A gorgeous (and warm) weekend!

What a great weekend!! We actually had temps in the 70s yesterday and today!! After the snow we got last week, this feels like heaven!!! Feeling like a kid who had just been let out for summer vacation, I didn't want to waste a minute of this warmth and sunshine. Here in Colorado Springs, you never know if this 70 degree weekend will be followed by snow and hail! So, my outdoor adventures this weekend revolved around doing the incline and riding my Harley around.


You might be asking yourself What's an incline? It's basically a natural stair-master! Railroad ties are layed horizontally along the 1-mile length of roadbed that used to service a cable car that took people up the eastern face of the Rocky Mountains. The average grade of the incline is just over 40% with the steepest section being 68%! There is 2011 feet of elevation gain with it ending at around 8600 feet. The first pic is taken from the bottom of the incline and the second one is taken from the top looking back down along the length of it.


I've done the incline many times over the four years I've lived in Colorado Springs, but the first one of the season is always intimidating! I jog three miles several mornings a week, but that doesn't really prepare you for an hour's worth of stair climing!

The land that the incline runs across is owned by three seperate entities and is private property. The prospect of opening the incline to the public has been hotly debated for many years. There are "No Trespassing" signs posted, but it is a widely known fact that most of Colorado Springs incorporates the incline into their fitness routines. As you can see in the group picture of me with Lisa, Kelly and Robyn, I wasn't the only law-breaker this weekend! Actually if you look at the picture from the top looking back down, you'll see a bunch of other people out trespassing too!


With my workout taken care of, I spent the remainder of yesterday afternoon riding my Harley around with Suzanne & David. I got new handle bars on my bike and it is soooooo much more comfortable. It looks a bit like a chopper now with the "mini ape-hangers", but it fits me much better (I can sit upright now). And no, I don't have full arm sleeve tatoos, it's just the shirt I'm wearing!


Today, Suzanne & David and I rode up to Cripple Creek. It was a chilly ride up- the town of Cripple Creek is at an elevation of 9494 feet! The winding, scenic roads out and back made it worth the chill today though! The town was an old gold mining camp back in the late 1800s, but today it's a gambling tourist attraction. I really don't understand how a bunch of people can sit around a smoky, dimly lit room pumping money into electronic gadgets while drinking booze at 10:00 a.m. and think it's fun, but I'm sure a lot of people don't think that some of the things I do for fun make sense either! So, not one to judge, I opened my mind and my wallet and fed a whole two dollars into a slot machine and tried gambling. Yep, I still thought it was stupid after my effort, but to each his own!!! We stayed in town long enough to have a bite to eat and for David to take this picture of Suzanne & I in the town.

This great weekend ended with a BBQ at David & Suzanne's place that included a vacation-planning meeting. Me and a bunch of the folks I ride with are riding up to Custer, South Dekota at the end of June for a holiday. We've rented a couple of cabins and will go sightseeing at Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Devil's Tower, Sturgis and the Black Hills. I'm really excited about the trip and can't wait to make the ride on my Harley!

That's it for now. I'll be heading out to southern California in a couple of weeks for work, so maybe I'll find some mischief to get into while I'm there. Stay tuned!