Day 2:

In my previous post, I mentioned that I would be staying up late to see if waiting for exhaustion to set in would make for better sleep. Well, it worked. Too well. I didn’t wake up until 11 AM on Day 2. If that’s not impressive enough by itself, ponder the fact that 11 AM in Colorado is 1 PM “my” time. In any event (except discus throwing), I quickly found out northern Colorado was in for record heat (91 degrees…in Denver…in late September!). The late start combined with the heat led me to decide there would be no hiking on this day. Instead, I would drive to the city of Loveland, where I would photograph the signs on a local store. Now, I’ve been meaning to get pics of this place for over THIRTY years – I just never made it happen. So, I consider myself incredibly lucky that this place is still in business. In fact, it’s been open for over FIFTY years!

At this point, you may be saying to yourself, “OK, Cedric, what’s all the hype? What’s so great about this store?” And if you are talking to yourself…and calling yourself Cedric…then you may need to see a shrink. Believe me…I call myself Cedric…and I need to see a shrink…but I can’t see him because he’s so tiny. GET IT?!

Alright, enough hype. I give you…

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With the Wig & Bible Store finally off my To Do list, I continued up the road to Fort Collins, where the record-breaking heat inspired me to drop into Walrus Ice Cream (maybe I should have gotten pics of their signs as well?). Walrus is a locally owned favorite that’s been around for well over 30 years. If you order a bowl/cup, they pack absolutely as much as they can fit in there. I’m one of those people who says there’s “always room for ice cream”. Apparently not always. I ordered a bowl of double dark chocolate ice cream. It was so densely packed that I couldn’t finish it. And it was yummy.

I didn’t do much else on Day 2; just drove around Fort Collins to see what’s changed since my college days, then went back to the hotel and drank the rest of my ice cream.

Day 3:

This was not much of a day. I hadn’t planned anything for Day 3. Around 11 AM or so, I decided to go to the Cussler Museum, stopping for lunch on the way there. As luck would have it, I didn’t spot any restaurants that I felt like going to. So, when I got to the museum, I just kept going. Only a block away, I spotted the Colorado Tap House, so I went in and had myself a very nice pear cider. After that, I was sleepy, so I took a nap in the rental car. When I woke up, it was late enough in the day that I figured I didn’t have enough time left for the museum. Instead, I headed to Blackhawk, known as Colorado’s casino city. I gambled. I lost both my yachts, my wife, and 28 of my yaks.

Day 4:

At this point, I’d like to talk a bit about my trip planning. I planned this trip around the weekend of September 28 and 29, as there were two events in Denver that I wanted to get in on: the Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown and Doors Open Denver. As I was making my final preparations for this trip, I went back to the Pinball Showdown’s web page, where I learned that it had already happened. I don’t know where the Hell I got the idea that it was scheduled for this weekend, but the fact is, it happened a couple weeks prior. So, no go on the pin show.

Doors Open Denver (DOD) is an event where several buildings that aren’t usually open to the general public are opened to the general public, so’s you can come in and enjoy the architecture of these buildings. At least, that’s what it was when I lived here over a decade ago. As I was making my final preparations for this trip, I went back to the DOD web page. The event now seems to be more oriented to speeches by, and gatherings of, current architects. The list of participating buildings is maybe a quarter of the size it used to be…maybe. And almost all of the buildings that were on the list were buildings I had already toured during the DODs of years passed. So, I only found two places to go – the Denver Firefighters Museum and a B&B known as Capitol Hill Mansion.

I met up with an old friend and went to the Denver Firefighters Museum, located inside an actual fire station that was built in 1909. I was expecting to see loads of firefighting vehicles, and while they do have a great representative sampling of different vehicles from different eras, they also had a lot of interesting stuff that I hadn’t expected. (Author’s note: When I was typing “firefighting vehicles” above, my Auto-Complete suggested “firefighting vegetables”.) My favorite was the display regarding the Denver Fire Department’s “busiest hour ever”. I forget the specific numbers, but it happened one day around the turn of the 20th Century. Three churches and dozens of houses each caught fire independently, all within a 64-minute period. It turns out the Denver Gas & Electric Company had somehow applied 9,300 volts to a line that was only designed for 110 volts. Ummmmmmm…oops!

Next, we went to Capitol Hill Mansion. This is a really nice red sandstone house, with great proximity to downtown Denver. I may actually consider staying there on my next trip to Colorado. After the mansion / B&B, we went to Colorado Journey Mini Golf and played all 36 holes there. It was a fun course, though nearly all the holes are pretty short. It’s called Colorado Journey because various parts of the course are themed after famous places around the state, like Garden of the Gods, St. Elmo, and this place:

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Day 5:

This day turned out to be a near disaster. I met up with two old friends in the morning, and we all piled into one car. The idea was to wander to various historic sites in the greater Denver area. After a 45-minute drive, as we were getting out of the car in downtown Denver, when I realized I did not have my backpack. I had left my meds for the day either in my rental car back at my friend’s house, or at my hotel, and I was almost due for the next dose. Luckily, I was actually feeling alright, so we were able to check out a couple of historic sites downtown, before we made the 45-minute return drive. Specifically, we saw a building that was built in 1863 (which may not sound all that old to you east coasters, but consider that Denver didn’t come into existence until 1859) and a historical marker at the spot where Captain Silas Soule was murdered. (This murder was part of the aftermath of the Sand Creek Massacre – an important and disturbing piece of American history.)

My failure to bring the backpack that my meds were in leads me to the following:

PD Travel Tip: Put at least one dose of your meds in a tiny plastic bag and put it in something that you NEVER forget to bring when you leave home (or leave a hotel). For me, this is my wallet. If a wallet doesn’t work for you, maybe attach the meds to a keychain, or place them in a purse, or your crack pipe.

Upon returning to my friend’s house, I was happy to find the backpack with my meds was inside my rental car. After I ate my drugs, we got some lunch at a local Indian restaurant, then continued our historic adventures. We tried to get to a uranium mine, but the road was closed. We successfully located a pioneer cemetery that is hidden at the center of a bunch of housing developments. And we visited a small park at the spot where placer gold was first found in Colorado. Contrary to popular belief, the initial gold discovery was NOT at the junction of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River. In fact, no gold was ever discovered at that locale (which makes sense, because there are no gold veins upstream from that point along either body of water). Nay, the first gold discovered in what was to become Colorado was at the junction of Clear Creek and Ralston Creek (the dude who discovered this gold was Lewis Ralston). This was the first discovery of gold but was only a few gold flakes in the water. The first gold vein discovered in Colorado was in what became the city of Blackhawk.

After this, we went our separate ways. I went back to the hotel for a nap. When I awoke, I felt like visiting another pinball joint, so I headed back up to Loveland for a place called The Flipside. Interestingly, this place turned out to be just a block from the wig and Bible store. I could have killed two birds with one stone. Instead, I killed two birds with two stones. Stones are cheap, who cares? Anyway, I thought The Flipside was even better than Pinball Jones. All the machines I played were VERY well maintained, and they all featured all the available upgrades (some pinball machines have had new ROMs released over the years that include new audio clips or updated modes or rules, while some have additional ‘toys’ on the playfield such as action figures or “gold” fixtures replacing the usual stainless steel). They also had even more of my old favorites (notably Revenge From Mars).

That was Day 5. Only one more day to go…