CO1 - Pike's Peak Cog Railway

On Thursday, June 21, 2007, I flew to Colorado Springs to visit my friend Nancy A., who had been living out there for about four years. My flight out was delightfully uneventful, except that when we got to Colorado Springs, there was a small windy thunderstorm hovering right over the airport. So we circled for about a half hour, in the full sunlight, watching the lightning springing from the dark clouds, until the thunderstorm moseyed off east and we could land. I think I can now draw you a map of certain housing developments on the outskirts of Colorado Springs. Afternoon thunderstorms are a common feature of Colorado Springs weather. Colorado Springs sits right at the junction of the plains and the mountains. To the east, the ground is absolutely flat (well, okay, it actually slopes down to the east, but it looks flat), and to the west, the land rises abruptly to a ridge of mounts. So the mornings tend to be clear and the storms tend to blow up as the cool air comes down from the mountains in the afternoon. Something you really need to take into account when planning outdoor expeditions. One of the very cool features of Nancy's house is that she has full-length patio windows that look out onto Pike's Peak. Here's the view (click to get a bigger picture): Wow! Can you imagine waking up to this view every day! Amazing. For our first morning, Nancy planned a trip to the top of Pike's Peak on the cog railway. The plan was to take the 9:30am train, which would get us up and back by around 1pm. You can also drive up Pike's Peak on a toll highway, but Nancy's car was a bit underpowered for the climb, and she wasn't thrilled about dealing with the dirt road and the steep dropoffs. So we would relax and ride up on the train. Here's another view of the mountain as we drove west through Colorado Springs. The drive brought us by the edge of Garden of the Gods with its jutting red rocks. (And I'll have more about Garden of the Gods later). The cog railway starts just past a pleasant foothill town called Manitou Springs. There are actual springs here, many of which have been channeled through interesting sculptural fountains. When we returned here after the train ride, we had a lovely lunch, and browsed through a bookstore and some crafts shops. (Side note: If you're in the area, Adam's Mountain Cafe in Manitou Springs serves wonderful fresh food and I highly recommend it. My lunch was the Cashew Chicken Salad: Adam’s chicken salad on organic greens with sliced avocado, sliced hard boiled egg, tomatoes, spiral cut carrots, Colorado grown pea shoots, scallions, cucumbers, red cabbage, and tamari roasted cashews. Served with Great Harvest roll and choice of dressing on the side. $ 8.50. Yum.) The cog railway train station is the original station building, constructed over 100 years ago. The Pike's Peak Cog railway is the longest and highest cog railway in the world. It begins at 6571 feet and goes to 14,110 feet over the course of 1 1/2 hours. The maximum grade is 25% and the average grade is 16%. If you're planning to go, keep in mind that there are no rest rooms on the train (and they warn you about that several times before setting off and urge you to use the rest rooms in the station). Also, the best side to sit on is the far side from where you board (the left side of the train as it goes uphill). Seats are assigned by number, and (at least on the train we were on) the good side is the 3-seat side, so those seats tend to go to the families and other larger parties. We were seated on the less desirable 2-seat side, but the windows were quite large and you still get a good view from the "bad" side. Still, it's worth asking about when you reserve your tickets. The first part of the trip goes up through a narrow valley called Engleman Canyon, named for the Engleman spruce trees. The commentary on the trip was interesting and amusing, describing many of the sites we passed, to the detail of pointing out particularly interesting rocks. Rocks are a big interest in Colorado, and most of the towns feature interesting rock shops/jewelry stores. You can see why. After a while, you could look back and see the flat plains of Colorado Springs, and with the naked eye you could even make out the upthrust red rocks of Garden of the Gods (not visible in the camera photo). Alongside the tracks, we could catch glimpses of a rushing mountain stream and green mountain meadows. Everything was much greener than usual, because the area has been getting more rain that usual this year. At the 3-mile mark we passed a site where there used to be an old grand hotel, but which no longer exists. Near this location, there is a residence of the couple that watches over the reservoir pumping station