We were so dazzled by the drives through Garden of the Gods Park yesterday that we decided to return today to hike around a bit. It was pretty hot today and we hoped for shade along our route.
The park has a few parking areas strewn about the loop road and we picked one and bailed out of Charlotte. The contrast between the superb temperature inside Charlotte’s air conditioned cab and the outdoors was immediately evident. We moseyed down the first trail we found and were almost instantly rewarded with gorgeous scenes inside this Colorado Springs gem.
After a few hundred yards, we approached a little plaza right next to a formation they refer to as Sentinel Rocks. Several other visitors were there and I stupidly struck up a conversation with a former Marine from Michigan who was visiting his son here. The Marine whipped out his cell phone and sat down next to me to show me numerous tiny pictures on his phone of animals he had killed utilizing a sniper’s blind near his house. He had pictures of dead skunks, dead opossums, dead deer and also was generous enough to show me pictures of his death blind where he apparently spends his winter in a dedicated attempt to kill all the fur-bearing vermin near his home. When he asked if I wanted to see more of this gore, I declined but that didn’t stop him from continuing on about all the little inedible creatures he had blown to bits with his guns. When I made a half-hearted attempt to get away, I thought he was going to grab me so I wouldn’t miss any of the carnage shots. Finally Peggy came and rescued me from the suffering and I was delighted she did so.
Escaping down one of the loop trails led us to absolutely stunning views of the salmon meat colored rock formations that appear to be sedimentary but turned vertical. There are big holes throughout the rocks that make them look like enormous Swiss cheese pieces. There are also some almost white formations that erosion has treated differently so they look like they have secret writing on them. This park is pretty neat, especially since it is free. Free stuff around here is extremely rare. Seven Falls at the Broadmoor Resort is $14 a head. The cog railway to Pike’s Peak is $37 a pop. The May Museum of bugs is $6. Even the visitor center at Garden of the Gods cost $8 but they reward you with an 18 minute movie in which alleged experts speculate on how the rock formations were formed although they are not sure.
From our hiking expedition through the park we returned back to Manitou Springs where we checked out the possibilities regarding non-resident marijuana purchases under Colorado’s enlightened reefer laws. We selected a very affluent-looking outlet and headed inside to browse. They checked our identification and ushered us into an impressive showroom with numerous dope varieties and vehicles for getting well. They offer buds, edible products, oil products for vaporization and even some sprays and rubs with alleged fantastic pain-killing properties.
Indica and sativa varieties are arranged on tables in little bins that you can see into with magnifiers and also that have little sniffing ports so you can sample their odors. It was marvelous. Since this was not a “medical” dope shop, the prices are higher than those catering to those miserable bastards with true or imagined afflictions requiring marijuana to alleviate the pain, boredom, anxiety or other crises pervading their fogged-out minds. If I lived here, I would almost immediately contract some ailment that could only be remedied by frequent and dedicated application of reefer cures.
We finished up our drive for today by checking out CO-115 which is the road from Colorado Springs to our next destination in Canon City, CO. It looks like that’s the way to go tomorrow instead of taking the interstate. The road runs along the foothills and also has unique and beautiful rock formations on both sides of the road.