Last Day on the Re-Tramp

As much as Lummis loved Golden, he would chose a different place to go near Albuquerque years later when he needed a refuge.  When Lummis finished the Tramp, he literally went to work the next day at the Los Angeles Times.  Lummis was a workaholic, keeping up the intense expenditure of energy he performed on the tramp.  As the hard-working editor of the LA Times from 1885-1888, he consistently burned the midnight oil grinding out the daily paper.  Eventually, his incessant work caught up with him and he suffered a stroke that partially paralyzed his left arm and leg.  He decided to leave Los Angeles and recuperate on the ranch of his good friend Amado Chaves in San Mateo, New Mexico.

While living in New Mexico he observed and reported on the corrupt machinations of a powerful old guard New Mexican family.  In an article published in the LA Times he accused the family of being behind the murder of an elections worker on Election Day 1888.  Townspeople in San Mateo told Lummis and his host that a peon from Mexico had been paid to assassinate them.

As Mark Thompson puts it in his biography of Lummis, The Curious Life of Charles Fletcher Lummis, "He didn't have a death wish, some of his conduct over the years notwithstanding."  Even before the article was published, Lummis had been looking for a place to escape from the threats on his life-- but he evidently still wanted to stay in New Mexico.  He chose a place he visited only briefly on the Tramp: the Isleta Indian Pueblo.

Another Silly Gringo in Their Midst

It's always good to let people know what you're doing, because you never know when someone can help you out.  While on the road I got an email from my aunt in Tucson that they had a friend who worked in the medical clinic at Isleta, and would I be interested in having her show me the reservation?  So the morning after tramping around Golden I got to visit Isleta.

I had to get up early to follow my host into work on the reservation.  Soon after getting off the highway and entering Isleta, I found myself pulling all my worldly possessions through a confusing tangle of dirt roads, surrounded on all sides by a mixture of low, earthen colored one-story adobe houses, mixed with low modern buildings.  Neatly packed dirt.  That's one thing I will always associate with Iselta.

But let me stop here.  I didn't really get to experience Isleta during this first, quick visit.  I didn't have time to meet any Isletans, didn't get to walk around much of the main plaza, or explore the pueblo, so I can't really give you a steel pen sketch of the place.  I don't want to romanticize it by describing the rambunctious young black and white puppy that ran across the plaza to greet us when we arrived.  But I will say I doubt it has changed much since Lummis lived there.  And I did get to do something really incredible:  I was given a tour of the old adobe Catholic Church at Isleta, built in 1710.  And I was honored with a meeting with the priest at Isleta, who personally showed me around the church and many of the ancient artistic objects-- a tribute certainly more to my host than to myself.

My kind and wonderful host in Albuquerque, Bee, had to leave me before the appointed time for the meeting with Father Hillaire. When I entered his office I was greeted by a kind-looking man you would guess was a college professor.  And indeed he could be a professor with his Ph.D. in Linguistics.  Bee mentioned that one of the things that first struck her about Father Hillaire was hearing him deliver a Mass in Southern Tiwa, the indigenous language of Isleta.

Bee gave me some great background on the pueblo over dinner the night before, and in the morning gave me a prep on behavior on the reservation: no pictures, and you can look but don't climb up on the kivas (the religious ceremonial chambers, entered through the roof via ladder).  I don't mind about the pictures, and actually I respect it.

From Albuquerque, Lummis went west into northern Arizona.   Northern Arizona is not characteristic of the rest of the southern part of the state.  It has high mountain ranges that get blanketed with snow, and Lummis indeed encountered lots of snow on his tramp.  2010 was no different.  The last, and biggest of three snow storms rolling through the Southwest was about to hammer northern Arizona.  With my experience with the last two storm systems, I was ready to call it a day.  As much fun as I've been having, I'm eager to land in Phoenix and begin my life.  I actually discuss driving routes with Father Hillaire, and he confirms that the best way to get to Phoenix would be to take I-25 South to I-10, then take that the rest of the way.  I-10 will get me to Phoenix far to the south, safely away from the snow.

So Father Hillaire leads me back out of the reservation (we were both concerned I might get lost trying to get out).  It was a quiet, apt way to end the Re-Tramp, for now.  I make a quick Starbucks stop, then hit the road hard, with near continuous driving for 7 or 8 hours to Tucson, where I stop for the night.  At some point along this long pull I start seeing saguaros, signaling that I am in the Sonoran Desert.











