U.S. Air Force Academy Self-Guided Tour

July 3-4th, 2010.

It was a hot one July 3rd. with highs right at 90 with at least 60% humidity in Denver. I say Denver, because we drove to my sister and brother-in-laws house on the outskirts of Denver. My sister had a block party and barbeque for all the young kids and their parents in the neigborhood.

It was too much fun for me to handle so I spent most of the day watching the baseball game inside their house!

July 4th, 2010.

Happy 4th of July! 

We started off the morning with our usual walk with Maggie and Rico. We ventured into the pine woods around the campground and came across two large owls in trees.

Later in the morning, Joyce and I did the self-guided driving tour of the United States Air Force Academy in the morning. It was a beautiful if not hazy day.

The B-52 Display

View of the Cadet Chapel and the athletic fields from one of the scenic overlooks

The Cadet Chapel is the most popular man-made attraction in Colorado, with more than a half million visitors every year. Groundbreaking began on the iconic landmark Aug. 28, 1959, and was completed in 1963 at a cost of $3.5 million.

The Cadet Chapel's principal designer and architect was Walter A. Netsch Jr. A Chicago native, Mr. Netsch studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, receiving his degree in 1943 and joining the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. He was 34 when he completed the design for the chapel.

The chapel's aluminum, glass and steel structure soars more than 150 feet into the Colorado sky. Its 17 spires can be easily spotted from Interstate 25, several miles east.

The structure is a tubular steel frame of 100 identical tetrahedrons, each 75 feet (23 m) long, weighing five tons, and enclosed with clear aluminum panels. The panels were fabricated in Missouri and shipped by rail to the site. The tetrahedrons are spaced a foot apart, creating gaps in the framework that are filled with one-inch thick colored glass. The tetrahedrons comprising the spires are filled by triangular clear aluminum panels, while the tetrahedrons between the spires are filled with a mosaic of colored glass in aluminum frame.

The Cadet Chapel itself is 150 feet (46 m) high, 280 feet (85 m) long, and 84 feet (26 m) wide. The front façade, on the south, has a wide granite stairway with steel railings capped by aluminum handrails leading up one story to a landing. At the landing is a band of gold anodized aluminum doors, and gold anodized aluminum sheets apparently covering original windows.

The Cadet Chapel was designed specifically to house three distinct worship areas under a single roof. Inspired by chapels at Sainte-Chapelle in France and the Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi in Italy, architect Walter Netsch stacked the spaces on two main levels.^[4] The Protestant nave is located on the upper level, while the Catholic and Jewish chapels and one all-faiths room are located beneath it. Beneath this level is a larger all-faiths room and two meeting rooms. Each chapel has its own entrance, and services may be held simultaneously without interfering with one another.

1st Year Cadets Marching in formation to lunch.

A picture of the Air Force Stadium which is very close to the Fam Camp.

We attended a hot dog and pot luck lunch at the campground around 1:00 and then took naps. I filled the truck with diesel off base in preparation for our move on Tuesday.

The Air Force Academy was hosting a public fireworks display on base with festivities to include Air Force Bands beginning at 6:30 pm. However, the rain clouds rolled in and there were reports of severe weather with lightning, hail and tornadoes so we stayed in the campground hoping the weather would clear by 9:30 so we could at least go watch the fireworks. The weather didn’t cooperate so, Joyce and I walked out into the campground in the light rain to watch what we could see of the fireworks that went off a bit early to avoid the next severe storm.

It stormed till about midnight which cooled things off and made for good sleeping weather.

Pikes Peak Cog Train

July 2, 2010.

Another beautiful day in the Colorado Rockies. Temps overnight were not as cool. It was expected to be 90 today. But no worries, we were all taking the Cog Train to the summit of Pikes Peak today. It should be about 40 degrees cooler on the top of the mountain. The most visited mountain in North America and the second most visited mountain in the world behind Japan's Mount Fuji, Pikes Peak forms a stunning backdrop for Colorado Springs and the Garden of the Gods. At an altitude of 14,110 feet above sea level, Pikes Peak is the 31st highest peak out of 54 Colorado peaks. It is the farthest east of the big peaks in the Rocky Mountain chain, which contributed to its early fame among explorers, pioneers and immigrants and made it the symbol of the 1859 Gold Rush to Colorado with the slogan, "Pikes Peak or Bust"

We started the day with breakfast at the Air Force Academy Golf Course. We then drove to the Cog Train Station in Manitou Springs, Co. on the outskirts of Colorado Springs.  We had reservations for all  of us to take the 12:00 train but my sister’s family was running late. So we waited till they arrived and booked passage on the 1:20 train.

It’s about an hour and a half trip up the mountain in the Cog Train. We started out in a lush pine forest and as we got to about 10K feet the trees thinned out to nothing but alpine tundra.

Before long, we were on top of Pikes Peak. On top there is a concession stand and restaurant as well as observation decks.

There’s also a large dirt parking lot to accommodate the visitors that chose to drive up.

The scenery was beautiful even though it was cloudy and raining in spots, so the views weren’t as clear as they could have been.

The temperature was about 40 degrees cooler, probably upper 40’s or low 50’s. It was nice and cool!

We had about 40 minutes on top of Pikes Peak before we had to again board the train for the long trip back. But not before we took the obligatory photo ops.

My sister's family

On the way back down the mountain, we spotted some Big Horn Sheep. I enlarged the photo to see the sheep.

