Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs

We’ve always been told how pretty Garden of the Gods is, so on another warm, sunny morning we decided to find out.   It’s lucky we chose that day, as the day afterwards the visitor centre was closed for renovation and wouldn’t open again until Thanksgiving.

 

Garden of the Gods got its name, when, in August 1859, two surveyors planning the new town of Colorado Springs came upon the sandstone formations.   One suggested that it was a great place for a ‘beer garden’; the other that truly ‘it was a place fit for the gods’, Garden of the Gods it became. 

General William Jackson Palmer, who founded Colorado City, persuaded his good friend Charles Elliott Perkins to buy land in the area known as Garden of the Gods.   General Palmer donated more than 1,000 acres to the town as public city parklands.

On his death Charles Perkins left the land for the use of the city of Colorado Springs.   In 1909 his children deeded the 480 acres of Garden of the Gods to the city of Colorado Springs stipulating that it should be “free to the entire world”.   Today Garden of the Gods covers over 1,367 acres, it is still and always will be “free to the world”.

This rock formation reminded us either of a mountain lion in profile, or a gargoyle on a church, we couldn't decide which. 

Garden of the Gods is a National Natural Landmark and has been recognized by the Department of the Interior as a nationally significant natural area.  There are hiking, biking and horse riding trails in the park, not to mention rock climbing.

This rock reminded us of a foot. 

Pikes Peak from Garden of the Gods.

Balanced Rock.

 

After coffee, we watched the informational film and then armed with a map, drove to a parking area and followed a paved hiking trail as it meandered through the red rocks.

 

Have fun, we are!

Valley of Shadows - Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument

On another gorgeous morning, we again drove up through Ute Pass, only this time we were heading to Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument.

 

At one time when the planet was much warmer, the whole of North America was covered in giant redwood trees.   About 34 million years ago, volcanic eruptions formed a lake 12 miles long, known as Lake Florissant.   Further eruptions covered the lake, trees, fish and insects were covered in lahar (volcanic mudflow) up to about 15ft.   Eventually the tops of the trees died and the trunks became fossilized.

 

In 1969 the Fossil Beds, including 6,000 acres of prehistoric Lake Florissant became a National Monument.   Ute oral tradition refers to the area as “Valley of Shadows” as they saw fossils as “shadows” imprinted on the shale.

When we arrived we only just found somewhere to park, as the monument was teeming with people, we hadn’t realised that we’d decided to visit on a ‘free park’ entry day. 

After watching the informational film we followed the path across the fossil beds.

Apart from a few fossilized redwood trunks, which are huge, most of the fossils are buried so there’s not actually a great deal to see above ground.   At one time visitors used to chip bits of the redwood trunks.   Now of course it’s all protected and woe betide you if you’re caught taking any fossils. 

We also visited the Hornbeck Homestead.

Adeline Hornbeck had been twice widowed and was a single parent to 4 children when she bought her 160 acre homestead in the Florissant Valley in the 1870’s.  

Within 7 years she’d built a sizable house, with 9 outbuildings and had $4,000 worth of livestock.  On top of looking after the children and working on the homestead, she also took a job at the general store in Florissant.   She was one tough lady.

After looking round the homestead we decided to drive back through Cripple Creek and stop for coffee, of course not only was it a ‘free park’ entry day it was the weekend so it was packed.   In the end we never did get our coffee but we had another great drive back through the mountains.  

As we drove back we stopped at an informational sign about the Gold Belt Tour National Scenic Byway.   How lucky that we didn’t take the road to Cripple Creek as we came out of Cañyon City the other day, otherwise we might’ve ended up driving along ‘The Shelf’ a one lane 4WD road.   Even though our truck is 4WD, we know our limitations and some of these roads really are jeep roads!

 

Have fun, we are!

Royal Gorge Bridge, Cañon City, Colorado

On another sunny morning, we headed off to visit the Royal Gorge Bridge in Cañon City.   From Colorado Springs it’s a nice easy drive, through some pretty scenery.

 

The actual bridge is a few miles on the other side of town; Cañon City has 7 jails in the city limits, as we drove towards the bridge we drove past the oldest.

 

Arriving at the bridge, building works were in progress, a fire in June 2013 destroyed most of the complex; luckily the bridge was saved.   We knew the complex had been closed for a while but hadn’t realised why.

 

We thought the entrance fee was quite expensive at $16.00 each, but for that we could walk and drive across the bridge, and who knows what else will be there once the rebuilding works are complete.   The road at the other side of the bridge is still closed, so as we couldn’t drive out that way we decided just to walk across.

Opened in December 1929, Royal Gorge Bridge is over 1,000 ft above the Arkansas River Gorge and is the largest single span suspension bridge in the world. 

There were some amazing views from the bridge.

 

Looking the other way.

The Royal Gorge Train as it follows the Arkansas River under the bridge.

 

State flags line each side of the bridge and as we walked across people were having their photograph taken by their state flag.    The bridge is made of what look like railway sleepers and if a vehicle crosses the bridge as you’re walking across it sort of ripples, it’s a very strange feeling. 

 

The steel cables that hold up the bridge.

In some sections gaps in the sleepers mean that you can see the river far, far, below, quite a scary view.

 

Once we’d walked back across the bridge, we enjoyed coffee and delicious homemade muffins and cookies in the café, it’s a very nice spot and has lovely views of the bridge.