Final thoughts

Going into this driving tour of Lummis's walking route, I definitely had expectations about what I would find and write about.  I expected to find a West radically transformed in the 125 years since Lummis walked it.  I expected to find shocking differences that might reveal startling things about our modern world.  I expected to report on an overhauled West.

But just the opposite happened.  I found myself constantly surprised by how much was still the same as Lummis's account.  Sure, a lot of things are different, but I found the basic outlines drawn in the Tramp Across the Continent to be surprisingly intact.  Some of the things I came across were crumbling ruins, but I also came across things that are still living institutions 125 years later.  It seemed like I couldn't avoid stumbling into some of the same situations Lummis did, merely by retracing the same basic route.

In a lot of ways it seems like the country has merely built up along the lines described by Lummis, and not so radically transformed in the intervening 125 years.  Denver, though it has swelled since Lummis visited, is still a dot of civilization on the edge of the vast plains.  Mountains and mountain passes are still formidable obstacles.  Even one of the biggest changes, the birth of cars and roads and the demise of horses and trains, did not strike me that forcefully: I was driving my car along historic railroad lines, connecting cities that were formed around railroads, rivers, and wagon roads.  I defy someone to drive on Route 40 in Western Kansas, drive in and out of the tiny cities, like pearls on a string, that Lummis mentions, and tell me this place has radically changed since 1884.

  If you committed a crime in Colorado in 1884, there's a good chance you were sent to Cañon City.  If you commit a crime today, you will probably still end up Cañon City.  If you are a Native American seeking advanced education, you may follow in the footsteps of generations of scholars and high yourself to Lawrence, Kansas.  I visited a brewery in Golden, Colorado, today one of the world's largest, that was brewing beer in the same place it was when Lummis came through Denver.  I got to the top of Pikes Peak on a train that's been running since 1891.

Maybe we are not as revolutionary as we think, and are more deeply rooted in the past than we believe.

All in all, in case I haven't shown it in my last few posts, the way the country slowly changed and unfolded was incredibly powerful for me.  The route was like a plot line in a drama about the Continent.  Different emotions are pricked at different times.  The country says different things to you at different times.  It builds you're suspense as you speed west towards the Rockies.  It whispers in your ear soothingly as you coast down the cozy space between the plains and the foothills, and sends you soaring as you reach Pike's Peak.  Then your pulse races when you try to cross the mountains.  I could see easily how this route transformed and inspired Lummis.

Thanks for Reading

I'd like to thank everybody who has read this blog (especially if you are still reading this post!)  The blog made this amazing trip even more fun for me.  Your comments and notes meant a lot and were much appreciated.  Don't be surprised if you get an email about another blog sometime, and I will appreciate your patience with this spam email.

Love ya,

SHU

Golden, New Mexico

Released into San Luis

Now unhooked from the tow truck down in San Luis Valley, I beat it south like a trout released in a pond.  I was traumatized by the La Veta snow-in and wanted to put some serious miles behind me.  One thing about traveling in the winter is you have less daylight, and I feel like I'm always chasing the fading daylight.  In this twilight I now found myself on the West side of the Sangre de Cristo Mountain range: pretty mountains on my left, with the wide open valley on my right.  The sun has dropped below the horizon, but soft white light still fills the valley.

Highway 159 goes directly south towards New Mexico for many miles, but bends to the west momentarily before diving south again towards Taos, New Mexico.  If you ever find yourself on this little bend, be sure to LOOK TO YOUR RIGHT! and you will see another incredible view of Mt. Blanca.  From this spot the mountain looks even more lonely, even more magnificent than before, and in this fading light all alone on the highway it is stunning.  This might have been the view of the trip.  Too bad there was no place to pull off for a picture.

Soon bright dots of light start to appear above the Sangre de Cristos on my left.  Alone in a car, a quiet moment like this turns you philosopher.  I think about the people seeing the same sight thousands of years ago, and I wonder what it meant to them.  Maybe they would have been struck, like me, with the contrast between the rough rocky irregularity of the mountains and the seeming order and perfection of the points of light above them.  The Sangre de Cristos, so earthly looking, against the starry constellations, so delicate and pristine-looking.  Of course I've seen the night sky before, but it appears novel placed right up against the jagged line of the Sangre de Cristo range.

Snow again

When I draw the curtains on my Super 8 Motel room in Taos the next morning, it looks like someone has dropped the Blizzard of '96 outside my window.  It's a white out all over again.  I can't see anything in the distance, and snow is piling up every second.   Just thinking about the miles ahead make me queasy.

