn’t see a single police officer within the city. I just saw a police car parked outside a McDonalds, and that was it! But, I am sure this doesn’t apply to the entire US. Looks like citizens of this area are ‘self disciplined’ enough :)
Never step out without your maps
When you are on the road, you are on your own! That is a disadvantage we have here. Back in my country I could just pull down the shutter and ask someone the direction to get to any part of the island. But, not here! If you get on to a freeway by mistake, there’s no turning back until you catch the next exit. Even if you manage to get out of the freeway, you need to figure out how to get on to the freeway again on the other side of it. Now I get the point of features like the compass appearing on the iphone and why integrating GPS for mobiles was so much sought after. Anyway, when you drive here you need to know where you are going, and ‘when’ you get lost (like it happened to us few times) you also need to know where you have ended up. So, maps are a ‘must have’ here. After all, it is good to get used to that structured way of navigating :)
The never ending natural beauty
I really loved starting my US experience in the state of Colorado, since this is one of the most beautiful states in the US. It was a treat for the eye to see snow capped mountains every morning as soon as I wake up and gaze out of my window. During the two week’s stay I was fortunate to get the chance to see two highlights of the state – Eldorado Canyon State Park and Pikes Peak.
The Eldorado Canyon state park was an amazing creation of nature which was made up of thousands of rocks. This is said to be one of best location for climbing, and it showed! It was bloodcurdling to see so many climbers clinging on to vertical rock faces 100s of feet above the ground. I simply enjoyed the natural beauty of the area and headed back :)
Pikes peak was a different experience. As a matter of fact Pike Peak region itself has so many attractions like the Garden of Gods, Cave of Winds and so on. But, due to the time limitation we chose the Pikes Peak Cog Railway. This is a unique ride on a rain which goes to the peak which is 14,000 feet above sea level. Unfortunately we traveled only about 70% of the journey since the train could not go further due to the heavy snow on the top. But that partial trip alone was so great. The views were magnificent and traveling in a train which sometimes climbs gradients as much as 25% (possible due to the drive mechanism involving cog wheels meshing in to a toothed line on the track) was pretty exhilarating.
Rapidly varying climate
All these days I thought the climate in my hometown had a fast changing climate. But in the area I was, the changes were pretty dramatic. During the two weeks stay, there were sunny days, rainy days, gloomy days and to top it all, a day with a pretty heavy snowfall out of nowhere! Walking in a snowfall was awesome for me for the first few minutes. But, the fact that it is still heavy, frozen chunks of water makes all the difference in a while :).
- Finale -
Although I was supposed to fly back to my lovely country Sri Lanka, my stay got extended by 3 more weeks where I was to fly to the state of Ohio. The start I got at Colorado was extremely pleasant and I would love to explore the rest of it someday.
Anyway, let’s see what Columbus, Ohio has in store for me!!!