 

On the way back to Colorado Springs we saw signs for Cripple Creek and Victor, I suggested we drive back that way, DB said no, we’ll maybe do that another day, that turned out to be a very good decision.

 

Have fun, we are!

Cripple Creek - Gold everywhere!

After leaving Loveland, we headed back to Colorado Springs and on a picture perfect late September morning, we headed off to Cripple Creek.   It was a lovely drive as we followed highway 24 through Manitou Springs, up through Ute Pass and the town of Woodland Park before turning onto highway 67.

 

As we drove through Elk Valley and higher into the mountains we were surrounded by forests of beautiful, yellow, copper, gold and green aspens.   There’s nothing quite like the soft rustle of aspen leaves in the breeze.

 

Our first stop as we came into Cripple Creek was the Heritage Centre.   The lady at the desk made us laugh as she immediately said to everyone who walked in “Ladies to the right, Gentlemen to the left!”   That must be the first thing everyone asks when they walk in. 

The Heritage Centre is extremely well done, providing lots of information about the history of the area, the town, the mines, the mountains, not to mention very important things like coffee shops and restaurants! 

Right across the road from the Heritage Centre is the Molly Kathleen Mine, very picturesque today, but probably not so pretty if you had to spend 8 hours, or more, a day working in its deep, dark, dusty shafts by the light of a single candle.

Cripple Creek sits at an elevation of 9,194 ft, and was once one of the biggest gold mining camps in the world, at its peak it was home to over 10,000 people.   The whole town was entirely built of wood and burned down twice, once, according to legend, when a quarrelling couple knocked over an oil lamp. After the second fire the town fathers decreed that all the downtown buildings had to be built of brick.

It’s an easy walk town to walk around, and the detail and design on some of the buildings is lovely.   

Quite a few casinos line the main street, but there were also a few empty shops as well.   We weren’t sure whether the shops were empty or just closed for the season.

I loved this old sign on one of the walls.

 

We took the short trip on the Cripple Creek & Victor Narrow Gauge Railroad,

the train took us past old mine shafts and abandoned log cabins before turning around and heading back into town. 

The driver gave us lots of interesting information about the town and mines as we chugged along, unfortunately, since then I’ve forgotten most of it.   Of course, if I actually updated the blog a bit more often………………..

Leaving town, we found our way through the town centre road works and continued on highway 67.   Driving past the huge working Cripple Creek and Victor goldmine, we read about the amount of gold it produced, I’m sure I remember something about a billion dollars.  

This old mine site was at the side of the road as we drove through small town of Victor

and continued through the mountains.   I think we stayed on the highway 67 loop, but I was busy looking at the gorgeous autumn colours, so I could be wrong, but as we got where we wanted to be, it didn’t really matter.

Another beautiful area to add to our ever expanding ‘to re-visit’ list, I thought by now our list would be getting smaller not bigger! 

Have fun, we are!

Cache La Poudre

Cache La Poudre (pronounced pewter) Canyon is a nice drive from Loveland so one sunny day we decided to explore in that direction.

 

We followed CR27 through lovely rolling countryside until we reached the town of Masonville.   It’s only a small place and our plan had been to get coffee at the mercantile, unfortunately for us it was closed when we arrived.

 

I loved the totem pole out front.

Our plan had been to follow CR27 until we reached La Poudre Canyon, but the road was closed and only open to local traffic so that was the end of that. Instead we followed CR38E and CR23 past Horsetooth Lake.

 

It’s very pretty, we saw speed boats, paddle boards, rowers, canoes, a swimming beach, it must be very busy place during the summer.

We followed the road to the General Store at Bellevue, then onto Verns, from there we followed highway 287 until we reached highway 14 and Cache La Poudre Canyon.   

A gorgeous view as we headed deeper into the canyon. 

As we followed the road, there were some lovely canyon and river views.   We drove as far as the tiny town of Rustic, this was our turnaround point so after coffee at Glen Echo we headed back.

Driving through the tunnel

 

Have fun, we are!

Big Thompson Canyon & Glenhaven

While we were visiting Rocky Mountain National Park, we stayed at the Riverview RV Park, in Loveland; it’s a nice place on the banks of the Big Thompson River.    

 

Along with many other homes and businesses it was badly affected by the awful floods in 2013, the sites and cabins along the river were washed away. When we visited all the utilities had been replaced and work was continuing on re-building the cabins.   One section of the park was slightly higher and the floodwaters never actually reached it, this was where we stayed.  

 

On our way to Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park, we drove through Big Thompson canyon and signs of the floods were everywhere.

Here, the whole mountainside slipped into the river. 

 This was once someone’s riverside cottage.

This loo in a riverside park in the small town of Drake, used to be somewhere close to where I took this photograph, now it’s on the other side of the river.  

In Drake we took a left on CR 43 heading towards the small town of Glen Haven.   Signs of the 2013 floods were visible everywhere as we followed the winding road up the canyon. 

 

In Glen Haven, coffee in hand, we sat outside the General Store enjoying the sunshine, and watching as diggers worked continuing to make repairs to the town.

Coffee and a delicious home-made cinnamon bun (the bun was so big it took two of us to eat it) eaten, we followed the road as it wound its way up through Devils Gulch and into Estes Park.

Have fun, we are!