I knew that most roads at higher elevations would already be closed because of snow and ice. But I figured on driving to the Upper Beaver Meadows Trailhead at 8400 feet and hiking up to Cub Lake at 8600. Too late; they had also closed that road for the season.

Anyway, the ranger at the entrance gate had told me that people had seen moose near Sprague Lake on the Bear Lake Road. The sightings were a week ago, “but they are still in the area,” he said.

That was enough for me to change my plans. Moose are rare in the eastern part of the park. I had seen moose only in the northern section near the Cache la Poudre River, west of Fort Collins.

While I didn’t have great hopes of seeing moose today, I like hiking around Sprague Lake and decided to give it a shot. It’s even higher than Cub Lake and part of the trail was icy. And no moose were hanging around in plain view for me to see.

No matter. This view of the mostly frozen lake with the Continental Divide as a background was my first reward.

Sprague Lake at 8,700 Feet with Hallett's Peak at 12,700 Feet (Right of Center)

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I hiked back to my SUV along the brook that feeds the lake and marveled at how clear the stream was. Just then I spotted a school of brook trout and got my second reward.

Brook Trout in a Brook

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How’s that for clarity!

But improbable isn’t impossible. While all my life I hadn’t seen any black swans, I saw two of them yesterday. Even white swans aren’t all that common. But I saw three of them.

All five of these beautiful birds were swimming gracefully in Cheyenne Lake near Colorado Springs. The Broadmoor Hotel surrounds the lake. I went there yesterday afternoon between my first and second visits to the Garden of the Gods.

At the time I didn’t know about the improbable black swans there nor even that the Broadmoor had a lake. I just knew that the Broadmoor was one of the great hotels of the world. I remember visiting it once with my parents and my sister, but that was more than half a century ago.

The lake is just one of the hotel’s many amenities. It has 744 rooms in 30 buildings on 3000 acres of Cheyenne Mountain. The Broadmoor has 18 restaurants and cafes, seven tennis courts, three golf courses, three swimming or lap pools, three outdoor hot tubs, a fitness center, horseback riding, a movie theater, and a world-class spa.

It also has 24 speciality retail shops. Long ago in one of those shops my mother shocked me by buying a small figurine of a nude woman. No longer shocked by the beauty of the female form, I now keep it on my desk.

I thought about spending the night at the Broadmoor. But then I check the rates in my AAA TourBook. Rooms rent for $290 up — all the way up to $2500. For one person, one night.

Instead, I chose a motel. I could afford its rate, $29.99.

The Broadmoor's Main Buildings from Cheyenne Lake

Gracefully Pedaling Fast, this Swan Makes Reflections in the Lake

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Stretching Her Wings

An Improbable Black Swan and a Probable Mallard Duck

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Colorado Springs has the United States Air Force Academy and Focus on the Family.

On the other hand, Boulder is home to the main campus of the University of Colorado, the Buddhist-inspired Naropa University, more outdoors people and athletes per square mile than any other city, and Jared Polis, the first openly gay man elected to the House of Representatives (Barney Frank of Massachusetts came out after he was elected).

Boulder has a well-deserved reputation as a pocket of liberal political views within a largely conservative state. Some people call it “The People’s Republic of Boulder.”

Colorado Springs, 70 miles south of Denver, is Colorado’s second city with 360,000 residents. Boulder, 25 miles northwest of Denver, with about 95,000 people isn’t even in the state’s top 10.

In one way, however, the two cities are alike. Both have spectacular red sandstone formations. These so-call Fountain Formations stand along the Front Range with Boulder’s Flatirons and its Red Rocks at the northern pole and Colorado Springs’ Garden of the Gods at the southern.

Near Denver are two more beautiful examples of these formations. One is the Red Rocks Amphitheatre, where I was delighted to see and hear Leonard Cohen this summer. The other is Roxborough State Park, where Susan and I explored the Fountain Valley Trail a couple of weeks ago.

Twice before I briefly visited Colorado Springs. In 1953 my family drove through on our cross-control summer vacation. I vividly remember visiting the Broadmoor Hotel where my mother shocked me by buying a small figurine of a nude woman (no longer shocked, I now keep it on my desk). I’m sure that I would remember the Garden of the Gods had we visited it. On my second trip here I rushed through the city en route to nearby Pike’s Peak, where I drove to the 14,115 foot summit.

