Two. Two! TWO meals in one entry!
As with our July road trip to the South, I was determined to find places to eat in Colorado Springs that we didn’t have back home in Indianapolis. Here we backtrack a bit to recap a couple of culinary experiences we had in the margins between the last several chapters in this series. One was very much Of Colorado, while the other gave us a mostly happy case of vacation déjà vu.
Jean Louise Finch might gladly welcome you, but she’s busy reading.
By the time we finished our exhausting tour of the U.S.S. Alabama on Day 5, rush hour was on and we were still over two hours away from our hotel. We had one more stop on our itinerary that I was tempted to cut because it required a sizable digression off I-65 and I figured all the businesses would be closed by the time we arrived. Getting to our hotel in Montgomery before nightfall would’ve been a plus, but unlikely regardless of whether or not we stopped on the way. On the other hand, it’s not as though we’re in the area all the time and will have multiple opportunities to drop in. The more attractions we postpone to some other future theoretical vacation, the more of those attractions we’ll probably never see.
So by a unanimous vote of 2-0 we threw scheduling comfort to the wind, temporarily abandoned the interstate, and drove the 30-odd miles out of our way to a brief stopover in Monroeville, hometown of author Harper Lee. You may remember her name from headlines last year.
If you visit the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs and read your brochure front-to-back, you’ll notice your admission includes an unusual mountainside bonus that requires some extra effort to check out. It’s nothing to do with animals, but it’s an interesting tangent in the Zoo’s historical and literal background even if you’re too young to know anything about actor/humorist Will Rogers. Ask your grandparents if they remember their parents ever mentioning him.
In game, you sink Battleship. In real life, battleship sink YOU.
After lunch, Day 5 saw us heading east along the Gulf Coast, back into the state of Alabama, slowly through the city of Mobile in congested traffic, and down to the shore of Mobile Bay, where they’ve docked the kind of enormous boat that would’ve been a big help against Jaws if it would’ve fit anywhere near Amity’s beaches.
Welcome aboard the U.S.S. Alabama.
After lunch on Day Three, I headed back to the hotel to rendezvous with Anne, who had reported to work hours early by request in exchange for an earlier departure. They would’ve been more than happy to let her work ten or twelve hours, but excess overtime hadn’t been part of trip planning. She also really liked the idea of having time to rejoin me on the sightseeing before all the best places closed. She’d missed out on nearly everything I did Monday. In my book, she deserved to see more of what Colorado Springs had to offer.
We did our best to make it count. Next stop: the U.S. Air Force Academy, one of the few military installations in the city that allows civilians inside. We’re not allowed access to all 18,500 acres, but of all the permissible parts, the most fascinating is the Cadet Chapel.
Most of these photos were shot inside the nave during early sundown. Above: the view toward the altar. Below: straight-up shot of the vaulted, pointed ceiling.
The giraffes had space both indoors and outdoors. In the mornings, you’ll find them where the food is.
If you read Part 10 and Part 11, you saw a lot of me nattering on about the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, that fabulous nature spot with animal pens up the side of a mountain, but not so much about the zoo animals beyond the meerkats. This, then, is the one with a bunch of other animals in it.
Today the coastline along the Mississippi Sound is a calmer, beauteous place. As a target to multiple hurricanes over the past two centuries, it hasn’t always been like that. We found a few places on our drive through Biloxi that testify to the tragedy in those moments as well as to the resilience of its residents and their works.
It’s the kind of moment a man hears can happen, but never sees coming. He’s walking around by himself, minding his own business, lonesome in a crowd but trying to keep up his spirits. Then out of nowhere a young lady walks up to him without preamble or any sign of hesitation, stares him down point-blank, and hits him up with the kind of once-in-a-lifetime proposition he’d have to be a fool to refuse:
“Hi! Would you like to help feed the meerkats?”
If I ever got self-deluded enough to pay for a Midlife Crisis Crossover booth at a convention, this would totally be the image on our banner.
Whenever we meet new people and tell them about our annual road trips, we’ll talk partly about the famous attractions and the Very Important sights, but sooner or later we make a point of mentioning the expected “biggest ball of twine in Minnesota” sort of roadside whimsy and bafflement. Some places are more self-aware of their kitsch levels than others. Some places stop just short of posting “STOP HERE FOR PHOTO OP!” signs begging you to drop in and go wild. We’ve seen a few places that go all the way with full-on shameless billboards dozens of miles in advance. (Wall Drug, I’m looking in your direction.)
U.S. Route 90 through Biloxi runs near the Gulf of Mexico and features a pair of souvenir shops ready to sell you Mississippi memorabilia, provide all the beach gear you’ll need for your extended near-ocean stay, or just let you hang out with their marine life collections — all of it colorful, most of it inanimate.
Fans of Dr. Strangelove, Stargate SG-1, WarGames, and numerous other near-apocalyptic dramas may recognize the location. No, I don’t mean the zoo.
Welcome to Cheyenne Mountain! One of the most distinctive sections of the Rocky Mountains in the Colorado Springs area, this mass was once home base for the North American Aerospace Defense Command. If you saw a movie or TV show in the ’80s or ’90s in which grouchy American military officials glowered at each other in a secret underground bunker and tossed around terms like “mutually assured destruction” or “DEFCON 1” or “the football” or “Russkies”, chances are they were filmed in a sterile Hollywood soundstage but fronted by a stock photo of thick, beautiful Cheyenne Mountain.
NORAD isn’t quite the hotbed of top-secret nuclear management it once was, having transferred its primary functions to nearby Peterson Air Force Base. (No public tours. I checked.) Today it’s a mountain with a lot going on around its base, not much of it related to national security anymore.