There's a middle-aged Native American fellow in the tiny Super 8 lobby also looking anxiously out at the road and we become lobby buddies.  He's trying to get to Hispanola, down the same road but closer. He's nervous because his vehicle is shit in the snow too.  Our hope is the snow will clear the same way it did yesterday.  It's still early in the morning, so we have time to wait.

The snow isn't letting up, and by 10am I'm starting to loose faith that I'm going to depart Super 8 anytime soon.  But in another hour, like a miracle, the clouds depart just like yesterday.  Suddenly I can see the piñon-dotted mountains outside Taos, and the hot sun is out again.  By the time I wrap up some work on the laptop, Highway 64 is clear as a blacktop basketball court in summer.

A sense of elation similar to getting towed out of La Veta again fills me, and I am all eagerness to hit the road, P.D.Q. (to use a bit of Lummis-speak).  As I start rolling on 64, I literally let out a "yeeehah!" outside my car window (although it may have come out more like a Howard Dean "Yaaaahhh!").  It is beautiful the rest of the way to Santa Fe.  On Highway 64 I rejoin Lummis's route and start shadowing the Rio Grande and experience the Rio Grande gorge.

Searching for Golden


At Santa Fe I get back on I-25.  I have about 2 hours left of daylight, and I want to stop by the ghost town of Golden, New Mexico before arriving in Albuquerque.  From Santa Fe there are two ways to get to Albuquerque: I-25, or Highway 14, also known as the "Turquoise Trail".  This is the road that Golden is on.

This is a climatic moment for me.  It was the experience of reading Lummis's extensive account of Golden, and then discovering it as an abandoned "ghost town" that helped inspire this whole trip.  From the descriptions and pictures available online, it was very difficult to understand what exactly Golden is today.  I had to see it for myself.

I believe there are more paragraphs per square mile devoted to this town of about 300 residents than any other place in the Tramp.  This is partly because Lummis got snowed in here for 12 days.  He intended to stay only a day or two, but about 2 feet of snow would fall before it finally let up enough for him to depart (and he barely survives the tramp to Albuquerque from Golden).  During these 12 days he seems to really fall for Golden, and the lifestyle of the West he perceives.  He makes friends, partakes of Golden's society, hears the local lore, and visits the mines.  He admits that he catches a bit of gold fever himself, and it seems at least one person even gave him a stake in a mine if he ever returned.

In my brief online research on Golden, I can't find an exact moment that Golden failed, but it seems that the big mineral deposits didn't really "pan out".   It's an ominous sign that in Lummis's 1892 book about the Tramp, all talk of Golden's future prosperity is scrubbed.  Although he still notes that, "Our twelve days among its mines were of the most enjoyable of the whole journey..."  And to know Lummis's account of the Tramp is to know that this is really saying something.

I pass the town of Cerillos, which I ache to spend more time in, it looks so cool, but the day is fading fast so I press on.  I see Cerillos on the map, and then Golden further down the highway, but it's taking longer then I expect to find Golden after Cerillos.  I know I will be tramping around in the ghost town in the twilight.  Finally I come to a bend in the road where I see a tiny adobe cross.  This is the first sign that I've reached Golden.  Further down the road I start noticing wrecked old houses.  I turn onto a muddy dirt road, which appears to be the "main drag" of today's Golden.

Golden is not really my image of a prototypical, iconic ghost town.  It's a heterogenous ghost town.  Different houses have been built and faded into disuse at different times.  There are a few lots where people are living today, with modern cars and dogs barking.  Other lots seem to have faded out sometime in the 1970's, some in the 1950's.

And then there are lots with crumbling buildings that look like they could easily be 150 years old.  One of the most prominent ruins, which I later saw identified as the old schoolhouse, looks so antiquated you could have told me it was 1000 years old (not this one, though this looks really old too).

Because there are a few permanent residents of Golden, I don't feel entirely comfortable walking around snapping pictures, but I do it anyway.  There are barbed wire fences and no trespassing notices, but it is still a meditative moment.

It's a really beautiful area.

This is the old schoolhouse.  One of the neat things about Golden is it's history that's just out there, it's not behind glass at a museum.  There were one or two times before this on the Tramp where I came across remnants of undocumented antiquated buildings or other structures, and it is always thrilling.

Well, it's getting dark, so it's time to get a move on to Albuquerque on the other side of the mountains.
SHU

Crossing into the "Enchanted Land"

One thing I've learned on the Re-Tramp is that a good portion of Lummis's route is shadowed by Interstate Highways, or more accurately, the "Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways". It's convenient when you can follow Lummis's steps by driving on one of these massive, limited access roads that a third of all car miles are driven on in the US.

