Day 4: Some may never live, but the crazy never die

When I opened the door of my motel room, I was greeted by dense fog and a steady cold wind. The sky was grey for as far as I could see, so I stayed in the room for a while, repack­ing my bags, updat­ing this site and drink­ing cof­fee. Once the fog dis­si­pated a bit, I made my way back to the inter­state en route to Colorado Springs.

Overcast skies had me in a bit of a funk, but a few miles down the road, I crossed under an over­pass, and some­how, all the clouds dis­ap­peared. I mean, all of them. Freaked me out a little.

At Limon, I left I-70 for U.S. 24, the high­way to Colorado Springs. My plan for the day included get­ting to the sum­mit of Pikes Peak and din­ner at the Woody Creek Tavern, and there was no rea­son to go to Denver unless you like being in a police state—preparations for the Democratic National Convention were already under­way, and I couldn’t afford the delays.

The drive to Colorado Springs is full of rolling hills and small com­mu­ni­ties, with the shad­owy blue sil­hou­ette of Pikes Peak at the hori­zon. Its size seemed to grow expo­nen­tially the closer I got.

Pikes Peak in silhouette

As I got closer, I decided to visit the Garden Of The Gods, a mag­nif­i­cent set of rock for­ma­tions just out­side Colorado Springs. It was, as expected, packed to the gills with tourists, so I didn’t spend as much time as I’d have liked, because I am not a hiker, and the photo oppor­tu­ni­ties were marred by peo­ple. Still, I man­aged these two:

Garden Of The Gods

Garden Of The Gods

After leav­ing the park, I thought it was as good a time as any to make the sum­mit of Pikes Peak. $10 poorer, I began dri­ving up the wind­ing Pikes Peak Highway, and started get­ting alti­tude sick­ness almost imme­di­ately. Still, I was deter­mined to make it to the sum­mit. After all, Alton Brown made it on a motor­cy­cle and brewed cof­fee from melted snow dur­ing the first series of Feasting On Asphalt. How hard could it be?

Hard. So hard that I only made it as far as Crystal Reservoir, stil sev­eral miles down the road and a mile lower in ele­va­tion than the sum­mit. I was dizzy and dis­ori­ented and had to turn back, but not before tak­ing a photo of the gor­geous scene in front of me:

Crystal Reservoir

On the way down, I also stopped at Ute Pass to give my brakes a rest, and saw this:

View from Ute Pass on Pikes Peak

I punched up the loca­tion of Woody Creek Tavern on my GPS and took the shorter of the two routes it offered.

Boy, was that a mistake.

The short­est route from Pikes Peak to Woody Creek fol­lows Colorado 82, which looked rel­a­tively benign on the screen. What it didn’t show was that a size­able por­tion of the route involved dri­ving all the way up and down a moun­tain.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is9AhSKVHUU]

On the other side, I finally made it to through Aspen to Woody Creek Tavern. WCT is the place Dr. Hunter S. Thompson held court for many, many years, and the decor shows it. Original “Thompson for Sheriff 1970″ posters, orig­i­nal Ralph Steadman sketches, pho­tos, bumper stick­ers, paint­ings and mem­o­ra­bilia related the Thompson and Woody Creek cover every avail­able inch of wall. I tipped my glass of Flying Dog Amber Ale to Thompson’s mem­ory, and to my friend Lane who wasn’t along for the ride this time (but who, unlike Thompson, is still very much alive).

Woody Creek Tavern

After a din­ner of home­made corn chow­der and tilapia tacos, I got back in the car and tested my mem­ory of the pre­vi­ous trip out here in 1995: could I find Owl Farm, Thompson’s res­i­dence in Woody Creek, again? I had no address, noth­ing but foggy mem­o­ries of a late-night drop-by and intu­ition guid­ing me, the same thing that got us there the first time.

Twists, turns, turn­arounds, split roads … and lo, there it was, just as I’d remem­bered it, even if the big red Cadillac con­vert­ible and the pea­cock cages were gone, the house was still there, just as I remem­bered it.

Entrance to Owl Farm

From the road, I could see a car in the dri­ve­way and some­one doing some­thing, but I knew bet­ter than to stop. I closed my eyes for a moment and recalled the pre­vi­ous trip, our encounter with Dr. Thompson, and decided I’d rather it live that way than add a new loca­tion mem­ory and destroy it.

Mission com­plete, I turned up Highway 24 and landed at the Ramada Inn in Glenwood Springs for the night.