Tag Archives: Colorado Springs

Skywatch Friday – Healing on the Trail

On our trip to Colorado Springs last month when we interred my brother Bob. My sister Ellen suggested we go for a short hike at the Fountain Creek Regional Park where she volunteers weekly in their visitor center.

What a great idea that turned out to be. I’ve been escaping to nature my whole life to get rest, comfort, and rejuvenate myself and this was the perfect park for that. What a jewel, El Paso County has in this park. So the five us hiked a one mile or so loop trail.

They pack a lot in that one mile loop to see.

We saw several mule deer. This butt belongs to one of them. Sorry, that was the best photo I could get.

BIL Irv, found this tiny little geocache (called a nanocache). I went ahead and signed the log even though he found it. Please don’t turn me in to the geocaching police.

“A walk in nature, walks the soul back home” – Mary Davis

“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” – Albert Einstein

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” – Psalm 19:1

“Nature itself is the best physician” – Hippocrates

“I go to nature to be soothed, healed and have my senses put in order.” – John Burroughs

“Allow nature’s peace to flow into you as sunshine flows into trees” – John Muir

So one hike isn’t going to bring anyone peace. It’s a process, not an event and I will always miss my brother.

I’m a big fan of Fountain Creek Regional Park now. Hopefully I’ll be back.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday

Dirty Window Cross Country Road Tripping Skywatching

We drove from Tulsa to Colorado Springs last week. The drive takes all day. My wife and I take turns with the driving. When I’m driving, I just drive. When she is driving, I google all the small towns we pass and give her interesting (to me its interesting) tidbits about the town’s history, attractions, or culture. When I’m not doing that, I take photos.

The entire trip is across the Great Plains of the Midwest. To many they are very boring. I love them. I look for things. Is the land grassland or crops? I’m on the lookout for pipeline infrastructure and try and guess if it is for liquids or natural gas. I also look for wind farms. About 11% of our electrical needs come from wind. Think about all the carbon dioxide not being put into the air because of windfarms. That number is from 2022. I bet it is more than that now.

I love grain elevators. They are so photogenic. When you are up close and have good light. Not so much when you are shooting through a dirty window.

I love hay bales as well. There are hay bale enthusiasts that regard them out the field as an art form. I guess I can see that. Back when I was building pipelines I talked to a lot of farmers about all sorts of things and cutting and baling hay was fascinating. If you don’t let the hay dry out enough before baling it, it will have spontaneous combustion and start on fire where it is. Hopefully in a field, if you are unlucky it will be on your trailer or truck. Just one of the many useless little farming tips I picked up while buying pipeline right of way.

Most of the drive was in Kansas. I love Kansas, especially the work I did there. The thing about Kansas and business is that Kansas likes to protect Kansas based businesses and everybody can look out after themselves. That’s why I called Kansas, the People’s Republic of Kansas. Sometimes I think they took their protectionism a little too far. It’s a nice state though and the people are great.

And cows, there are lots of cows in Oklahoma, Kansas, and Colorado. I’ll give you a fun fact about cows that I bet you didn’t know. They only cows that fall into open pipeline ditches and die are prize breeding stock. At least that was what ranchers would tell me when I was trying to settle damages. Yep, they drove all the way to Maine to buy the animal, paid $50,000 dollars for it. For some reason though the cow on the bill of sale is a different color than the cow in the ditch. Ranchers tell me that can happen though. (Actually, 99,9% of ranchers are honest and just want to be treated fairly, but every once in a while you get “that guy.”

And trucks, freeways have lots of truck traffic. I have lots of stories about truckers from back when I was working. Most of them are pretty boring so I’ll spare you.

And then the sun started going down. Sunset lasted a long time.

I like road trips. The wife not so much. I get it.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday

Christmas 2023

Christmas and the end of the year buzzed by really quickly this year. Sorry I have been incommunicado all the sudden but hey, I’m back. So I’ll bring you up to speed.

A few days before Christmas we joined another couple for a Christmas music show at historic Cain’s Ballroom featuring several very talented local singers and musicians.

Isaac Hanson, of Hanson, showed up and played a couple of songs. Heather and I remember when he was just a little boy and played for free at local events with his brothers. He’s all growns up now and has a whole bunch of kids of his own.

Heather made her traditional gingerbread cookies. They are always a hit.

They go fast.

We made a visit to my brother Bob at his residence.

And gathered around the tree.

On Christmas Day we went to my MIL’s house and we opened gifts and had steak and baked potatoes for Christmas dinner. Bad blogger me, didn’t get any family photos.

A couple days later Heather, son Logan, Kodi, and I drove a roundabout route to Colorado Springs. My sister and BIL were hosting their family for Christmas. We hadn’t seen them for years so they graciously assented to our presence.

They are an active and fun loving bunch. If you are going to hang with them you better get up early and be prepared to stay late. They were very welcoming to us crashing the party.

Here is Logan with my sister and BIL’s dogs. The little dog is Maisey and is very sweet the big dog is Aspen. Aspen kept trying to play with our little dog, Kodi but Kodi was intimidated.

Sister and her husband treated us all to the US Olympic and Paralympic Museum in Colorado Springs. It was great. There are lots of things to look at and videos of past performances and artifacts like the costume above worn by Peggy Flemming who won the Gold Medal in figure skating at the 1968 Winter Olympics. I always thought she was classy and elegant.

Back at my sister’s house, Kodi went for a walk and got to meet Jasper the horse and get sniffed and inspected really good by the horse. I think our city dog thinks he doesn’t want become a ranch dog.

On the drive back to Tulsa Kodi found an earth cache. A specialized form of a geocache. So now I call him Kodi the Geodog.

I also got a shadow photo of Kodi so I guess he is a shadow dog as well.

So anyway, that was our whirlwind trip!!

I am linking with Skywatch Friday, Saturday’s Critters, Shadow Shot Sunday 2, and My Corner of the World