DISASTER!!! We were awoken this morning by a phone call from the Nissan dealership. The shop supervisor told me that rather than replace a part to the transmission of the Altima, they were going to have to install a brand new transmission all together. The parts weren’t in house and would have to be shipped from Dallas on a truck overnight. So instead of getting the car back that evening, they were going to need to hold onto it until late the next evening at the earliest. This put a major damper on our schedule, considering we were supposed to be leaving for Utah the next morning. We were sick to our stomachs. So, the next 2 hours consisted of Kari and I canceling hotel reservations and making a complete new schedule for the next few days of our trip. It was a stressful morning to say the least. Luckily for us, we figured out how to make it work and only be a half day behind. So… we showered and headed off south to Colorado Springs. We didn’t have much planned for the day in Colorado Springs, so leaving around lunch time didn’t affect our schedule.
As we made our way out of Boulder, we finally got to see the Denver skyline. We’d missed it the night before, because we arrived in the area so late. It was a pretty cool city. The interstate that takes you south of Denver, hugs the city and allowed us to get a great view. We were excited to get to come back the next day to spend some time downtown. We passed right by the Denver Broncos football stadium. It looked like a pretty cool place to see a game.
After arriving in Colorado Springs an hour and half later, we headed to the base of Pike’s Peak. We’d purchased tickets that morning to ride the Cog Railway up to the summit of Pike’s Peak. We were both wearing short sleeves and shorts when we walked down to the train platform. It was 90 degrees outside. At the last second, Kari decided to head back up to the car and change into pants. In retrospect, I should have done the same. My bone head thought I would just man up and deal with the temperature drop as we reached the summit. Bad idea! We boarded the train and it began its slow accent to the top of Pike’s Peak. We had a young college student as a tour guide. She started out trying to be clever and made the tourists laugh, but then she became Cruella de Vil about halfway up the mountain. You aren’t allowed to step into the isle of the train. This was a major no-no. But as she’d point out something beautiful on one side of the train, everyone on the other side would want to step over to see. When this happened… everyone on the train became a 2nd grader and had to listen to their teacher scold them by threatening to kick them off the train and force them to hike down. I kid you not, this isn’t an exaggeration.. she was dead serious. A couple of times, the trip became uncomfortable when she would yell at the tourists. I was seriously scared of this little blonde college student. Eventually, we did reach the summit. It was over 14,000 ft tall and gave us incredible views of Colorado Springs below. When Kari and I got off the train, it took us about 10 minutes to get used to the elevation. It was very windy and the chill factor was at 36 degrees. My legs were very cold… luckily I brought my hooded sweatshirt. We stayed at the summit for about 30 minutes. There is a gift shop and restaurant at the top, so we got a souvenir and grabbed a doughnut and headed back down the mountain. I am not sure the experience was worth the $34 per person ride, but it was an experience non the less. They can’t all be good, right? If we learned anything about Pike’s Peak in the total 3 ½ hr train ride up the mountain, it was… don’t step in the isle!!!
After getting down from the mountain, Kari and I drove to our hotel, which was a Fairfield Inn. It was a comfortable stay. We checked in and then headed out to dinner and a movie. After the past few days of stress because of the car, we needed a date night to calm us down. We had Italian food and saw the movie Crazy, Stupid, Love which was very entertaining. I’d recommend seeing it if you get the chance. After the movie, we went back to the hotel and crashed. We were very nervous to find out what was going to happen with the car situation. Would we get it back on time, would they find something else wrong with it, would the truck with the car parts make it from Dallas on time… if you want to find out, tune it tomorrow. Same website, same authors, same crazy trip across this beautiful country. Good night!
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