December 26-Post Christmas updates, hot off the Presses!

December 17, we headed out to check out the Broadmoor Hotel here in Colorado Springs. This is the major 5 Star Hotel and is usually decorated for Christmas but since it's daytime the lights aren't the attraction! We had to use the "completed" side of the new Tejon St. ped/bike path to get over to the Southgate Shopping Center Panera Bread for hot tea to go with our brown bag lunch. We turned up Nevada St. to pick up Roanoke Rd up to the Old Broadmoor Road and over to Lake Ave bike lane to the hotel. Check out the video tour of the outside of the hotel, below. Headed back the same way then over to Shooks Run Trail to the Good Neighbors Meeting House to get a 2nd. Hot Tea to eat with our Think Bars. From there the weather got cloudy and chilly so we headed to the storage unit!

Good Neighbors Meeting House

A decorated house on the Shooks Run Trail
 

December 19, the last time we tried to ride the Foothills Trail, we had to turn around due to a crew was actually doing "Trail Repairs"!! They were filling in the "trail wide" cracks up and down the asphalt sections of the Foothills Trail. We decided to head up Sinton Trail over to pick up Foothills Trail and see if the repairs actually made the trail useable. To be honest, it's better but just patching isn't going to really make it so you can keep a constant speed on the downhill sections! :( Oh well, it's an improvement so we are happy to see it completed!

Crossing the bridge over the T-Gap Trail to pick up the Sinton Trail, heading to the Foothills Trail

Mesa Springs Greenway over to the Over I-25 Ped/Bike Bridge to Monument Valley Park

December 21, decided to head up to Cottonwood Regional Park on the Cottonwood Creek Trail. Decided to go a little past the park up to the Powers Blvd trail connection. We stared up the Pikes Peak Greenway, got off at Academy Blvd to head to Starbucks for hot tea and of course, the infamous brown bag lunch! Rejoined Cottonwood Creek Trail to Powers Blvd, headed back the same way and back to the storage unit.

Pikes Peak Greenway over to pick up the Cottonwood Creek Trail to the Park

Cottonwood Creek Trail connection off of Powers Blvd, heading to Cottonwood Regional Park

December 22, yet another ride out the Rock Island Trail to check to see if any progress has been made on the new "Crossing Light" at the RIT and Murry Blvd intersection. Minor progress, a 2nd signal light pole on the east side of the intersection, another control box, etc.

Rode east to the current end of the trail at Powers Blvd. Turned around and headed back and then over to the Mavrick Convenience Station for, what else, Hot Tea and brown bag lunch.

Rode back over to the Rock Island Trail west to the Templeton Gap Road bike lane and stopped at Nancy Lewis Park for a Think Bar and water break. The temps were dropping and the clouds thickening so we headed to the Templeton Gap Trail and the Cascade St. bike lane to the storage unit, tucked in the trikes and headed home.  

Nancy Lewis Park, Colorado Springs, CO.

Rock Island Trail heading east to Murry Blvd

The current end of the Rock Island Trail heading east at Powers Blvd, turning around and heading to Lunch and Hot Tea!

Well, that's the end as we headed into Christmas Eve and Christmas Day activities and cooler, grayish, cloudy days ahead. Hope to be able to get out again by Saturday (28th) and Sunday! Hope your Christmas Day was GREAT and from us have a Happy New Year's Day!

December 16, 2024-Internet has been down a few days, here is a "Catch Up" of our rides!

 December 5,  We headed over to the 8th. street Walmart to pick up some toys to give to "Toys for Tots"! We had to go through the "URBAN Jungle Trails" to get directly over there and that store is the closest to the Colorado Springs Police Department, downtown were they had a "drop off" box for Toys for Tots. Kinda cool we ran into a Retried Marine who was picking up toys, they had two full tubs of toys so we added ours and headed out for bit more of a ride! 

December 7, We rode different trails and lot's of back streets with bike lanes to get over to where we could access the Sand Creek Trail off of Airport Blvd bike lane. The trail heads south to a bridge, then it goes east and south. We wanted to see if they continued the East trail over to and under Powers Blvd to hook up with the new Sand Creek Trail section under the new Hwy 24 and Powers Blvd bridge! Well we found out they did add some more concrete trail BUT, it's blocked off before Powers Blvd due to "flood damage" that took more than half of the dirt under the concrete trail!! Sadly, it also dead ends at Powers Blvd, turning from concrete to dirt "single track" trail! They haven't even started any "connection" trail up to the Hwy. 24 and Powers Blvd, RATS! We headed back and stopped at thee Life Perks Coffee House for our sugar free snack and a hot tea! Then headed back to the storage unit!

