Month: August 2013

Colorado Discoveries 9: Cripple Creek

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Our family took a leisurely drive in the Mustang with the top down. We didn’t set a location precisely, but ended up in Cripple Creek, Colorado, a very quiet little mining town that’s filled with casinos.

There’s a tourist railroad in Cripple Creek, called the Cripple Creek & Victor Narrow Gauge Railroad. Trains leave every 40 minutes and take tourists on a 45 minute ride. We didn’t plan to stay long enough for a train ride, but we enjoyed looking around at the depot.

You know what else is cool, the railroad is pet friendly! When we come back to ride it we fully intend to bring Howie!

Otherwise, Cripple Creek has numerous small casinos and little else. The state voted to allow gambling in Cripple Creek in 1991. The town is tiny. It was tough to find a place for lunch in the area…most of the restaurants are in the casinos. But we did find a burger joint on called The Creek on Bennett Avenue (the main drag), that was pretty good. Dave had an elk burger which he testified was pretty darned good.

 

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The kids have mixed feelings about having the top down. So long as we aren’t going too fast, they really enjoy it.

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More Hiking in Colorado Springs

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There are so many places to go hiking throughout Colorado Springs. I’ve made it a point to get the kids out and about 3-4 times per week this summer. The City of Colorado Springs parks and recreation website has a great listing of area parks, which is the best starting point when planning your day.

The boys would often get tired after these hikes. Jacob has recently revealed that he can’t stand “desert walks”, which we encountered on most of these hikes. We’d quickly go from aspen-kissed creek beds to sandy junipers and pear cactus. I had found a couple memes to make fun of these hikes. Here’s one that sums up Jacob attitude about the more desolate parts of our hikes…and here’s one that sums up the bike ride we took last week (which I don’t have any pictures of, and it was quite traumatic for all…so we’ll pretend that it didn’t happen).

Enjoy some photos from some of the hikes we’ve done lately….

Pulpit Rock Open Space, near downtown Colorado Springs

Pulpit Rock is in the middle of Colorado Springs. We took a short walk around the base of the rock, it was storming around us. We didn't last long.
Pulpit Rock is in the middle of Colorado Springs. We took a short walk around the base of the rock, but it was storming around us. We didn’t last long.

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