Relocating from Illinois to Colorado (Denver, Fort Collins: apartment, rentals, houses)

[ChicagoGirl847]

Hi everyone!

I've been reading the threads about living in Colorado and I was looking for a more customized response for my situation. I will be moving to Colorado for my career within the next year. I'm coming from the Chicagoland area. I have visited Colorado before and really enjoyed it and saw it as a place that I could see myself living in. I'm wondering what things should I be expecting? The area that I would be living and working in is Morgan County. I do understand that it is rural, which is different than where I am coming from. However, I have lived in rural areas in my life in the past, so I'm aware of most of the differences. What's living like in that area? Houses/rentals? How friendly are people? Weather? Bugs (I'm not a huge fan of spiders of any sort, but what kinds of bugs are we talking about here)? Availability of resources? And any other information you could give in order to help me see what my new life would consist of would be very helpful.

Thanks!

[reed303]

While you wait for somebody more personally familiar with Morgan Co, if you haven't already, you might look at these web sites to get a general idea about the area:
Morgan County, Colorado - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fort Morgan, Colorado - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (county seat)
Morgan County Home Page
Fort Morgan, CO

Having moved to Colorado myself from Chicagoland (Hanover Park), you're going to love the it. While there are some spiders, there are way less other creepy-crawlies, mainly due to the dry, low humidity air. Winters are generally way milder, although summers have got warmer in the last 5-10 years. Morgan Co is convenient to larger towns like Greeley, Ft Collins, and Denver is a straight shot on I-76.

[jazzlover]

Morgan County is not stereotypical Colorado. It sits on Colorado's Eastern Plains away from the mountains. In fact, the mountains are barely visible from Fort Morgan. The climate is typical of the Colorado Plains--semi-arid, not a great deal of snow in the winter (but subject to infrequent and quite severe blizzards), warm to hot summers with severe thunderstorms and hail a regular probability especially in June to mid-July. There is a tendency for air pollution from Denver to Greeley to follow the South Platte River northeast, so Fort Morgan, though considerably away from Denver, can get smog from it.

Fort Morgan and Brush are OK towns, but suffer from the fact that they are close enough to Denver that shopping is pretty limited unless one actually goes to the metro areas. The area is farm and ranch country that has historically depended on a lot of Mexican migrant labor, so there are a lot Mexican immigrants (legal and illegal) living in the area.

Nasty "bugs" include widow spiders and mosquitoes--some of the latter being varieties that can carry West Nile virus. There are rattlesnakes in the area.

Of the towns along the South Platte valley, I prefer Sterling over Fort Morgan or Brush because Sterling is far enough from Denver to avoid a lot of metro problems, but close enough if one needs to get to the city for specialized shopping or services. Fort Morgan and Brush is just close enough to Denver that some big city issues (like the aforementioned air pollution) can readily reach it.

[barbre44]

I'm in Fort Collins area for now, and I can tell you the mosquitoes are terrible in the summer. Flies are everywhere.

Be prepared for forest fires too.

[jazzlover]

Originally Posted by barbre44

Be prepared for forest fires too.

Huh? Not in Fort Morgan, though the smoke from them can sure get there.

[Mike from back east]

I'd expect GRASS fires out there on the plains, and IIRC there was 44,000-acre grass fire out there somewhere in summer 2012 and it took most of a small town with it.

[jazzlover]

True, Mike, but a prairie fire is not a forest fire--different fuel mix, different behavior, different control methods.

[ChicagoGirl847]

Originally Posted by reed303

While you wait for somebody more personally familiar with Morgan Co, if you haven't already, you might look at these web sites to get a general idea about the area:
Morgan County, Colorado - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fort Morgan, Colorado - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (county seat)
Morgan County Home Page
Fort Morgan, CO

Having moved to Colorado myself from Chicagoland (Hanover Park), you're going to love the it. While there are some spiders, there are way less other creepy-crawlies, mainly due to the dry, low humidity air. Winters are generally way milder, although summers have got warmer in the last 5-10 years. Morgan Co is convenient to larger towns like Greeley, Ft Collins, and Denver is a straight shot on I-76.

That's news I definitely like to hear about the bugs! So winters are milder than Chicago's? That's not something that I expected to hear! I'm quite shocked! And I'm used to warm summers. Thankfully, Colorado doesn't have the humidity that Chicago does! I think it's nice that Morgan Co is near larger towns, but would I be traveling to those towns often for things that I would need? Or do Brush and Fort Morgan have options for shopping/necessities?

[ChicagoGirl847]

Originally Posted by jazzlover

Morgan County is not stereotypical Colorado. It sits on Colorado's Eastern Plains away from the mountains. In fact, the mountains are barely visible from Fort Morgan. The climate is typical of the Colorado Plains--semi-arid, not a great deal of snow in the winter (but subject to infrequent and quite severe blizzards), warm to hot summers with severe thunderstorms and hail a regular probability especially in June to mid-July. There is a tendency for air pollution from Denver to Greeley to follow the South Platte River northeast, so Fort Morgan, though considerably away from Denver, can get smog from it.

Fort Morgan and Brush are OK towns, but suffer from the fact that they are close enough to Denver that shopping is pretty limited unless one actually goes to the metro areas. The area is farm and ranch country that has historically depended on a lot of Mexican migrant labor, so there are a lot Mexican immigrants (legal and illegal) living in the area.

Nasty "bugs" include widow spiders and mosquitoes--some of the latter being varieties that can carry West Nile virus. There are rattlesnakes in the area.

Of the towns along the South Platte valley, I prefer Sterling over Fort Morgan or Brush because Sterling is far enough from Denver to avoid a lot of metro problems, but close enough if one needs to get to the city for specialized shopping or services. Fort Morgan and Brush is just close enough to Denver that some big city issues (like the aforementioned air pollution) can readily reach it.

Thanks for this response. It definitely gave me a good glimpse of what I'm looking at here. I've had many experiences with hail storms and severe thunderstorms. My apartment needed lots of repairs. Not fun at all! But I'm glad to hear that there isn't too much snow, however I can understand the possibilities of blizzards. How does Colorado, or more specifically Morgan Co, respond to blizzards? Does everything shut down or remain functional? I know that varies on the state and severity of the blizzards so I'm curious how that area deals with it? In terms of Morgan Co, is it an area that one might feel that things can become too monotonous since it is out there from the bigger areas and doesn't have as much to offer?

[jazzlover]

Well, Fort Morgan ain't Chicago. As I said, Fort Morgan is farm/ranch country with the culture that goes with it. A night on the town in Denver and back to Fort Morgan is quite doable, however.

As to blizzards, when they do occur and are severe enough, even the Interstate may be closed for a time. Secondary highways and county roads may not get plowed out for up to a few days. Those kinds of storms are fairly rare, usually only occurring every couple of years or so.

Fort Morgan is part of "Hail Alley"--a portion of the western Great Plains extending from the Front Range east into western Nebraska, western Kansas, and including eastern Colorado, southeast Wyoming, and the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles. The area has the highest frequency of thunderstorms with severe hail per year in the United States. "Severe hail" means hail golfball size or larger, including really large hail up to softball and grapefruit size. (If your car is out in hail of that size, it will likely be totaled.) Colorado has had several single severe hail events that have ranked in the top 10 natural disasters in the US when measured in dollars of damage. Many areas of the US with much more tendency toward tornadoes than eastern Colorado (like Illinois) nonetheless do not have the number of severe hail events as does eastern Colorado. I'll skip the three page scientific explanation of why, just know that it happens.