Especially this year I have concentrated on experiencing our 58 national parks. So far I have I been to exactly half of them — 29 — and visited 15 national parks this year alone. But the Garden of the Gods isn’t a national park. It isn’t even a state park. It is just a little park of the city of Colorado Springs.

In 1879 Charles Perkins, a friend of General William Jackson Palmer, who founded the city, purchased 240 acres of the Garden of the Gods, later doubling the size of the land he owned there. Exactly 100 years ago his children deeded that land to city, stipulating that, “It shall remain free to the public, where no intoxicating liquors shall be manufactured, sold, or dispensed, where no building or structure shall be erected except those necessary to properly care for, protect, and maintain the area as a public park.”

Not until yesterday and today did I explore the Garden of the Gods, figuring that, unlike many landscapes, the season wouldn’t degrade its beauty. I arrived about noon after driving straight through from home in less than an hour and one-half.

Arriving when I did might not seem to make sense for landscape photography. It’s more about light than any other photography, even nature photography. We can capture the beauty of wildlife, flowers, and insects even in the harsh light of midday. But landscapes are the most beautiful in the first hour after sunrise and the first hour before sunset.So the reason why I arrived at the Garden of the Gods just after noon was to plan my shots for yesterday evening and this morning. I needed to see where to be when.

Nevertheless, I carried my camera with me for my introductory walkabout. Just in case.

I was glad that I did, since I captured two of my favorite shots on my first visit.

Holding Steady

A Flock of Birds Circled Around and Around this Red Rock

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When I returned for the day’s last hour of sun, I knew where I wanted to be — on the west side of the central rock outcroppings. The rock climbers were already there.

Climbing with the Gods

Birds on Finger Rock

"The Three Graces"

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I especially wanted a shot of the “Kissing Camels.” All of the books about the Garden of the Gods show it, some as the cover photo. You can clearly see how this part of the rock got its name in this view from

the west.

"Kissing Camels" from the West

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For my third visit to the Garden of the Gods this morning I left my motel room about 6:30 to capture the views from the east side of the Garden of the Gods. Assuming that I would need to take morning photos was the reason why I stayed overnight in Colorado Springs. Otherwise, I would have had to get up too early even more me!

Even after scoping out the scene the day before, I was surprised that the “Kissing Camels” were making out in full view from the east.

"Kissing Camels" from the East

"Balanced Rock"

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Still, the main reason why I knew I had to photography the Garden of the Gods in the morning was to capture Pike’s Peak to the west in the background.

South Gateway Rock, Pike's Peak, and North Gateway Rock

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My three walkabouts through the Garden of the Gods gave me a good workout. My pedometer says that I walked 15,000 steps yesterday and 2,300 so far today.

My plans worked out. Even the weather cooperated. Just a week ago we got 23 inches of snow in Boulder. And Colorado Springs probably got as much or more because it’s considerably higher (ranging from 6035 to 7200 feet, while Boulder’s elevation ranges from 5300 to just 5600 feet).

But the warm weather since then melted all the snow, except on the peaks. Yesterday’s weather prediction for both Boulder and Colorado Springs was sunny skies and temperatures in the 60s, and cloudy with temperatures in the mid 70s today. I had a little concern that the sky over the Garden of the Gods would be overcast even when I was shooting. The three shots above that I took the first thing this morning show that everything worked out for the best.

Susan and Hawksbeak

An Impish Guy at Stella Lake

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Susan lives in Vermont, but one of her sons lives in Denver, and she is visiting him over a long weekend. Today I drove 20 miles meet Susan at his house. Susan and I then went to the Fountain Valley Trail in Roxborough State Park some 30 miles south of Denver. In all of the metropolitan Denver area, this 2.3 mile loop trail is my favorite place.

Of course, our cameras accompanied us. I especially wanted to try out my new 50 mm prime lens that arrived yesterday evening. It’s the fifth lens that I have for my Canon 50D SLR and the last one that I intend to buy — at least for a while.