But in a few places you have to get off the Interstate to stay faithful to the Tramp.  When Colorado Springs is well behind you and you begin to approach the Spanish Peaks in Southern Colorado, this is one moment the intrepid Lummarian must venture off the Interstate.  At this point, I-25 South follows the route of the Santa Fe trail east of the Spanish Peaks on the plains side.  But as I approach the Spanish Peaks I get off the Interstate towards La Veta.  Why does Lummis veer west at this point to take the more difficult La Veta Pass, north of the Peaks?  Author Mark Thompson speculates in his biography of Charles Lummis that he took the La Veta Pass route because it was the scene of the opening passage of a novel, White Chief, by one of Lummis's early literary hero's, Mayne Reid.

I had had 6 days of great luck with weather since I started this trip.  A few grayish days, but no serious impediments.  Winter weather had been one of my chief concerns setting out, and I had even told myself that I would ditch the trailer mid-trip if things got bad.  But so far I've had beautiful weather almost all the way.

Reports of bad rain storms in California had started trickling down to me, even in my tramping state.  I should have tramped to the first weather doppler 3000 or whatever I could find at the first hint of these storms, but instead I just let it be.  Scattered clouds the last few days in Colorado only seemed to add to the picturesqueness of the unfolding country.  Increasingly these clouds were starting to look a little darker.  But no precipitation yet.

The scenery I'm driving through once I get off I-25 is absolutely beautiful.  Some of best times on this trip were when I got off the Interstate.  I passed through small towns, notably Walsenberg, then continued winding my way towards the pass.  In the miles before the pass, you travel through a wide, flat-bottomed, fertile-looking valley flanked by tall mountains.  In this bucolic setting, about a mile before beginning the ascent up the pass, light, ethereal white stuff started falling from the sky.

At the first appearance of flakes I'm very nervous, but it's behaving like flurries so I hope for the best.  Soon after I start up the pass, the white stuff starts clinging to the road.  Soon after that I can start to feel the car shuffling side to side some.  I slow down to 15 mph and turn my hazard lights on as cars begin passing me.  There is now significant accumulation as I start up the largest hill yet.  I just hope by driving slowly and carefully I can get through the pass to lower elevation on the other side.

No dice.  My front wheels, the power wheels, are beginning to spin out and I slow down to a crawling pace up the hill.  The road is a two-lane highway with shoulders.  With my last ounce of forward momentum I steer the car and trailer onto the shoulder and stop.  I get out of the car.  Since I first entered the pass it has become a white out.  I can barely make out the mountainside next to the road.  Standing there in the cold with the flakes coming in at my collar, I consider my options.  I decide that I will not attempt to get this rig any further.  I call AAA and arrange a tow out of La Veta Pass.  It's funny, I think to myself, Lummis too experienced a sudden snow storm crossing this pass: "On the summit of the Pass I had the pleasure of wading through a fierce snow-squall, which was unlooked-for and unwanted."

Sitting comfortably in the roomy cab of the tow truck I feel a rush of relief and can finally enjoy the scenery around me.  I kick off my boots and warm my toes.  What's intensifying the relief is that about 10 minutes before the tow truck arrived, the previously impermeable clouds began to disappear from the pass.  In only a few minutes the white out conditions have been replaced by a gorgeous, blue sky.  I'm squinting as the sun peaks out between mountains, when just 30 minutes ago I was resigned to camping out in my car on the pass if necessary.  It's eerie when we pass a tracker trailer in a deep ditch on the side of the road.

All the sudden we are out of La Veta Pass and descending into the sunny San Luis Valley when a magnificent site greets me.  Off to my right: a massive bluish-purple mountain seems to be rising straight out of the level plain, its very top shrouded in lingering clouds.  This is the storied Mt. Blanca.  As we sit in the silence, the driver who has just pulled my car out of the pass says to me, "I bet you've had enough of these mountains."

"I don't know, it's kind of pretty country actually..."

SHU

Cañon City

My first stop after Pike's Peak was Cañon City in southern Colorado, a town that really captured my interest.  There are three things you should know about Cañon City: 1) It's one of the few US cities with an enyay (the letter 'n' with a tilde) in the name, 2) there's a huge gorge just outside of town, and 3) It's one of the prison capitals of the US, with 13 prisons located in or near the town, including an underground federal supermax lockup.

