Colorado Springs Wrapup

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I mentioned in an earlier post that we have visited Colorado Springs twice before and went to Garden of the Gods both times. So it might seem like we could take the “been there, done that” approach and not go back. There are so many other places in the area, we should check some of them out instead. But it turns out that in both of those cases, we missed the whole eastern side of Garden of the Gods park. We decide to head back for another hike. There are numerous options listed in AllTrails but the Niobrara and Galloway-Homestead Loop seems like the best option. Just over 2 miles with only 200 feet of elevation gain. There are a few parking options, but the most convenient would be one designated as Parking Area 10 near the southern end of Juniper Way Loop Road since the trail goes right by it. This lot is well south of the main rock formations, but even so, it was crowded fairly early in the morning when we pulled in getting one of the last spots. The trail was more obvious heading north out of the parking lot so we went that direction doing the loop in a clockwise fashion.

Starting Up Trail at Garden of the Gods

It seems like all of the rock formations in the park have been given a names but I didn’t bother trying to identify them. Most of them are to the west of the trail but we are able to get a good view from this trail and it is much less congested than the main park area is. In fact as we work our way up toward Gateway Road, there is a whole line of cars and pedestrians working their way over from the visitor center. We only pass a dozen or so people on our hike.

Some Formations in Main Portion of Park

The trail heads east for a short distance before turning south. As we get to a trail intersection, we are trying to decide whether to head up the switchbacks to a trail along a ridge or stay low. One of the few other people out walking stopped to tell us we should head up - so we do and it was a good call. We are only about 30 feet higher along the ridge but it gives a much better perspective of the area both to the west and the east. The trail follows a ridge for almost half a mile. The west side of the ridge looks a lot like the other rock formations in the park. They have a narrow, fin like look to them but in this case the back edge hasn’t eroded off yet. Maybe in many thousands of years from now this formation will be a highlight of the park. This is a good vantage point to see how many of the smaller rock formations line up in rows.

View from Upper Trail

Our Trail Looks Like a Future Fin

Distance View

At the southern end of the ridge, we work our way back down and to the west. At this end of the park, there are numerous homes nestled in and amongst the rock formations just outside the park boundary. We take a slight detour near the southwestern end of the loop to check out the overlook provided at Parking Area 9. Back on the trail we work our way to the car. It was a nice way to enjoy Garden of the Gods without needing to deal with the massive crowds.

Homes Nestled in Rocks and Pikes Peak

Other Fins Lining Up

We had brought along lunch in the car but we moved to our next destination to let someone else have our spot. We were heading to Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site just to the east of the trail we were on. In fact we were able to see some of the sites on the ranch from our hike along the ridge. It looked to be an interesting place and worth a visit. The admission price was right at just $5 per person for seniors. The suggested route thru the ranch takes visitors past various displays and buildings in chronological order. It’s a bit of a walk back to the first stop at the American Indian Area. A native volunteer is setup in a small shelter and giving a talk about the history of the native Ute people that lived in this area many moons ago. He had all sorts of crafts, tools and other items depicting how his people lived. It was rather interesting and he seemed to be a great storyteller.

Tipi

Various Housewares

Next stop was the homestead cabin. While not original, it was an fairly authentic reconstruction. A couple of volunteers were at the cabin to talk about life here in the mid 1800’s. It was a rather hot day and I felt a bit sorry for the woman that was sitting in the cabin by a fire burning in the fireplace. Outside was a cow that lives on the grounds.

Reconstructed Cabin

Working at the Fireplace

Cow Makes Appearance

Next stop is a large, beautiful barn with an assortment of farm animals from chickens, sheep and horses. Most of the horses were in a small shed having lunch as we came by but one of them was out in the field rolling on its back trying to scratch an itch.

Approaching Barn

Supply of Hay for Horses

Sheep and Chickens

Vigorous Backscratching

Next along the route is the General Store turned into a small gift shop. Just across from the store is the beautiful 1875 Chambers Family Rock Ledge House. There are several women and girls all dressed in period garb. We are given a tour of the house with a couple of the volunteers explaining about the life of the residents nearly 150 years ago. The young woman that guided us thru the second floor was apparently new to the job as tour guide. She got thru the descriptions in each room but I refrained from asking any hard questions.

