Yesterday

Yesterday was our last day in Colorado Springs (I’m writing this Saturday morning).

We woke up with the dawn and a glimpse out of our window showed the sun really lighting up the Rockies. This prompted us to throw on some clothes, leap in the car and drive to the shopping centre car park opposite as this gave an uninterrupted view for some picture taking.  The cloud base was pretty low but the sun in the east behind us gave the mountains a beautiful golden glow.

With the help of all her medicines, Susie was feeling a bit better and able to do a few things (although needed top up doses once they wore off). We arranged a late checkout from the hotel and headed out for a drive.

First up was a drive through Old Colorado Springs as this is where I had eaten with Linda, Mike and Lynda the night before and I wanted to see a little more of the area than the white lines on the road! We followed the road through Old Colorado Springs and ended up in Manitou Springs which was a really scenic spot. We drove up to where the cog railway starts on its journey up to the top of Pikes Peak (summit 14,114 feet). I’m sure this is a great thing to do and would be absolutely superb for photo opportunities but felt that as we had a bit of an issue with the altitude at Colorado Springs (more like 7,000 feet), this may not be the wisest thing to do.

We then went back to the hotel and finished packing the car and completed the checkout process.  We were now homeless until arrival at Denver!

We remembered that Nurse Carrie in the ER had recommended the Whole Foods Market (of which more later) for cornbread so we decided to pay a visit.  It was brilliant and furnished us with a slice of maple bacon, apple and garlic pizza to take away for a bite of lunch.

As the sun was out – it was still fairly cool out though – we headed back to Garden of the Gods so we could see it in good daylight, rather than the fading light of a few days previously.  It seemed like a good place to munch our piece of pizza too.

There is a driving loop round the park, most of which is one way, with a 20 mph speed limit.  There are some designated “pull off” areas plus a parking area but for the most part you cannot just stop to take photos when you want to.  This means that we’ve taken quite a few photos on the move, through the windscreen, side windows along with several where the camera was stuck out of the open window and the shutter depressed without any idea of what the camera had in its viewfinder!  Some have turned out pretty good, some disastrous and some our personal reminders of the scenery but not really good enough for sharing.

The car park was really busy but we managed to secure the last spot. After polishing off our pizza we went for a walk down the path which we hadn’t had a chance to investigate on our previous visit. It lead down behind the “Kissing Camels” and provided some photo opportunities.  We finally remembered to take our first “selfie”, something we’d been meaning to do all visit!

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