Right this way for another round of scenery and guaranteed animals!
My wife, Anne of Arabia.
One of the great things about vacation photos is you can refer to them whenever you’re in the midst of oppressive dreariness and remember a time when everything was better . I’m writing this in January at the end of a weekend whose temperatures plummeted by half within a 36-hour span and saw snow and ice cover our roads dangerously enough to warrant at least sixty-six police runs to handle traffic accidents this morning. Worse still, it wasn’t enough to blanket all the greenery and make everything look like a Christmas postcard. Slick and ugly snowfall is the worst.
Thanks to the magic of blogging, tonight we’re traveling back to that bygone era of July 2015, on a quiet Sunday morning when my wife and I ran amok on a brightly burning beach that was the dehydrating yet delightful opposite of the chilly here-and-now.
If the sun tries to burn me, maybe this giant rock shaped like a crab claw will save me.
By the time I was finished wandering Woodland Park, I’d lost interest in continuing the snaky haul southwest through the Rockies to Cripple Creek, and decided to head back east toward Colorado Springs. I was tired of driving but, to my surprise, still in the mood for high-altitude walking.
Despite my appearance, I’ve come to like the sensation of walking in and of itself, as long as the surroundings don’t bore me and especially if I can walk at my own speed. Years of discreetly running from class to class in both junior high and high school, followed by twelve years of restaurant work in which speed was essential to both service and survival, conditioned me for an above-average pace when left to my own devices. It’s rare that I really get to cut loose back home. If I do, my wife’s cute tiny legs struggle to keep up. I’ve never actually seen my son hurry, and my mom decided in her forties that she’s officially elderly, a few decades ahead of schedule. If I indulge myself, I leave my loved ones eating my dust.
(Please note these sentiments apply to walking only. Jogging and running are a different story. My enthusiasm has its boundaries.)
US 24 took me through Manitou Springs and to the perfect spot to push myself: Red Rock Canyon Open Space. Curious natural sights, varied terrains, and the Rockies for a backdrop. Much more stimulating than the average treadmill grind.
Day Five took us beyond New Orleans and into the southeastern tip of Mississippi, where we found a few different must-sees on our road-trip checklist. We’d hoped to see something distinctly in Mississippi after our disappointing nonstop Day Two drive; genuine Gulf of Mexico water; a true Southern beach; and an authentic Southern mansion or plantation, whichever was available.
We found all of that and more in the coastal city of Biloxi. Our first stop along the way was at the mansion called Beauvoir, whose property from 1877 to 1889 was the home of Jefferson Davis, President of the erstwhile Confederate States of America.
Yes, there’s a gift shop.
Of all the food we enjoyed during our six November days in Colorado Springs, none made a more lasting impression than these six sweet, intricate, handcrafted circles filled with creative ingredients, sinful carbs, and a heaping helping of love.
Right this way for the names and my motives behind this purchase…
This is not the Star Wars toy store you’re looking for.
By the time I left the Cave of the Winds, it was after 12 and lunch sounded like a great idea. My original plan had been to work my way up US 24 into the Rocky Mountains for a while, eventually switch to another winding highway, and browse the restaurant and sightseeing options in the town of Cripple Creek. All the brochure photos looked like Deadwood or other Old-West throwbacks filled with arts, crafts, state-themed souvenirs, cheesy knickknacks, period boutiques, and probably casinos in every other storefront. Plenty of opportunities for bemusement and/or learning experiences, maybe.
Halfway there my appetite was seriously interfering with my enthusiasm for driving all those dozens and dozens of elevated disaster curves. I reached the much nearer hideaway of Woodland Park, noted a smattering of old-fashioned facades, cut my drive a couple dozen miles short, and thought to myself, “Yeah, this’ll do. Food now.”
Right this way for an impromptu stop in a quiet Colorado town!
The neon of Bourbon Street, one last time.
Our final sixteen hours in New Orleans saw physically debilitating lows, frustration with the transitory nature of small businesses and mapping apps alike, a few new sights that came along at just the right time, and final encores with our favorite French Quarter sights before we bade farewell to Louisiana.
This wasn’t my first cave, but this stalactite was possibly the longest I’ve ever seen.
I had to kill a few hours in the morning puttering around free areas while waiting for other Colorado Springs businesses to open. Eventually I made my way west through the Rockies, up the side of a mountain, then down inside it.
Crawfish beignets: in which New Orleans cuisine achieves its ultimate form.
For this year’s scenic tour of the American South, even if everything else went wrong or turned out boring, we kept our hopes high that the cooking would prove to delight our senses and heap shame upon our own meager kitchen skills. On Day Four we found two restaurants — one a fine-dining restaurant, the other an open-air market booth — that delivered the goods and won the week.
The title sounds like some sad attempt at a pun, but it’s technically not. Not on my part, anyway. Pictured above is America the Beautiful Park, one of the more scenic public spaces I found in Colorado Springs. Even without the Rocky Mountains backing it up, the park has a few classy touches of its own, which you can appreciate if you can first find the park.
This garage door used as a desperate message board is one of several Hurricane Katrina fragments on exhibit at the Presbytere.
The Louisiana State Museum is no single building, but rather a statewide aegis for several full-size museums and a few structures of historical significance. Over half are in New Orleans; one of those, the Old U.S. Mint, sits near the north end of the French Market. After lunch on Day Four we sped through three such locations bordering Jackson Square — two on either side of St. Louis Cathedral, the third nestled in one of the quaint strip malls, cleverly disguised as one of many gift shops.
Midlife Crisis Crossover! 