On the Porch
Onisha Ellis
September 13, 2017 Day 7
Our seventh day on the road. We are moving at a turtle pace, but we are savoring the journey. Tomorrow we pick up our daughter and family friend at the Denver airport and they will spend the week with us. We checked in with Rebekah before hitting the road. She is still without electricity but good news, a friend from church who does odd jobs will be over to repair her roof. I know she will be relieved to have it fixed before joining us in Denver.
I am particularly excited about this leg of our trip as we have tickets to ride the Royal Gorge Train near Cañon City, Colorado, I first learned of this train while reading Go West by DiVoran Lites but never dreamed I would have the opportunity to ride it. To add to the fun, my husband would enjoy the up close view of scenery straight out of a cowboy movie!
Our seating was in a club car and we began the journey sharing a table with a lovely newly wed couple. Once the train pulled out of the station, we moved to an empty table so we could stretch out.
Food and drinks were available but we brought a picnic lunch and ate before boarding the train.
As we pulled out of the station, we passed the Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility. The prisoners here ran the first water flues through the gorge to bring fresh water to the town. I wondered if this was the prison where DiVoran’s father once worked.
As we entered the gorge, we decided to check out the view from the open bed car. We were fortunate that one adjoined our club car.
My hair was a mess
The front of the train heading into the narrow opening.
The opening through the mountains is so narrow, the first tracks laid were a “slim gauge,” 36″ between rails;
A bridge was constructed 1,000 feet above the gorge but as cars became larger, it was downgraded to walk across only. As our train passed under the bridge we saw a brave soul riding a zip line across the gorge, over 1,000 high. For the less brave, there is a gondola. We decided we were content to leave the adrenaline pumping to the more adventurous. We didn’t get a picture but we also saw several groups of people in rafts taking on the whitewater of the Arkansas river.
Zip line was almost too fast to capture the shot
The bridge is 1,000 high and they are higher!
The railroad provided a guide on the open car to point out interesting sights as well as share tidbits of history. When we came alongside these miniature power poles, he explained them to us. They were not power poles at all. The short lines extending down from the cross tie were in fact, used as a rock slide alert. If a rock touched the line and broke the connection, the train station was instantly notified there were rocks on the track and pinpointed the location. Clever, yes?
My husband was fascinated by this tree as we waited to board the train. At the end of the trip, he asked what type it was. Being from Florida, he had never seen a cottonwood tree and was pleased to finally be able to touch the bark. He enjoys carving and had read that cottonwood was excellent for carving. I wonder where we would find the bark for sale in Florida.
After all the fresh air and sunshine, we were both craving some ice cream before heading to Interstate 25 to complete our trip to Denver. We went to McDonald’s for a hot fudge sundae, but their ice cream machine was broken. Has anyone else noticed that McDonald’s has a high rate of ice cream machine failure? Not to be deterred from our ice cream craving, we pulled into a Sonic Drive In . Their ice cream machine worked fine and our cones were decadently delicious.
Our hotel for the night provided a free welcome buffet so we ate our supper there, then made it an early night. We were both looking forward to picking up Rebekah and Pam the next day and beginning a new adventure.
Old Things R New 