General Store Turned Gift Shop

Beautiful Rock Ledge House

Play Me a Song

Boys' Bedroom

Another View

Next stop - the 1890 Blacksmith Shop. Besides the working blacksmith, there were several carriages and wagons inside to check out. The blacksmith was actually using the forge to make some items that will be sold in the gift shop. He had lots of stories to tell and turned out to be the person in charge of the ranch. We asked him about all the young children that are working throughout the ranch. I assumed they were likely just the kids of adult volunteers and were being “forced” to work here. It turns out getting a gig here is a rather coveted job. Many more children apply for positions than they can take.

Approaching Blacksmith Shop

Beautiful Old Carriage

Explaining the Process to Group

Get Piece Good and Hot

Weld the Loop Closed

Three Young Girl Volunteers at Ranch

The final stop on the tour was the 1907 Orchard House. Our tour guide of this house was delightful and had many stories about the former owners and how the different rooms were used. This is one impressive home with all sorts of amenities. She even rang the call button in one room and another “servant” came to see what we required. The owner was an ornithologist so there were many bird related items scattered around the house. The floor lamp with a large bird’s foot base was rather unique. If I could have snuck it out, it would have made the perfect gift for one of my nephews. In all, the tour of Rock Ledge was quite enjoyable and definitely worth a visit.

Back of Orchard House

Front of Orchard House

Homeowner's Office

Wonderful Copper Sink

Bird Foot Lamp Base

The weather in Colorado Springs has been a bit hotter than we would like. It meant we weren’t all that inclined to go outside for hikes even though we had others we wanted to try. One Saturday afternoon, a geology professor from a local college was giving a presentation on the geology of Cheyenne Mountain. It was inside the very nice state park visitor center that we hadn’t visited yet, so we headed there.  It was entertaining although it may have been a bit more geology than we could handle. That evening, another storm rolled through the area. After passing over us, it seemed to sit still in the plains just east of town. I got the camera out in an attempt to get some lightning pictures. I set the camera up to take 2 second exposures continuously. It does produce a lot of pictures without lightning strikes but I did catch a couple that were decent. While I was sitting next to the camera during the shoot, I could hear something in the brush very near the rig. It was quite dark and I didn’t want to turn on my flashlight right away. I attempted to setup the camera to get a picture of whatever was there. I turned on my flashlight and snapped the photo. I’m not positive what mode I had the camera in but it produced a rather odd image of a couple deer less than 10 feet away!

Inside CMSP Visitor Center

Large Fireplace

Lightning Strike

Odd Deer Photo

Since cooler weather wasn’t coming our way, we decided to head to a cooler location for a hike. Mueller State Park is only about an hour’s drive but it is nearly 3300 feet higher in elevation than Cheyenne Mountain SP. This should equate to about 11 degrees cooler than where we are. Since we were expecting mid 90’s, even mid 80’s will feel good. Our first stop is at the visitor center. We ask about suggested hikes given our time frame, capabilities and the fact we are at 9500 foot elevation.

Nice Morning at Mueller SP Visitor Center

Only Seen Here

The Outlook Ridge Trail was the ranger’s recommendation. We could either stay parked at the visitor center or drive less than a quarter mile down the road to a specific trailhead parking lot. This trail gave us plenty of flexibility. The main trail is about 1 mile long with three different overlooks along the way. Unfortunately all three overlooks are on spur trails and will add nearly 3/4 mile to go out and back for each overlook. We head out figuring we will play it by ear as to how many of the overlooks we tackle.

Starting on Outlook Ridge Trail

We were actually feeling pretty good and ended up going out to all three of the overlooks. I wasn’t sure if the mountain range we were seeing in the distance is Pikes Peak or not. Each of the overlooks was different and had interesting rock formations on the edge. With her fear of heights, Chris stayed back from the edge, satisfied with her view from 25 feet back. There are a couple of small ponds in the valley below the last two overlooks.

Pikes Peak Range in Distance?