This small, light, and inexpensive lens may just be the one that I use the most. Today I used it for all of these shots below. While a prime lens lacks the flexibility of a zoom, it more than makes up for that by its inherently greater sharpness:

Susan Today

Me Today

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But the scenery that we came to see was more spectacular. The weather was still and warm and the colors of fall surrounded us:

Part of the Fountain Formation

Fountain Valley

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We didn’t see any fountains. The Fountain Formation takes its name from the city of Fountain, Colorado, where people first found an exemplary example of this red conglomerate sandstone. But these red rocks also exists in several locations along the east side of the Front Range of the Rockies. In addition to Fountain Valley in Roxborough State Park, I have seen beautiful examples in Boulder and Denver’s Red Rocks Amphitheater. Near Colorado Springs is the Garden of the Gods, which is high on my to-do list.

The afternoon was warm, and I was in a better mood that the past few cold days when I shut myself into my apartment. I loved the peaceful feeling of being out in nature.

As I set up my camera on a tripod and sat down to compose my pictures, I reflected that the careful photography that I have moved into is more like fishing that the other outdoor activities I see. Both photographers and fishermen take their time to soak in the environment. I certainly did today.

Using only my new 300 mm telephoto lens on my Gitzo tripod, I took 50 pictures of the three scenes below and picked the sharpest images.

Close Up of a Prairie Dog

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The Berries of Fall

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Seeding Plant Along South Boulder Creek

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But I was stranded in Durango. Traveling alone, I checked into a motel as I tried to figure out a way to return home.

The surgeon strongly recommended against my driving back. The main reason was that if I had to hit the brake hard, I could tear open the six inch incision in my stomach.

But the surgeon offered an inspired suggestion. “You can probably find someone on Craig’s List who wants to share a ride from Durango to the Denver area,” he told me.

In fact, I found two parties who wanted a ride from Durango to within 20 miles of my home. One of the parties was a couple, Jason and Christine, who wrote on Craig’s List that “2 of us (1 guy, 1 girl) are finishing a hike of the co trail 10/05 and need a ride from durango to denver. We each have 1 large backpack to take, willing to share all ride expenses of course. Cell 720-352-4029. Pls leave a msg, we don’t have cell or internet while hiking so we won’t be able to respond till the 5th.”

Of course I left a message! I asked them to call me as soon as they got into Durango, and they did. They were checked in to a motel a block from the motel where I was staying. I went right over and met them Monday afternoon. The chemistry worked, and we decided to leave Durango at 9 a.m. yesterday morning.

Jason and Christine Hoff are a remarkable couple. Not only are they long-distance hikers but they are also sailors. They just finished sailing their boat, the S.V. Lotus, more than 12,000 miles on a two-year voyage from Florida to San Francisco. You can read about those adventures in their blog.

Now they are both looking for positions in their fields. He is an engineer and she is a college admissions officer. But while they had time, they hiked the entire Colorado Trail in 32 days.

The Colorado Trail, starting at Waterton Canyon southwest of Denver, runs for 483 miles to Durango. But with the detours they had to take Jason and Christine hiked more than 500 miles.

About 200 miles of the Colorado Trail are also the Continental Divide Trail. The elevation of the Colorado Trail ranges from 5,500 feet in Waterton Canyon to 13,334 feet in the San Juan Mountains. “Some estimate that those hardy souls hiking the entire length of the trail will gain (and lose) nearly 75,000 vertical feet,” according to Wikipedia.

And I thought that the 132 miles that I hiked on my two week High Sierra Trek was a long hike!

Of course we had a lot to talk about. We shared our hiking experiences.

Jason did all of the driving and is a slow, careful driver. While I have usually had a hard time relaxing when someone else drove, I was so at ease with his driving that I even napped a bit.

We even walked a few steps on the Colorado Trail when we came to Kenosha Pass, one of the trailheads. Jason says that this section will be a great hike for me next July or August, and I intend to do it.

We stopped for lunch in the town of Del Norte. I was surprised to find such a charming natural foods restaurant, the Peace of Art Cafe, in such an out-of-the-way location.

Christine and Jason in the Peace of Art Cafe

The other significant stop we made was to photograph the beauty of the San Juan Mountains. This mountain range in southwestern Colorado is the state’s youngest geologically and therefore the most rugged.