In his letter from Pueblo, Colorado, Lummis tells a thrilling tale about Cañon City.  As he passes a gang of laborers in black and white jumpsuits working outside a stone building, he notices something on the walk in front of him.  "It was only a shadow, but the shadow of a bull-necked ruffian, whose uplifted right hand held a stone hammer".   Lummis has just enough time to jump into the middle of the road, flip out his revolver and watch "the convict and his fellows jump back to their work with studied innocence".  Lummis has passed the Colorado State Penitentiary at Cañon City.

I came to Cañon City primarily to stop by the Royal Gorge (aka Grand Canyon of the Arkansaw).  I knew about the prison story, but had no idea if the prison still existed, or exactly where it would be.  I didn't expect the 1884 prison to be standing and hoped only to take a picture of a modern facility for the blog.

Pike's Peak took up a lot of time, so dusk was rapidly approaching as I made my way to the outskirts of town.  Route 50 is the main drag of Cañon City and leads you into town as well as out to the gorge.  Once the town begins to peter out and you enter the foothills on the edge of town, Route 50 elbows off to the right suddenly.  Right in this elbow is an odd-looking complex built snugly against a small mountain.  I only had time to catch a few glimpses as I drove past the building and rounded the elbow.  Could that be the...

With it getting dark fast I made my way for several miles on Route 50, signs periodically promising me the gorge right around the corner.  Stars are starting to appear on the horizon.  I'm trying to decide whether to just turn back and call it a day.  Eventually I pass an arch informing me I am entering the Royal Gorge area, and I make my way slowly in the twilight through a narrow, hilly road crowded with twisted piñon trees.  I'm still wondering if I'm being stupid, will I even be able to see the gorge if I get to it?  As I round a curve, a large deer appears next to the car and startles me.

Finally, I get to the main visitor area and lookout of the gorge.  The gate to the parking lot is down, and I see a ranger-type dude eyeing me as I park the car in a space just before the gate.  A short, winding dirt path takes me to a lookout area crowned with blacktop and chain link fence.  It's almost dark now so it's hard to see the gorge.  I feel like one of the only souls around.  As I approach the fence I hear a novel sound: it's the deep resonating of the river thundering below. When I walk up closer and squint and let my eyes adjust, I can see the soaring, ragged walls of the gorge that the river is reverberating off of in the dusky night.  OK, I'm impressed.

I get back in the warm car, turn on the radio searching for whatever it can pick-up, and make my way back to town, fairly satisfied with my Royal Gorge experience (driving real slow for deer).  The dark, lonely drive back through the hills in uneventful, though I'm determined to have another look at that building by the bend.

When I get to the bend outside of town again, my eyes dart around this weird complex, and I see tantalizing signs that I've struck Lummis gold.  It's definitely a prison, and appears to still be in use.  Among the modern guard towers with angled windows are old stone walls that blend in surprisingly well with the color of the mountain and short medieval-looking tower structures that don't seem to be in use.

I wasn't sure then, but this is the same prison, in modern form, that Lummis walked passed on his way to the Royal Gorge in 1884.  After re-reading his account and familiarizing myself with the location, I realized this old prison is exactly where Lummis says it is, "Half a mile beyond town, and a mile east of the portals of the canyon..."

Woefully, both the Museum of Colorado Prisons in Cañon City and the History Center are closed on Tuesdays in the off-season, so I can't fully dive into the interesting history of this prison-capital, but I gleaned interesting information from local people and from Nancy, the director of the Prison Museum who kindly returns my call.

- The prison was opened in 1871 as the Territorial Prison.  It became the Colorado State Penitentiary when Colorado became a state.

- The prison was built by convicts out of stone quarried from the mountain behind it

- It has held prisoners continually since it's creation and is still in use as a medium security prison.

- Residents told me that correctional facilities are the major industry of Cañon City.  It's generates lots of revenue for the city and accounts for a huge share of the jobs in town ("a lot of cops live here," I was informed).  When I suggested the Royal Gorge must also be a big industry, my informant replied that the Gorge was seasonal, while the prisons are year round.

By the way, I was told at the hotel that they give tours of the State Penitentiary.  This is not true, they do not give tours, do not attempt to take a tour.  The morning after my first trip to the Gorge and prison drive by, I returned to the facility, this time parking my car and getting out for a closer look.  With camera slung over my shoulder, and Letters from the Southwest in hand I strode through the front gate of the prison.

"Can I help you sir?" I hear a voice calling out.