December 8, We wanted to see if they had finally finished the "construction" along the Cheyenne Blvd/Rd bike lane and wanted to head up to the Sacred Grounds Cafe heading up to North Cheyenne Canyon City Park. LOL, the answer is, "NO", the lower section is cleared out but from 8th street up to 21st street is still a MESS! We rode on the sidewalks as much as we could, then had to "go play with the cars" till we got through the construction and back on the bike path. We got up to the Sacred Grounds Cafe, ate the brown bag lunch and had hot tea's! The day was suppose to sunny and warmer but it started turning quite gray and chilly so wee headed back to downtown, over to Monument Valley Park, then headed to the storage unit, called it a day! 

December 12, Finally got a decent enough day to do our Weekly Food Run. Headed up the Rock Island Trail over to the Walmart Market Place on Union Blvd. With the cargo trailer we packed the bags of food in and then headed home to the apartment, put away the food and household supplies and headed out to McDonald's for a BOGO FREE, double cheeseburger and iced tea! Again, the temps started dropping so we headed straight to the storage unit! 

December 14, been a bit since we headed over to Manitou Springs. It was a nice sunny morning but as we got close to our lunch stop, the Starbucks on Colorado Ave and 31st. street a lot of high clouds started coming in! Bought a large HOT tea to go with our Brown Bag Lunch. The sun came back out so we headed west on the Midland and Creek Walk Trails over to the current "end of the concrete" trail at the Manitou Springs Chamber of Commerce Building. LOL, again the clouds came back and the chill with them, so again it was time to make our way back to the storage unit, via Midland, and other trails and bike lanes! (Note: No videos due to our internet has been DOWN for several days!) 

December 15, we needed to end our ride over at our local Walgreens Drugs to get meds for Jo before we went home so we decided to ride the "T-Gap" Trail up to its current ending at Ranch Road. It was a VERY SUNNY day, but the WIND was CHILLY!! We headed off the trail on the Flintridge Road bike lane up to the Starbucks on Flintridge and Academy Blvd. The winds were strong so we went and found "INSIDE" seats were, we could still SEE the trikes! Got our HOT green tea and ate the Brown Bag Special! ;) Headed back downhill to the T-Gap and headed north to Ranch Road. Turned around and headed south, headed over to pick up the Rock Island going east up to Academy Blvd, then turned around, wanted to stop at Life Perk's Coffee Shop for a Apple-Cinnamon hot tea to go with our THINK bars but found out they are CLOSED on Sunday's! It wasn't getting any warmer and the wind was stronger so back to the storage unit, tucked in the trikes and headed home!

Well that's the end for now folks, had to take December 16th off to have a Xfinity Tech come to the apartment to fix our internet! He had to replace the Modem, it got fried when the Network was vandalized and was down for 2 days for repairs! Till next time:

It's enough to be "ON YOUR WAY", it's Enough, just to "Cover Ground", It's ENOUGH to be "MOV'IN ON"!! Happy Holidays BJ and Jo :)

December 6, 2024, Playing catch up again, "On with the Show, this is IT"

 

November 23 Riding on the Cottonwood Creek Trail, just getting in a ride, here's a video!

November 26 Just a short ride to see the progress of the Rock Island Trail and Murry Blvd. lighted crosswalk. 

Crosswalk heading West at Murry Blvd and Rock Island Trail

Crosswalk heading West, now with re-aligned crosswalk striping

November 29 Took a ride to get a new and TALLER Christmas Tree, tired of having to put the old 4ft tree on a table, found a affordable 6ft unlighted artificial tree at Walmart. Hooked up the cargo trailer and we headed across town!

December 2 We headed up to Angletech the Backwards way, Midland, Foothills Trails but then were forced to detour up the Mesa Trail over to the Fillmore St. bike lane and then picked up Centennial Blvd Walk/Bike Path. Back to the PP Greenway and headed back to the storage unit, Strange Ride!

December 4  Headed up to Angletech to get the "Brake Swap" done on Jo's trike. Changing from Problem causing MIRRORED disc brakes to 90mm DRUM brakes. Both Kirk and Joshia, worked her trike over and now she's got great brakes!

Well that catches us up, will add the ride on the 5th. next blog, thanks for coming along for the rides, Happy Holidays!