One of the San Juan Mountains

Close Up of Aspens Turning on the San Juans

I returned home at 8 p.m. yesterday evening. Having Jason to drive me made the long trip easy.

Now that I’m home I will have plenty of time to concentrate on my work. Because of my surgery, I had to cancel my planned ride on the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad and trips next week that I had planned to Dallas to meet with folks from the American Heart Association and to Seoul, Korea, to meet with folks from i-SENS Inc.

My surgeon also says that for the next six weeks I can’t do any hiking. But he encouraged me to do a lot of walking.

The difference between hiking and walking is a subtle one. But the surgeon says that I shouldn’t climb more than 1,000 feet. I can handle that.

After two and one-half great days in Mesa Verde National Park, I drove  30 miles to Durango. My plan had been to finish my vacation with a 90- mile round trip from Durango to Silverton on the Durango & Silverton  Narrow Gauge Railroad. The train has been in continuous operation for  127 years through spectacular mountain scenery.

I even bought a ticket to go Deluxe Class from 9 this morning to 6 this evening. I also got a room in a Durango motel for last night and  tonight.

But about 7 p.m. yesterday I got a stomach ache that just wouldn’t go away. At midnight I rather sheepishly I drove to the emergency room in  Durango’s Animas Surgical Hospital.

Instead of laughing at me, the nurse, Cindy, and the doctor, Russell Hill, took my complaint seriously. So seriously, in fact, that the  doctor immediately had a radiology technician give take a CT scan, which he then sent it electronically to a group of radiologists in the  Midwest for their reading.

That reading was not good news. Instead of an upset stomach, the CT  scan seemed to show that my small intestine was twisted. The twist  formed a kink that backed up what I had eaten yesterday from passing  out of my body.

While Animas Surgical Hospital must perform a lot of surgeries, Dr.  Hill referred me to Dr. Robert Desko at Mercy Regional Medical Center.  Dr. Desko was on call at the middle of the night and agreed to have me
directly admitted to Mercy. I drove there at 3 a.m.

At Mercy the nurses immediately inserted a nasogastric tube through my  nose, past my throat, and down into my stomach to drain its contents.  Throwing up a couple of times also helped, but neither strategy  offered much relief to the pressure and my pain.

Dr. Desko studied my CT scan and told me that it clearly showed to him  that a section of my small intestine was twisted and might need to be  “resectioned,” in other words cut out. But when he felt my stomach he  didn’t think it was likely that he would have to resection my small  intestine.

About 10 this morning they wheeled me into one of the hospital’s five  operating rooms. After operating, Dr. Desko told me in the recovery  room that the operation was a success and that he had freed up the  twisted part of my small intestine. It had been stuck to the omentum.

Dr. Desko also said that I would need to stay in the hospital from three to five days in order to recover from my operation. Since I have  a lovely new private room and the most attentive nurses imaginable,  the arrangement is even better than the motel room I traded for it.

Every time that Boulder seems to have too many people, I have  considered living in Durango, About 16,000 people lived here the last  time they counted. Many of them are telecommuters, according to one of  my guidebooks. Since that’s what I am too, I wanted to see what living  here is like. Through this strange twist of fate I am beginning to
find out.

Far View Sunrise

Then, later this morning I experienced the most challenging cliff dwelling, Balcony House. The challenge was in getting to and from the one cliff dwelling clearly situated for defense:

The View of Balcony House from Across the Canyon

Getting there in the 1200s when the Ancestral Puebloans built Balcony House must have been almost impossible. Now it is merely difficult. I had to climb the 32-foot ladder shown at the right in the photo above and close up in the photo below:

The Only Way to Balcony House

Not a fun place to visit if you have a fear of heights! Or for that matter if you have claustrophobia:

The Tunnel Was so Tight That I Had to Sit Down

Once I got to Balcony House I could visit some of the complex’s 38 rooms:

At Balcony House

Leaving Balcony House was almost as much fun. First came a 60-foot climb along an open rock face. Finally, I climbed two 10-foot ladders.

Then, this afternoon I hiked the three-mile Petroglyph Trail to see the largest known group of petroglyphs in Mesa Verde:

Mesa Verde's Largest and Best Known Petroglyph Panel

Here is a close up of the central section. The figure with one hand to the head and the other to the waist is a whipping kachina, or spirit being, according to four Hopi men (descendants of the Ancestral Puebloan people) who interpreted this glyph in 1942. The figures on either side of the kachina represent the Puebloan people:

A Kachina Keeping the Puebloan People in Line

Who keeps us in line? Do we need a Whipping Kachina?