I looked around for a second, then look up and see an officer looking down at me from the tower.

"Um...yeah, I heard they are tours here, can I take a tour"

"No"

"Is it OK if I take some pictures?"

"No"

"Alright, thanks."

"Have a nice day."

So I turned around and drove out to the Royal Gorge again.

By the way, these illicit photos are from an area near the Prison Museum, which is located adjacent to the facility.  I climbed a small hill and started taking pictures before I attempted the tour.  I'm worried they may have seen me doing this and were annoyed with me (maybe they were watching me from the towers the whole time as I pulled into the parking lot).  This area, I believe, is not even from the oldest section of the prison structure, but it gives you an idea of how cool it looks.  Imagine incredible, locally quarried stone walls and turrets 50 years older than these.


So, thank goodness, I escaped a free tour of the inside of one of Cañon City's prisons.  I wish I could have taken more pictures at my leisure, because this was one of the neatest old West buildings I've come across thus far.  If you're in the Colorado Springs area, I highly recommend a side trip to Cañon City to the see Royal Gorge, and the old prison on the way.

Sincerely Yours,
SHU

High on Pike's Peak

Cañon City, Colorado

I consider myself a bit of a train riding veteran.  I lived my entire 4 years in Chicago sans car.  I endured the annoyances of the Chicago Transit Authority, covered massive distances by public transit, performed crazy, multistep transfers to get where I needed to go.

But going from 6,000 to 14,000 feet via train is not something I've done before.  Yesterday I summitted the mighty Pike's Peak by boarding the Cog Railway. What is a Cog Railway?  A regular train can handle an incline of about 8%.  A train using a "cog" or rack system can climb inclines up to 48% (the Pike's Peak Cog Railway can do up to 25%).  Basically, a cog train rolls on slotted tracks, instead of smooth ones.  Slotted wheels on the train lock into these slots, so the train can "climb" steep inclines.

This was really neat.  It was a stroke of luck to be able to go to the top of the mountain this time of year.  The top of Pike's Peak in winter can be covered in feet of snow and experience winds of over 100 mph.  In times past no one went to the top of Pike's Peak during the winter.  Lummis reports that the US Signal Station on the top of Pike's Peak (where he crashed), was in "solitary confinement" until Spring.  The engineer said that for most of it's history the Cog Railway didn't run at all in winter.  It was not until the 1970's that the cog railway has been able operate into the off-season, thanks to the construction of a powerful snow plow that can clear the track.  This Martin Luther King Jr. Day was mild enough that we could go to the top.  So I made my reservation, paid my thirty bucks and took my seat.

I was excited as we began our slow ascent up the mountain.  Topping out at 9 mph, I watched enormous boulders, partially frozen streams, and remnants of rusted old water tanks and cabins float past the window.  The cog tracks seem to take up only a narrow swath in the forest without disturbing the surroundings.  As you near the top the vegetation peters out and the landscape becomes tundra.

The Top

We have about 40 minutes to explore the top of Pike's Peak before the train starts back down.  If we miss it we'll "become hikers, " as the conductor puts it. Feeling light headed, I can sense the elevation as I step out of the railway car onto the summit.  The space on the very top of Pike's Peak is about the size of a Walmart parking lot and savors of an extreme environment: rocks, ice, wind-swept snow, blue sky and clouds.  A couple small drab buildings laden with antennae cling to the rock.  The wind is stingingly cold.  I feel a bit like I'm on the North Pole.  The distances you can see all around are staggering, but you are so high the land looks unfamiliar (though you can clearly see Garden of the Gods below, which looks like a cluster of off-color pebbles sticking out of the dirt).  You can also now see the rest of the Rockies beyond the Front Range, as well as the infinite tawny plain to the east.  There's a gift shop on top where you can buy donuts, hotdogs, use the bathroom, and escape the cold wind, which gets tiresome real quick.  A cup of coffee from the gift shop tastes so good and is so refreshing up here after tramping around for a little while.

It's Business Time
Lummis penned his letter of November 5th, 1884 from this remote mountain summit.  The US Army Signal Corps built a small station on the top of Pike's Peak in 1873 to take measurements for weather prediction.  Lummis ran into one of the station agents just coming off the mountain, they chatted and Lummis was offered free board to sleep on the floor of the station.

Lummis hiked up, which is a significant feat.  He says he started at 10am and arrived at the station at 3:30pm.  We picked up two hikers at the top who said it took them 8 hours to make it to the top, so Lummis's time sounds pretty fast.

