Kevin - Monday. Denny is selected to begin the day from downtown Denver because trail head locations are dictating who has to go the most distance today. I’m planning to take the skightly longer stretch but that means she has to start. She is leery of the homeless population and is even more disconcerted by my vague instructions on the route. Heck! Even I don’t know the exact route. It’s just called the South Platte River Trail – used by hikers, bikers and homeless persons. It’s well populated. My general instructions to Denny are, “Keep the sun on your right, follow the river flowing downstream. Hurry along and don’t take no shortcuts.”
She has access to the Google Maps I specially created for each section of our trip, but she decided to use her beloved Apple Maps for some reason. As our oldest son Christopher says, “You get what you get and don’t throw a fit.”
While Denny is starting, I drive north to Trailhead Park (88th Ave & Colorado Blvd.) to start my leg which will take me all the way to Brighton’s Veteran’s Park. Total for the day is about 22 miles, all on a very nice bike/hike trail.
Quite a bit of nature to be seen along the way. Trout are in the South Platte River’s cleaner stretches. Birds a plenty of various types. Couldn’t get my camera out fast enough to catch the pair of pelicans that flew overhead. Down on the Rio Grande with the main command, one of the Battalion Boys shot a pelican for food. He used the lower beak and crop as a hat. I would love to have a pelican hat, but they’re protected species now.
Some jokester posted a unique ‘Keep Out’ sign. And again, the communities are investing in artwork to supplement the natural habitats. The owls aren’t alive – but they are cute, especially the owlet in the knothole.
Who would expect a battleship in the middle of the high plains desert? It’s part of Adam’s County Veteran’s Park. Being the son of a WW2 veteran, I get all misty-eyed reading about the sacrifices our parents’ generation made.
After we’re done, we head back to the RV. Stopping into a hardware store, we get some supplies to make sure the RV power cable doesn’t get loose again. If it does, the spring I added should retract the plug up and away from dragging on the pavement. HA! So there!