Mesa Verde offers so much to do that I had to be picky. I focused both literally and figuratively on Cliff Palace, the largest Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwelling anywhere. Once it probably had more than 200 rooms, of which 151 remain, including 23 kivas.

Cliff Palace has an incredible location, 100 feet below an overhanging ledge of rock. I appreciated the location all the more when I hiked down to it and then back up. I took this photo from part way down:

Overview of Cliff Palace, the Largest Cliff Dwelling in the World

When I finally climbed down all the ladders to Cliff Palace, this view of the south side of the cliff dwelling presented itself to me:

Close Up of Cliff Palace

Kivas are underground chambers that were ceremonial rooms. The Ancestral Puebloans probably used kivas for healing rites or to pray for rain, luck in hunting, or for a good crop. They were also comfortable gathering places with beam-and-mud roofs. They were not baptismal fonts, as I had imagined, and weren’t even used to store water:

One of 23 Kivas at Cliff Palace

Aside from the kivas, the only round structure at Cliff Palace is this tower. A ranger told me that because unskillful archeologists excavated Cliff Palace more than 100 years ago, we have no idea now why the Ancestral Puebloans built this tower:

Round Tower at Cliff Palace

Finally, I was also able to photograph wildlife for the first time on this road trip:

Wild Turkey

Only once before had I ever seen a flock of wild turkeys. I wasn’t able to get any photographs then. But on Tuesday I was able to follow them through open country for a while before photographing this bird. It looks remarkably familiar.

I wanted to stay at Orvis Hot Springs, one of Colorado’s few clothing-optional hot springs resorts. But they had no rooms available until late in October.

My drive Monday from Montrose to Mesa Verde National Park took me within a couple of miles of the hot springs. Naturally, I stopped to look around and see if they had a day-use option. They did and I took it.

Wisely, everyone soaking in the hot pools opted out of their clothes, and of course I did too. The day was perfect for a nude outdoor soak, with clear skies and dry weather in the high 70’s or low 80’s.

Actually, a soak for an hour, rather than staying for a day or two, was just what I needed. Photos were of course not an option.

My second regret was missing the height of the aspens changing color in Rocky Mountain National Park. But Southwestern Colorado showed me more aspens changing color to yellow and orange than I had ever seen in my whole life. I photographed about one and one-half billion of these aspen trees, and this was my favorite shot (thanks to a clear day and my new 300mm lens):

Aspens near Telluride

The town of Telluride lies in one of Colorado’s most picturesque valleys. It is also one of my state’s premier ski resorts:

Downtown Telluride

All along I intended to visit Mesa Verde National Park on this road trip. Here the Ancestral Puebloan people — formerly known by the politically incorrect term “Anasazi,” lived from 500 to 1300 AD. They lived in cliff dwellings of which Mesa Verde National Park preserves more than 600, the largest number in North America.

But until Sunday I figured that I would stay in a motel a few miles away in Cortez or Durango. But then my friend Tom Schulte emailed me to recommend that I stay “overnight in the park at Far View Lodge so that you can photograph at sunset.”

I didn’t even know that Mesa Verde had a lodge in the park. None of the three other national parks in Colorado have one. But as soon as Tom told me about Far View Lodge I called to make reservations there for Monday and Tuesday nights.

As soon as I arrived late Monday afternoon I visited one of the cliff dwellings, known as Spruce Tree House. With about 114 rooms and eight kivas, it is the third largest cliff dwelling in the park and the one that is best preserved. The Ancestral Puebloans built it between A.D. 1200 and 1276:

Spruce Tree House

Close Up of Spruce Tree House, Including One Kiva

Only after exploring Spruce Tree House did I check in at Far View Lodge. By that time the sun was setting in the far West. Noting Tom’s advice as well as the buildup of clouds heralding a spectacular sunset, I made sure to set up my camera in time to capture this scene:

Sunset from Far View Lodge

Views and experiences like this on Monday certainly wiped out any regrets that I had when I started this trip.