Anyway, it didn't take a lot of sleuthing to locate the building I am 99% certain is the one Lummis stayed in.  I asked the conductor of the train when I got off where the old signal service station was located, and he directed me toward this ruin.  This must be the one and only station building, because I doubt the powers that be would totally destroy any structure with this history (I mean, there's even ancient telegraph wire visible from the train on the way up, that's how long artifacts hang around here).

I've had a few adventures since coming back down to earth, but I've got to press on to Albuquerque, I'm trying to make progress south to beat the snow storms coming out of California.

Adios,
SHU

Live from Manitou, Colorado

Manitou, Colorado, near Pike's Peak

It's time for a little freestyle, off-the-cuff Lummis blogging.  I'm typing away right now in a little coffee shop in Manitou, called Yerba Mate.  I did not expect to find wireless in this little mountain retreat, but here it is.  Here's the scoop on Manitou, it's near the bottom of Pike's Peak, one of the prominent peaks in this part of the range and popular attraction, with a highway and "Cog Railway" to the top (we'll soon find out what that is).  The cool thing about it is appartently it has been a neat little mountain town for a while.  Lummis calls it in 1884, "a beautiful little town lying 7 miles up the canyon from Colorado Springs, and 6,500 feet above the sea".  Of the residents of Manitou Lummis says, "Half of its 500 people make their living keeping boarders.  The other half don't need to make a living at all, being wealthy owners of some as pleasant villas as you ever saw."

One of the charming things about Manitou I'm finding is mixed in with more recent construction are old stone structures, like little bridges  or parts of bridges, stone walls, etc.  Many newer houses are built on stones terraces carved into the side of the mountain.  Nice mix of old and new.  There's indeed, like Lummis says, a lot of stuff catering to tourists, a few boutique shops, antique shops, etc.  If you're into exploring neat little stores there're a lot packed in here.  There apparently is a little bit of a funky, new agey aspect too which I discovered when I wandered into this coffee shop.  But it's a very nice coffee shop, cool rustic wooden decor, good coffee, good food.

I'm waiting to board this Cog Railway at noon to get to the top of Pike's Peak, which I didn't expect to be able to do.  If, God willing, I make it to the top, I will be quite proud of myself, for getting to the top like Lummis did in winter, and on top of that taking public transportation to do it.  It's going to take a good chunk of the day to do it and slow me up (there are many other things to see ahead), but I just don't want to say I followed Lummis's footsteps and didn't go to the top of Pike's when I had the chance.  You can, by the way, drive to the top (Lummis mentions a road to the top under construction when he visited).

Manitou is also just down the road, so to speak, from Garden of the Gods, which really is an amazing place.  We're kind of entering the Heart of Darkness of Lummis's tramp (in a good way), where there are just a lot of sights Lummis writes about, and Lummis is spending a little more time exploring, not just booking it down the rail.  So for that reason I'm trying to be more efficient than I have previously on the Re-Tramp.  I got up before dawn in my Colorado Springs Super 8 and hit the road shortly thereafter towards Garden of the Gods, an amazing collection of rock features in the foothills.  I got there a little after 7:00am, and the place was spectactular in the morning sunlight, with few other people there.

 Lummis reports a lot of rabbits in this area, but I'm surprised he didn't mention the birds.  There was an abundance of birdlife as I wandered among the spires and sheer rock faces, adding to the atmosphere of the place: Magpies (I think), some sort of small bird of prey (a swift or something), a bluebird, doves, and some other really tiny birds (Audubon is turning in his grave right now).

Coffee is running out, so I'm going to go poke around Manitou a little more before I jump on the railway to PP.  Keep an eye on the blog, tomorrow I'm planning on going to jail.  Sorry, not in the way you all expected.

SHU

Western Kansas and Eastern Colorado, awesomely desolate

Boulder, Colorado

I finally had to depart from the easy road in the name of staying faithful to Lummis's tramp--with a nice payoff.   Earlier I reported that I-70 follows Lummis's Tramp through Kansas.  When I pulled out the map after my last update, I realized that was not so for the rest of the state and into Colorado.  Places like Wallace, Kit Carson, and Boyero, tiny towns Lummis mentions, are not along I-70, I have to get on Route 40 to pass these places.

