Colorado. October 10 – 14, 2014.

I did this trip by myself last March as Anne decided not to come so she could help out with Ellie’s new baby.  I enjoyed that trip and thought it would be nice to do it again together.  We told our friends CS and Shirley about this trip, and thy decided to join us.  Shirley dropped out at the last minute (yesterday.)

Friday Oct 10.  UA1521 was packed.  The interior looked very new, with nice seatback TV monitors.  The flight offered directTV, which I didn’t get; it also offered internet at only $1 an hour for handheld devices.  I gladly signed up for 3 hours, about the duration of the flight.  We left and landed on time.

CS took an earlier flight, so he had already picked out the rental car at Alamo when we joined him (after a train and bus shuttle ride.)  There was a strong upsell by the agent who offered four-wheel drive and collision waver for over $400 additional.  Alamo was notorious for making the customer feel either stupid or cheap when the company first started, and for a while I would never rent from them.  I thought they had stopped doing that, but perhaps the bad habit is coming back?  In any case, with the reservation done through Costco, I could be a second driver without extra charges.  CS didn’t get much sleep last night, so I volunteered to do the driving.

The one thing I didn’t realize was if it is Columbus Day in New Jersey, it is also Columbus Day in Colorado.  Even though we left the airport soon after 3 pm, we still ran into a lot of traffic.  Construction along some stretches of the highway made things even worse.

I was hoping to get to Alamosa around 7 pm, before it got really dark (sunset was at 6:30 pm,) the delays made that impossible.  So we stopped by IHOP in Pueblo to have dinner.  The drive on Rt 160 (from US25 to Alamosa) was a bit tough: overtaking slow vehicles on a two-lane highway, heavy patches of fog, high altitude (pass at over 9000 ft elevation) and worrying about deer or other animals jumping onto the highway.  I was thankful and relieved when we checked into our hotel a little after 9 pm.

Hotel for 2 nights: Hampton Inn, Alamosa, CO.

Saturday Oct 11.  We met up with CS for breakfast, and headed out for the Monte Vista NWR at around 8:30 am.  I was a bit worried if the sandhill cranes would come through as all my research seemed to indicate their appearance during the fall migration is not as “dependable” as the one in spring.  The sight of them on a field gave me great relief, and we drove off the road onto a field to try to get closer to them.  They were quite jittery, flying away before we got close.  At least there were quite a few of them.  The morning was spent chasing the cranes from one place to another, the most dependable location was the viewing area at the intersection of Rt 15 and Cty Rt 8, where large numbers of sandhill cranes, ducks, and Canada geese were gathered.  The regular entrance to the NWR drive was closed due to a “Junior Crane Festival,” we were told to drive on a “dirt road” to join up with the main drive.  We were relieved when we clear that dirt road (with some tall grass right between the tire tracks).  There were some water fowls (mergansers, pintails, and others) but no sandhills.

Yellow is the predominant fall color in this part of the country because of the abundance of aspens and birches.

Two snapshots of cranes we saw during the trip.  We were not able to get close to any large group of these large birds.

This was taken during my prior trip to Monte Vista National Park.  The chance of seeing a lot of these magnificent creatures is much higher during the spring migration.

After lunch at Arby’s, we headed out to the Great Sand Dunes National Park.  Only CS wanted to give the dune a try, Anne and I stayed in the parking lot.  There was not enough time to make it to the highest point, and I had interest in failing to "summit" a second time.

 CS walking up the sanddunes.  He would be gone for 90 minutes or so.

There was much more water flowing in the riverbed.  It was impossible to walk across without getting our shoes wet.

It was a bit after 4 that we left the Park.  My thinking (or perhaps hope) was that the sandhills would be doing the “last minute feeding” in the fields before flying off to wherever they go for the night.  That was not to be: all we saw were a few small groups of cranes flying.

Both the Alamosa Chili’s and Rialto had long waiting times for dinner, so we stopped by St. Ives Pub for dinner.  The only Irish items are Guinness and corned beef and cabbage, or so I thought.  I ordered the special, and it reminded nothing of what I used to eat in Ireland.