It’s not a cheap excursion at $33 per adult. It was an okay trip. I’m not fond of being packed into seats like a herd of cattle.

I would have preferred to drive up and save the $66 if I had the option. I caught this shot of the road as we passed it on the train. We could see trucks and cars on the road as we crawled up on the train.The 19-mile Pikes Peak Highway, paved part of the way, is open year round, weather permitting

On the way home we stopped for pizza at a local restaurant. We slept good that night!

July 1, 2010.

I had an appointment at Colorado Springs Dodge for some service on my truck. My truck now has 10,500 miles on it. When we began our full time adventure in October of last year, I had just had my first oil change at 2500 miles. So we’ve put on 8000 miles in 9 mos. 3 of those months we were workamping! The really astonishing part is that we don’t drive the truck much except for pulling our Carriage Cameo fifth wheel.

So today I scheduled my third oil change and the truck’s first fuel filter change. The owner’s manual says to change the oil at no more than 7500 miles or when the “change oil” message appears. It had been about 5K miles since the last oil change. The manual also says to change the fuel filter after 15000 miles, but I decided to do it earlier.

I had an appointment for 10:00 at Colorado Springs Dodge. I was there a half hour early and yet the service writer didn’t get to me till after 10! Not impressed with their lack of prompt service.

So after the oil and filter change and the fuel filter change, I was out the door of the dealership with a $199 bill. Geez and I had supplied the oil! The labor for the fuel filter change was $128! I’ll probably not go to a dealership next time! The truck smelled like diesel when I got in it. I checked to make sure it wasn’t leaking from the filter. They must have spilt some diesel on the undercarriage. Hey what do you want for $128 an hour labor! 

Thankfully, the emissions issue that turned on the Malfunction Indicator Light (MIL) must have corrected itself after the other dealership in Salide reset it under warranty about 150 miles ago.

That afternoon, I washed the Carriage Cameo before it rained and then wiped the truck down after the rain. 

Joyce had done laundry while I was at the dealership and then went with Karen to the base commissary for groceries.

Joyce and I have decided to not go on with my father and Karen towards Denver. We will be spending some time with my sister and her family driving to their home from here, at The Academy and thus we don’t want to spend a week in an expensive state park near my sister’s house. Colorado State Parks would charge us the $20 or $25 a day camping fee plus the $7 daily entrance fee, plus another $10 for our second vehicle each day. But more importantly, we are ready to have our lives back and “do what we wanna do...go where we wanna go...”

That evening, Joyce and I went looking for other RV Parks in Colorado Springs for when our stay is up here on the 6th, but the pickings were slim. We’ve decided that on July 6th we will likely go back to Buena Vista for a few days to visit a former co-worker and neighbor and then press on towards Gunnison or Montrose Colorado.

Travel Day to The Unites States Air Force Academy

June 30, 2010.

Today was a travel day to The United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. It was a beautiful morning, cool and perfect for traveling. We were packed up and ready to leave Pleasant Valley RV Park by 10:00.

Well some have said, “It’s not if, but when...” While backing up to the fifth wheel king pin, I hit the king pin with my tailgate that was down (at least it was down and not up). My heart sank after realizing what I had done! I put a pretty good dent in the top of the tailgate. I deviated from my routine which probably contributed to the accident. Usually I lift the front of the fifth wheel before backing up to it. I had meant to just get close but got distracted by a tree next to me as I was backing. Our site slopes from the front to the rear, thus in a level position the front and kingpin where unusually low. Damage done, I still had to take care of business and get hitched.

It was going to be a bit of a struggle to get out of our campsite. We were all pretty close together, but my site was compounded by that large tree by my driver’s side door and the concrete slab on the passenger side that rises about 3 inches above the ground and is pointed. You can't see the tree but it's on the passenger side of the jeep.

My concerns were: 

1. I wasn’t going to be able to make a left turn out of my site because of the tree.
2. A right turn would be difficult because of the concrete slab and potential for cutting my trailer tires making the turn and the swing of the trailer might hit the tree.

I decided to go with the right turn and was assisted by Steve the campground owner. I couldn’t make the turn with out the end of the trailer hitting the tree. I ended up pulling out and then jack knifing the rig to get it backed onto the slab and then made a right turn. It sounds easy but it wasn’t. It took a few minutes and I was surely providing entertainment for everyone around!

We finally got on the road with Joyce following me in the Jeep. In turn she was followed by my father and Karen pulling their fifth wheel. 

View Larger Map
It was a beautiful drive on Hwy. 50 along the Arkansas River in the Big Horn Sheep Canyon.  The road was curvy with some bling curves along the canyon walls. Before long we drove past the Royal Gorge but weren’t able to view it. We then took Colorado 115 with its steep rolling hills towards I-25 and Colorado Springs.

We arrived at the South Gate of the Air Force Academy around 1:00 and Joyce and I got passes to the base for our week long stay. Next stop was the Fam Camp. We were assigned sites 100 and 101. $25 a night for 6 nights. We quickly got set up in the shade of the pine trees.

We have a nice corner lot.

It’s a nice park in a forest of pines with gravel roads and sites. 

Some of the sites are far from level but our pull through site is not bad. The sites have full hook-ups and 30/ 50 amps.

We are the closest site to a very active railroad, complete with horn. Actually the train adds a certain charm!

That afternoon, after getting set up, I took a hammer and some tools to the dent on my tail gate and pounded it out to where it’s not so noticeable.  

BUT I KNOW IT’S THERE! and I'l see it whenever I open the tail gate!