View at Overlook

Anise Swallowtail

Steps Down to Another Overlook

Pond Below

Rocky Overlook

The higher elevation wasn’t doing us in too much as long as we paced ourselves. Instead of just backtracking to the car, we decided to do the Greer Pond Trail back. This trail was in the woods for the first part. There were some some really short but steep hills but apparently the park realized these were a challenge and put in an optional bypass. That doesn’t mean the trail didn’t have steep sections but not as bad as it could have. We pass by Lost Pond along the way. It isn’t very big but still a pretty setting to have a snack. Our modified loop ended up being about 4.5 miles with 800 feet of elevation gain.

Tiny Flower Cluster

Help Avoid Steep Hills

Lost Pond

One of the geocaches that started near the visitor center has the final container along the Wapiti Nature Trail. Even though we were hungry for lunch we did the 0.8 mile loop since it was along the way back to the visitor center.

Rolling Hills Along Nature Walk

We drove to the north end of the park, ate lunch then headed out for another geocache with Kaboom in the title. It sounded interesting and brought us to a place called Dynamite Cabin. The cabin has seen better days but was more upright than some we have visited. Inside were the remnants of an “Original Detroit Stove” dated 1885. It looks like it would have been rather heavy to get this thing way out here. The full hike here was not quite 2 miles but turned out to be enjoyable and very secluded.

Dynamite Cabin Needs TLC

1885 Stove

Dynamite Cabin Trail View

By this point we’ve hiked over 7 miles at elevation, but Mueller SP is very nice and we likely won’t make it back here so we shoot for one more hike and a geocache. The School Pond Loop is 1.6 miles and just over 300 feet of elevation gain. There is a pond along the trail but it was quite small. It does have a bench to rest our weary legs before trudging up the steep portion of the trail to find the geocache. We ended up with 9 miles of hiking by the time we rolled out of the park. We might need to consider camping here if we make it back to the area so we can explore more of the trails.

School Pond

The following day was another hot one plus we were worn out from the hikes so we went to the library and chilled wile working on some blog post. We really haven’t done much hiking with Cheyenne Mountain SP. We had been told that one of the prettier and more shaded hikes was a combination of Cougar’s Shadow and the Blackmer Loop. The trailhead was only a quarter mile from our campsite so we decided to simply start from the rig. This would make the full hike just over 4 miles and nearly 600 feet of elevation gain. We were able to get moving by 9 AM so we hoped to beat most of the heat. We do get some good views of Cheyenne Mountain.

Cheyenne Mountain View

The portion of the trail with good tree cover was quite pleasant. We suspect the trail gets us within a quarter mile of the NORAD base at Cheyenne Mountain but we opt not to test their defense capabilities by attempting to enter without authorization! Periodically along the trail are some nice trail markers with both the trail name, a marker number and GPS coordinates. I suppose all good things in case there is trouble on the trail. We kept an eye open for a cougar given the name of the trail but didn’t see one. I did spot an interesting bird with an orange belly. At first I just assumed it was a robin but then I noticed other colors quite different from a robin. Fortunately it perched long enough to get a picture to determine it is a spotted towhee. The bright red eye is rather striking. The hike ended up being rather pleasant and found a few geocaches along the way.

Trail Marker

Spotted Towhee with Red Eye

After dinner we headed to another trailhead in the park for a “moon walk”. No, not the Michael Jackson kind, but a trail walk under the light of a full moon. We arrived and there were about a dozen people already there. While we were waiting for things to begin, we noticed a snake all coiled up right next to the small shelter. I thinks this was the fist snake we have seen here in Colorado. There were two leaders and by the time all the visitors arrived, we split into 2 groups of 10 to 12 people. We had each brought along a flashlight but one of the leaders handed out red filtered flashlight to maintain our night vision.

Moon Walk Group Starts to Arrive

Napping Snake

Each group started just after sunset (~8:30) on the same loop trail but each group headed in the opposite direction. Our group had an excellent interpretive ranger leading us. He was Native American and had a ton of interesting stories to tell us along the way. We would walk for 10 minutes or so and he would stop to relate another story. Most of his stories revolved around Native American folklore.

Sunset

Our Moon Walk Storyteller/Guide

Story Time

As it kept getting darker, he was wondering why the moon hadn’t risen yet. My Garmin GPSr has sun and moon times so I knew that the full moon wouldn’t rise into about 9:20 so we had a fair amount of the walk in rather dark conditions. As we progressed, more and more people resorted to turning on the red flashlights to help see the trail. It was a challenge because the lights were rather dim and the trail was loaded with rocks, holes and roots. We were so glad to have brought along our hiking sticks for what we assumed would be a simple hike.

