Since I moved down here I have been wanting to go hiking. I love hiking and I've wanted to get to know the mountains in this area. Each morning I see them, so majestic, so close, beckoning to me. I'm not sure why it's taken me so long to plan a hiking trip, but it has.
I tried going with a friend a couple months ago. I forgot the map and neither of us knew where we were going so we gave up and just took a walk in Garden of the Gods and got Starbucks.
Today a friend and I planned to go hiking. I found a place that looked good, studied at the map and wrote down the directions (also, my car is armed with an Atlas)- this time I did it right! We were both very excited. Unfortunately we had some time constraints; she had something to do at work (which took longer than expected) and needed to be back at around 4. This was OK, the place I had chosen didn't appear to be very far away. After lunch we headed off, armed with my book of hiking locations, directions and an atlas. After driving for about 40 minutes (which felt more like 20) we reached a town and as my turnoff was in the first town we ought to reach-Manitou Springs we both began looking for the road we needed- Manitou Avenue. Instead, to my chagrin, I noticed that all the shopping centers and such were named Woodland something-or-other. Woodland Park is another town deeper in the mountains and far past Manitou Springs. We pulled off onto a residential road and took a moment to look at the maps and figure out where we need to go. Indeed we were far past Manitou Springs, which turned out to be much, much closer to Colorado Springs than I had originally deduced. It would seem that while reading the map I had confused the streets a little- we needed to exit at Fountain Creek which then turned into Manitou Avenue, and Manitou Springs did not straddle the highway as I had expected so I never saw it as we passed it. Knowing our error and how to correct it, we set off. At least we now knew where Woodland Park lies and how far away it is, plus we had gotten the privilege of seeing Pikes Peak from a different angle.
We drove 15 minutes and exited at Fountain Creek. Upon entering Manitou Springs we were held up by construction (keep in mind we had a time constraint). We passed through the construction and on to a cute little town. Only at this point did I remember that our next turn, Ruxton, was BEFORE entering the town. Since I was sick of driving around and the town was so cute we decided to put a raincheck on the hiking and just walk around the town. We saw a cool music shop and spent a considerable amount of time in there talking with the owner (who makes his own instruments) and playing with the instruments. I wish I could remember what the instrument we played with was - dulc-something (it was a stringed instrument, it's from ancient Persia and it was the precursor to the piano). Totally awesome.
So we never got to hike but we did have a lovely adventure, and we learned a lot! We learned where Woodland Park is and how long it takes to get there, we learned where Manitou Springs is and how extraordinarily close it is, we learned about awesome stringed instruments and we learned where that trail is so we can find it next time!
