Pikes Peak Summit Hike

Manitou Springs/Barr Trial to Pikes Peak Summit

12.5 miles; 7,500' elevation gain; 5:40

5AM start--still dark but not cold.

Up hill starts immediately and ends at the top.

Sunrise is a cosmic event--check it out.

Some choose (try) to sleep in.  I've always wondered about why one would pitch a tent in the trail.

3 miles into it.

Columbine

Pikes Peak Penstemon

Monument Gentian

Halfway there--sorta.

Yup, it was a blue shirt day.

Note to self:  start wearing looser shirts and longer pants.

You gotcher big picture

And, ya gotchur little picture.

Passing timberline

Passing at timberline

After all, it's just a big pile of rocks.

That was an airplane!

Forget-Me-Not  -- OK!

Summit looking SE

Summit looking N

Summit archeology--my favorite part of the visitor center.  We miss out on the famous donuts and getting a sweatshirt.

 And, then, we're just four more tourists.

19th Annual Starlight Spectacular

Nighttime Fun Bike Ride

Garden of the Gods/Downtown 20 Mile Loop

This event started with about 80 of us riding out on a raining night at 2AM.

Now it's 1500 partiers leaving at 10:30 PM

Recumbent with an attitude.

First year I'm feeling embarrassed not being in costume.

"How many times do I have to tell you, 'NO, we do not serve beer!'"

Note the inner tube vest.

The Levitator--a pedal powered non-bar.

Bancroft Park rest stop in Old Colorado City--my favorite.

Family fun at midnight

Then, what I get to do until well after dawn.

5AM, hood's up because the hydraulic parking break has a leak so it won't release--whole other story.

Buena Vista Bike Fest Century Ride

100 Mile Out and Back

Buena Vista to Leadville

June 1;  7.75 Hrs

We get a 6AM start into a chilly wind.  The we're happy to reach the first rest stop at about 16 miles and, apparently,  they are happy to have us.

Considering the wind, some might say we are smiling through the tears.

We reach the high point on the North side of Turquoise Lake.

This is June first in Colorado!

We're still smiling at the 1/2 way point--aren't we?

It's all about the background.

After-party

Beer, Brauts and the Band

Dodge Nature

Dodge Nature Center & Pre School in Mendota Heights and West St. Paul MN

The pond

What's in the pond?

Straw bale tour.

Visiting with a resident.

Ice cream.

And, entertainment.

Oh yeah, and jumping.

Rails to Trails, Minnesota in May

Gateway State Trail

Out and back bike ride from Mendota Heights to Pine Point Park north of Stillwater,  May 21, 57 miles.

 The biggest challange on this ride is making my way from the suburb of Mendota Heights, across downtown St. Paul, to the Gateway State Trail trailhead.  Due to overcast skies and a lack of mountains, by the time I decide to consult my map I'm 90 degrees disoriented and it takes me 10 minutes of consciousness alteration to find my location on the map.  Then, it's turn-by-turn navigation since I still feel that I'm headed in the wrong direction.  2 miles and 50 minutes after I start I'm on the right track.

The Gateway is a beautiful, well kept and relentlessly level trail that will take me from St. Paul to Pine Point Park, about 20 miles northeast, with a side trip to Stillwater.

My primary destination is Stillwater because, from there, I can cross the St. Croix River on this perfect, little, lift bridge and be in Wisconsin, thus a multi-state bike ride.  The white car is parked in a spot reserved for the "bridgekeeper".   I immediately resolve that since my retirement jobs of sheepherder and cabooseman are pretty much obsolete and if I don't get the lockkeeper's job in Scotland, I'd be happy to be a bridgekeeper.  (A day later I read that they are breaking ground for a new bridge in Stillwater).

From the Wisconsin side, the old town of Stillwater spreads along the Minnesota shore.

Yes, it is that quaint...and green.

Even though a very light rain begins just after my scone and coffee lunch in Stillwater I decide to continue riding north to Pine Point Park just because bike touring doesn't get any better than this.

 The Gateway is a seamless ride from the middle of St. Paul through farmland, forests and back again for a casual, short day ride.

Central Lakes Trail

 Out and back from Fergus Falls, May 22, 10 miles

Rails to Trails!

 Minnesota biking in May!

Greenland Open Space 4/7/13

First pasque flowers

We're always on the lookout for the first pasque of spring and these are them, in abundance, in the Greenland Open Space just north of Monument Hill.

Why pasque flowers appear in profusion here, just north of the Palmer Divide, long before they show up in Garden Garden of the Gods is a mystery, though these are soon to be buried in more spring snow.

The open space is bounded by I-25 on the east and railroad tracks with mesas to the west.  The trail is 8 miles round trip.

By far the most prominent marker in an old, Palmer Lake cemetery, incorporated into the open space.  Not  sure this of guy's history but he's been here for over 100 years.

And, so we did.

AFA/Lock Washer Park Oxbow Ride

This is 45 mile ride through Garden of the Gods, north on the Pikes Peak Greenway and the New Santa Fe Trail to a loop at the Air Force Academy, back south to Lock Washer Park and west up highway 24.  Or, a ride along Monument Creek with loops west at both ends.

                                           Nothing better than a  new road bike.

                                             My favorite city street--Ridge Road.

You've got your artistical, ceramic mosaic of undetermined meaning and

you've got your rusticated scenery.

Ice Lake,  just inside the AFA boundary,  looks better in the summer.  In the background is the impediment that stands between the now dirt trail and the well maintained asphalt of the AFA loop drive.

Consequently, it's onward on more dirt than anticipated but not a bad ride.  The plan is for the train to be gone after my loop so I can hop back on the trail.

Anyway, there's the Chapel.  And....there's my new bike!

The train didn't move, or maybe it's another one, so I had to sneak it.

 Because of it being a beautiful Saturday there were numerous other bicyclists along the trail.

Lock Washer Park (aka, much less descriptively,  America the Beautiful Park or ABP)

Last, and least, west (looking east) along Highway 24.