What better way to get an early start on a road trip that with morning boot camp at dawn at Red Rocks Amphitheater? Over the last few months I have been doing up to three mornings a week (and admittedly slacking off on other weeks) what my friend Peter calls Boot Camp. Pete is German, very fit, and likes to order people around, so organizes a group of his friends to get together bright and early before work for some hard core no-pain, no-gain exercise at Red Rocks, everything from trail runs to running up and down the stairs, to leaping up the bleachers, to various calisthenics, to climbing up the planter walls. I'm not sure if there’s that much pain involved for everyone, but there certainly is for a big chubby guy like me.

My bro had been getting an earful about my boot camp from me all summer, so I insisted he join us on the morning of our departure . "Red Rocks is on the way west anyway, so it’s not like we’re wasting a lot of expensive gas to drive out there and back!" I think Doug had some fun getting all sweaty and smelly for our first few hours ride west.