I'm no longer navigating by GPS, but by old fashioned map.  I have to take a road south to get to Route 40, which I do.  Eventually, just like the map says, I get to the Route 40 junction.  Something that excites me and tells me I'm on the right path, is that this junction also coincides exactly with a railroad crossing.  And then thrillingly, for me anyway, is that these tracks parallel route 40 closely.  I can see the tracks rolling past me as I drive.  At last I feel I am really re-tracing the tramp, literally.  Me, driving along the tracks at 50 mph that he walked, seeing exactly what he saw.  Additional confirmation comes when the railroad tracks and Route 40 enter, like clockwork, the towns Lummis mentions in his Letters.

Almost as soon as I depart Colby, Kansas (with the Starbucks) where I stayed the night before, the landscape begins to open up considerably, and just becomes more empty the further west you go.  At I'm driving west I'm continually amazed at the increasing emptiness and openness of the landscape.

But it's not boring, it's not depressing, it's so desolate it's thrilling.  I think part of the reason is all this time as you're heading west you are slowly gaining elevation, so at over 4,000 ft it's actually quite high compared to the plains of say, Illinois.  The air seems rarified.  The clouds of earlier in the day have disappeared and the mellow winter sun is out, giving the air this ethereal tint.  The landscape seems so dramatic.  Every spot, every vista seems like the location of a Hollywood western.  I don't know if it's the landscape itself that's so dramatic, or it's just that the landscape is a foil making everything that occurs in it more poignant, like a stage that makes the everyday and mundane seem extraordinary.

As I head west on Route 40 I have this feeling that I am going somewhere, that something great lays ahead of me.  I'm so eager to get there I want to lay on the gas.  I want to get to First View and see if I can see Pike's Peak.   But I drive 10 mph below the speed limit.  Route 40 is just a small two lane ribbon through the plain, no shoulder.  The speed limit is 65, so you can make good time if you want to, but there seem to be a lot of trucks with wide loads.  One truck in particular carrying two parallel bales of hay side by side sticking frighteningly out of the sides scares the crap out of me.

On this drive the Colorado/Kansas border just seems like an arbitrary line, the two regions, Eastern Colorado and Western Kansas are the same thing.  I doubt there is much more out here than when Lummis came through, if anything there may be less because the railroad passing through is less important.  Many of the towns seem to have no commercial enterprises open to the public-- no restaurant, no place to get a cup of coffee, although many do, I had a burger at Cheyenne Wells Colorado near First View.  Many of them are just a grain elevator, a clutch of houses, and maybe a couple other agricultural buildings.  A few have Post Offices: a small trailer-sized building with a satellite dish (the one I went into had no postal worker on duty, though you could still access PO boxes).  Generally there are trees in the towns (absent from the rest of the landscape).  The trees seem kind of like fortifications built up around the small collection of houses.

The larger towns like Kit Carson have a couple tiny motels, gas stations, some car service stations (often you can't tell if they're still in business or went under decades ago), and a small neighborhood.  When I parked my car in Kit Carson there were a couple dogs walking around in the street, eyeing me attentively.  But there was something very romantic about the town.  It really seems like a small oasis completely surrounded by the empty high plains.  It seems like a place from a different time.  Almost every sign is old, there aren't retail chains out here.  A lot of the houses are in major disrepair, but people seem to be living in them, but others are pretty, well kept houses, some all brick.  Really old broken down cars from the 50's or 60's just sitting in a backyard is not an uncommon sight.

Let me get back on track.  About 10 miles past Cheyenne Wells is "First View", supposedly the very first point at which you can spot Pike's Peak (on a clear day), one of the tallest mountains in the front range, 150 miles away.  Previously I was confused about whether this was a town itself, a lookout, or what.  Lummis reports a section house and a couple buildings here.  Today, First View is just a sign that says "First View".  There is an old dilapidated tower-like structure near by, and I was trying to surmise whether this had some agricultural purpose or was meant to facilitate said View.

I'm sorry to report that I, like Lummis, could not see any distant peaks at First View.  Maybe if I knew what I was looking for, or exactly where to look on the horizon I could have picked it out.  But I was also hindered by the fact that I couldn't stop the car, because there were very few turn-offs where I could be assured of enough room to pull a u-turn with the trailer.

I was filled with anticipation to begin closing in on Denver and the front range of the Rockies out of this vast high plain, but amazingly this openess and emptiness seems to last right up until you hit Denver. Denver seems like a massive, unexpected oasis.  I arrived at night so I couldn't get a good view of the landscape.  I'm in Boulder now in the company of my kind hosts, looking forward to exploring more of Denver, a city that impressed Lummis for its size and modernity in 1884.
Glad to be here,
SHU