for Colorado Springs' water supply. If they need to drive into town, their driveway winds for 60 miles to get down the mountain! A bit further along, we could start to catch glimpses of the peak ahead of us. The grade was pretty steep along this section, called "Son of a Gun Hill" because the old-time steam locomotives meant that the stokers would have to shovel coal like a son-of-a-gun. You can see the grade by comparing the angle of the train window to the angle of the tree trunks. At the top end of the canyon we had been following, the track curved to the left (south) and ran across the face of the mountain. During this section the opposite side had fantastic views of Colorado Springs and the prairies beyond. We passed Inspiration Point, named so because the view from Pike's Peak was the inspiration for Wellesley College Professor Katharine Lee Bates to write the words to America the Beautiful in 1893. (Click here for more - it's an interesting story.) The trees got smaller and smaller, and we passed some ancient bristlecone pine trees just as we crossed above the timberline. We started to see patches of snow, as it can snow on top of the mountain in any month. Here the tracks turned right toward the summit. At Windy Point the stone building used to serve as living quarters for the crew that maintained the top section of tracks. It was getting cold at this point, so everyone put on their jackets and parkas. The announcer said that bighorn sheep had been spotted on previous trips, but we didn't see anything bigger than a couple of fat marmots. We had to pause at a siding for a few minutes to wait for the previous train to pass us on its way down. When we went on, we saw a bit of the auto road. In the picture on the right, you can see two cars heading up the narrow dirt track, kicking up a cloud of dust in their wake. I could see why Nancy preferred to take the train. And then we were at the summit! The downside of taking the train is that they don't give you a whole lot of time up there - barely a half an hour. We went first into the summit building to get a doughnut and hot chocolate, the traditional summit fare. At 14,000+ feet, I really noticed the thin air, and found myself using my the deep breathing techniques I'd learned when taking singing lessons - breathing from the diaphragm to get a really big volume of air. (Nancy later told me she saw a girl who had gotten dizzy and was lying on the floor in the rest room, so it can affect people quite profoundly.) I was doing okay, though. Next, we waiting our turn to get our pictures taken at the traditional summit sign. Everybody was very nice and took turns taking each other's pictures. You'll notice I'm wearing a blue fleece jacket in the left hand picture, but added an orange parka for the right hand picture. That's because it was really cold up there. And the sunglasses and hat were really necessary because the sun was something fierce. It's probably possible to get sunburned and frostbitten at the same time up there. By the time we were done with the picture-taking, there was only a short time left to really go out and see the view. The mountaintop is very flat, and you do have to walk a bit around the parking lot if you want to get views to the west side. I found a guy who explained to me that the view to the west was across a high prairie called "South Park" and then to the mountains of the Continental Divide. He also told me that Pike's Peak was set in a national forest called, appropriately, Pike Forest, that was about the size of Rhode Island. This particular picture is to the southeast, though, with the southern part of Colorado Springs visible on the right. The view to the west was great in person, but was a bit hazy to photograph. But all too soon the train was tooting its horn and I had to hurry back to get on board. The ride back down continued with some of the amusing commentary. For example, "You might be worried about what would happen if the train's brakes should fail. Well, I want to assure you that we have a backup plan - we have two big springs at the bottom of the mountain to help us come to a stop. There's Manitou Springs and Colorado Springs." (Yeah, I know. But she delivered these lines in such a deadpan style that they were really funny at the time.) And to prove Nancy's keen insight in getting us on the morning train, as we got back to the parking lot, the storm clouds were already rolling in over the mountains. I really enjoyed the trip up the mountain. I would say that if you only have time for one expedition on your trip to Colorado, Pike's Peak is quick and easy and really rewarding. Just be sure to bring cold-weather gear and sunblock, pace yourself, and take good deep breaths. Next segment: Two Gardens