Sunday Oct 12.  We went back to the site where we saw sandhills yesterday, hoping to say goodbye to the birds.  What we saw mostly were ducks and geese.  Since I had few interesting sightings of birds during my last trip at Alamosa NWR, we decided to skip it and headed for Colorado Springs.

Along the way we stopped several times to admire the fall colors, which were predominantly yellow due to the abundance of aspens and birches in the area, and to take photographs, including the twin Spanish Peaks.  Since they are scarce on the East Coast, Carl Jr’s was our choice for a quick lunch at Walsenburg.  The town is at the intersection of Rt 160 and US25, and is just a few steps away from becoming a ghost town.  The restaurant was right next to a local church, and there were only a few cars in its parking lot.  I can’t imagine how a small rural town like this can survive the continued urbanization that’s taking place.

 We went off the major highway (160) and saw several deer.

Spanish Peaks territory.

We toured the Garden of the Gods for an hour or so.  The peregrine falcon that I saw last time wasn’t there, although the “cave” still looked occupied.  Along the way, I booked tickets for tomorrows Cog Railway ride up Pike’s Peak.

Dinner was at Black-Eyed Peas, a short walk from our hotel for the night.  I enjoyed the food; the ambiance reminded me of Tony Roma’s.

Hotel: Hyatt Place, Colorado Springs

Monday Oct 13.  We left the hotel at around 9:30 am and hit the North Cheyenne Canyon Park.  Along the way we stopped and hiked the short Helen Hunt Trail, with CS and Anne snapping pictures all over the place.  The trail does offer some nice vistas, at the top end  of the trail you get a great view of Colorado Springs.

The Helen Hunt Trail offers some quiet spots for the hiker.  It was labeled as "difficult" but was in fact quite easy to walk.

 Three old friends at the top of the Helen Hunt trail.  Colorado Springs in the background.

When we got to the Cog Rail train station, we were disappointed to hear snow was blocking part of the track.  The train could go only up to mile 6 (total distance is around 8 miles), and will reach an elevation of 11,500 ft or so (Pikes Peak is at 14,115 ft or so.)  They offered either a refund or $8 off for the abridged trip; we opted for the latter.  Overall it was a disappointment, not in the absolute sense, but because we were all excited about being at one of the highest points in Colorado. Inspiration Point (the highest point we reached) offered a great view of Denver and several other states; I couldn’t quite follow the conductor’s description, but I am sure she said if we had been able to reach the summit, we’d have seen New Jersey and California.  And today was a gorgeous day, no less.

View from Cog Railway includes Lake Moraine.

The snow eventually blocked our way to the top, we made 6 of the 8 miles of track.

A cog railway train consists of two cars.

The cogs are what made it possible for the trains to make the steep climbs necessary to get up the mountain.

A Selfie in front of the train at our stop.

This is the stop, at elevations of 9655 ft.

Elevation as indicated by iPhone 6's altimeter.  Colorado Springs is at 6035 ft, so we were at a point 11,200 ft above sea level.

It was close to 3 pm when we got done with the Cog Railway.  We wandered in town a bit – not much there interested us – walked into an Italian restaurant (Dat’s Italiano) and had a late lunch.  After checking into the hotel and resting for a bit, we walked across the street and had a light dinner at Ruby Tuesday’s.

We said goodbye to CS.  Anne and I would leave early tomorrow morning, he would tour the area for a few more days.

Hotel: Quality Inn, Denver International Airport.

Tuesday Oct 14.  We took the 6:45 am shuttle to the airport.  TSA Pre-Check and boarding passes on our cell phones made the process quite straightforward.  The plane was again packed.  It took me a while to get WiFi to work, but overall everything turned out okay.

At Newark Airport we encountered a traffic jam.  The exit to Rt 9 S was closed, so the EZWay shuttle had to make a long detour to get back to the parking lot.