N's Blog

  Soren, Dad, and I had been wanting to hike the Incline, a straight mile of stairs that's built on old railway tracks, so we were glad a nice day came along during spring break we could take advantage of. The trailhead is right near the start of the legendary Cog Railway, which heads up to the top of Pikes Peak. Pictured above is the view from the parking lot.  We got off to a good start, heading up right in front of some middle-aged folks, including one woman who was wearing dress shoes with a slight heel (what about "The Incline" doesn't make sense?). We didn't see them for the rest of the hike. The fun didn't last long. It got rough. At least everyone was suffering together. I did end up getting some pretty good pictures of the terrifically boring plains of eastern CO, as well as Garden of the Gods (second from the bottom) and some of the mountains that were burnt in the Waldo Canyon Fire of 2012.  Pictures don't capture how truly steep this hike was.

Hey everybody! As we've kind of made custom in the past few years, Dad, Nick, Baba, and I went on a hike after this past Christmas, on December 27th. We had to forfeit heading up to Eleven Mile Reservoir west of Pikes Peak as we'd originally planned because of freezing wind and ended up taking a no less freezing trail at the Spruce Mountain Open Space north of Palmer Lake. It was a beautiful clear day and we saw some great views of the mountains in every direction.  Some views of the butte country that separates Colorado Springs from Denver out east of the trail. Some views of the mountains up north of Monument. Pikes Peak shrouded by clouds. The mountains out west of the mesa we were hiking on.  I didn't take the best pictures because we were all trying to move quickly and get out of the wind, but it was a nice trail nonetheless and we had a good time.  As for the present, Soren and I had auditions for high school band last Monday and I believe they went well for both of u

Hey guys, I've decided to update this blog kind of out of order, but I should get around to uploading the many pictures I took this summer sometime in the next few months (hopefully). I really lost interest in blogging for most of the year, as I'm sure you've figured out, but the trip we took to Durango and Mesa Verde this August really fascinated me so I figured I'd start here.  On our way to Durango we drove down past the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, kind of in the direction of the Spanish Peaks. On a clear day here you can see all the way down from Colorado Springs to these mountains, in the area of Walsenburg, where we turned and started heading southwest, putting us in the general area of the Great Sand Dunes. It's a pretty drive to Durango, but there's not much in the way of civilization in southern Colorado in general so not a whole lot to see. Durango boasts the last remaining passenger coal-powered train (or something along those lines), but it was sold