Who doesn’t love a good cliffhanger? In our last post we were hanging out in Colorado Springs, recuperating from a pickleball mishap, 72 hours on the clock, deciding if we were eastbound and down or loaded up and truckin’.
As the Clam collapsed itself in the 30 mile hour winds on the ridge of Cheyenne Mountain State Park, the Trango 4 tent stood strong in a quivering quake while menacing clouds assembled overhead. Dogs barked and RV windows and doors slammed while we raced to stuff the truck for an early morning departure. Rain was nowhere in the forecast. It was supposed to be a calm evening. We think the predictors got DOGE’d.
The prescription was 600 mg of Motrin 4x/day plus a sturdy brace, elevation, and C.C. n’ hot tea mixed with low-key living. Trying not to go totally stir crazy, there was Warfare (film) at the Cinemark Tinseltown (two thumbs up), replacing broken dishware at the Ft. Carson Army Garrison thrift shop, reading books, hanging out in the visitor center and breaking out the art box. But camping in the town that hosts the Garden of the Gods, America’s Mountain, and the country’s highest waterfall, we felt like losers just staying home. We made the decision to act like tourists and pay to play.
If you are under the belief that the Dallas Cowboys are America’s football team, then you are going to love Pike’s Peak. It is America’s Mountain! Is Disney World Americas’s amusement park? Is Coca Cola Americas’s beverage? What does it take to become America’s Anything? The answer is a good marketing campaign and a lot of chutzpa. Thinking back to our visit to the Ringling Museum prior to our departure, was the Ringling Bros. and Barnum Bailey Circus the Greatest Show on Earth? Prove that it isn’t.
Pike’s Peak is a lot like that. At the base of 14,000 feet is a town that is 90% tourist and 10% local. Manitou Springs is where you board the rail line that will take you to the top of America’s Mountain, but not before paying for parking, trolleying, snacking, shopping, and breathing. The town is cute and the town is revolting. It just depends on what you had in mind. We found a darn good Shwarfel sandwich. Who knows how a middle eastern proprietor found his way to selling gyros in a tourist trap of a mountain town. Capitalism has a way of matching desire to supply that perplexes expectations. Having had many a gyro, this was a legit excellent middle eastern spiced pita sandwich. Maybe it was Americas’s Gyro.
A rail car that sorties out of Manitou Springs takes you to the top of Pike’s Peak on a three hour amusement park ride. The conductor (Jim) dressed like it was 1920, entertains with a selection of jokes and quips on the slow ride up. Think of how many ways you can use the word “rock” in a joke? I know, it’s hard! But, he does it time and time again until the rail car reaches the summit of America’s Mountain. Pike’s Peak is not the highest mountain in America, or even the highest mountain in Colorado, and General Pike never made it to the summit. But, don’t let the pesky details detract from your experience. America loves Pike’s Peak!
Once at the top the view is much like the view from the top of a mountain. Tourists and their children in shorts and tank tops shiver violently, surprised that the air is freezing cold and the wind is howling at the top of a mountain. Fortunately, a Visitor Center at the peak provides shelter and donuts where everyone huddles until the train whistle sounds indicating that the peak experience is descending soon. Conductor Jim has his return trip routine lined up. Don’t take it for granite.
After a day of acting like tourists we got lulled into a sense of security. There is no chance that the Cog Rail line to the top of Pike’s Peak is going to pose a danger to the ticket holders. The experience has been curated to be safe, predictable, and 4 stars on Yelp. Back at Cheyenne Mountain, Mother Nature failed to read Yelp’s fine print. Un-forecast thunderstorms rolled in with 30 mph winds and hard rain. We hunkered in the shaking Trango 4 tent straining which was straining but not breaking in the elements. That was why we had upgraded to a true base camp tent. Unlike the REI Grand Hut which we had to hold up from the inside in strong winds, the Trango 4 shook off the elements and we slept dry, albeit with one eye open.
No matter what kind of tent you may have, breaking camp in the rain and wind is not easy. We did our best to stay dry, but in the end, a lot of wet gear went into the bed of the truck as we departed Cheyenne Mountain at sunrise. Beaten, frozen, soaked and searching for a hot cup of coffee, we climbed into the Rocky Mountains loaded up and truckin’.