Getting Darker

Lights of Colorado Springs

We eventually came across the second group and we managed to get past one another on a rather narrow trail in the woods. When we finally made it out of the woods, we saw that the moon had indeed risen, so our guide was able to tell more stories about the sun and the moon. We finally made it back to the parking lot and there were a couple of telescopes setup to look at different celestial bodies. Generally a star party should be held on a night with a new moon, but they decided to tie a full moon hike with a star party. We didn’t stay long and didn’t have far to go to get back home.

The Moon has Risen

Stars Barely Visible Too

With just one full day left from our 14 night stay, there were still places to see and things to do in Colorado Springs. But some things will have to wait for a return trip. We never made it to the US Olympic Training Center or Cheyenne Mountain Zoo even though we had good intentions of checking them out. We want to fit one more hike in. We decide Ute Valley Park just north of town looks interesting. It has lots of trails, many geocaches and seems to have its own unique rock formations. From what we read, this is also a very popular mountain biking destination, but we go with the boots instead of the bikes. From all the trails in the park, we decide the Ute Valley Park Loop Trail looked the post promising. At nearly 4 miles but only 400 feet of elevation gain, it covers the majority of the park but is a modest hike for us. We made it to the parking area on the north side of the park and set off on the most obvious path.

Heading Toward Wrong Ridgeline

This is a beautiful area and in our haste to get going, we started to head down a trail that appeared to be heading toward a hill we thought we would be climbing. After a quarter mile, we realized we were not on our intended trail. That’s the problem with parks that have numerous trail options, it’s easy to pick the wrong one. The upside of numerous trails is that we were able to quickly rectify the situation and work our way to the loop trail we wanted. The trail starts to climb but not so steeply that it is difficult. Even though we haven’t seen cyclists yet, it’s clear this trail is used by them. There are lots of rocks from fist sized to cow sized. Some are loose while others are firmly attached to the ground. It isn’t to tough to hike up since it is a rather wide trail and picking a line is easy at hiking speed. I keep thinking that this would be a real challenge if I needed to bike up this hill. But once we make it to the top, the views are that much better, being able to look out over the area.

Heading Up Rocky Trail

View from Top

We ran into a group of bike riders near the top. It appeared to be two women and 10 preteen girls. They were heading down the trail we just climbed. Not a one of them had the look of fear in their eyes like I would have had upon seeing the descent ahead of me. I suppose if I had grown up in this part of the country, I would have acclimated to both the elevation and challenging terrain and simply taken it all in stride. I’m too old now to make that big of an adjustment! Sections of the trail are large expanses of smooth sandstone and the biking looks quite doable, even fun. But then we hit a downhill section where it is clear from the tire tracks in the dirt that people ride their bikes down it, or worse, jump their bike off a 3 foot tall ledge onto the trail below as it takes a sharp turn. I was tempted to simply park myself off to the side of one of these jumps and wait for a local to show me how it’s done.

Slickrock Conditions

Jump Off Darker Rock on Right!

Another Serious Downhill Stretch

As we hiked along the loop, we would often hear a small airplane flying overhead. With the tree cover, we weren’t always able to spot the plane but we did see one go by when we were in a clearing. Turns out it was a plane towing a glider. I suspect that these are planes and cadets from the nearby Air Force Academy out for training or fun? As we came back around the part of the trail heading northwest towards the car, we decided to take a slight detour for a virtual geocache. It was to bring us to a small arch on a different trail. We figured we could check it out and find our way back to the car. I was expecting the arch to be near the trail and seen from a distance but the trail actually goes under and through the arch. It’s about 4 to 5 feet tall so walking under it wasn’t too difficult. However tire tracks in the dirt indicate bikes come through this as well. I’m not positive I could duck low enough to clear the opening while on my bike at speed!

Glider in Tow

Another Great View of Pikes Peak

Indian Paintbrush

Rock Formations

Low Clearance Arch!

Ute Valley Park is a wonderful place and there are many more trails and geocaches to explore and find. We have really enjoyed our two weeks in Colorado Springs and will need to make a return at some point, but now we need to head back to the Denver area before heading into the Rockies.