MONUMENT & COLORADO SPRINGS, COLORADO for a WEEK

April 21st, arrived at Colorado Heights RV Park in Monument, CO. 

We still had wind to deal with and in the upper level of the park where we located we had to deal with mud.  More spring!!
Upon arriving, the traffic in the south bound lanes of I-25 was pretty well stopped.  Looked like maybe an RV wreck over the hillside opposite the RV Park entrance.  Sure enough!! I even saw them throw the mattress on top of the pile on the wrecker.
Sunday morning we started out to find a First Baptist Church about sixteen miles away. But going down the road here, just a mile or so, we saw a church with SBC under the name and decided to stop and try it out thinking that it might be a Southern Baptist. Sure enough!! We got into a SS Class that was more to our liking!!! Great teacher!!! And good discussion.  We felt like we were with our class in Ohio.  And it is a GROWING CHURCH, many, many small children!! 

It was great to see that, as so many of the churches that we get into where they put us in a seventies/eighties class and there are very few children.  We call those dying churches, unfortunately. And it must by my grey hair and Gary's baldness.
After church we went to Village Inn for dinner and promised ourselves that we had to come back on Wednesday for their free pie day!! Which we did.

Monday was laundry and Walmart day before it began to rain which turned into snow the next afternoon. It was now cold enough that we had to leave water run the next night to TRY to avoid frozen pipes. The park's water pipe that we connected to did freeze.
Gary loved crying to our sons about our weather, so he was always sending them pictures.

The next day it snowed a little more!!

Last evening we went into Colorado Springs to visit Salem Ohio friends. While there Andrew decided that we should go out for dinner, so Village Inn again. We love it!

Andrew, Asha and Rekha

Andrew had to get out the '97 Mustang to give Gary a ride and show how it vroom, vrooms, as Asha says!

Andrew & Gary

How we knew Rekha from Salem was from her time as a teller at Home Savings with me. And we later met Andrew on our first trip through Colorado only to find out that he is brother to our Pastor Pete in Salem. Gary and he have so many things in common, including art and cars to touch the tip of the iceburg! Andrew stopped by the motorhome Friday morning on his way to work, to check out our life style. He has dreams of doing this also when they decide to invest the money and when he can talk Rekha into it.

Andrew

Asha and Mom Rekha

 Wednesday was our day for Thrift Stores here in Monument. We found one awesome one where we spent $50 plus. That took care of a couple eye catchers for me, books for Gary @ 50 cents each and a Christmas gift for our daughter-in-law!!  We have been looking for Lynn's for a couple months and this was too good of a bargain. I could have bought a couple more things for me, but refrained. We are going to be so-o packed in the motor home for the rest of the trip back to Ohio!! And that will be more than three months!! The problem is that we love looking through the Thrifts!!
The drive up here from New Mexico was awesome even though windy. We just love the scenery.

Curvy as usual!

This was an awesome view over a Walmart!!

Now we are beginning to see the higher peaks!!

Last Saturday Audrey lost her oldest brother, Verlyn. It is a sad time!! But we decided that we are too far from Chicago area to be there for the sons.  Boys we love you and miss seeing you!!
Tomorrow morning we will begin again. to our next week's stop in Nebraska.
You all take care and stay warm!!

MORE OF LOS ALAMOS, NEW MEXICO

On Wednesday, April 18th after going to Los Alamos Museum for the WWII Manhattan Project, we stopped for lunch at The Hollar

in a quaint little mining town where you could buy anything from soup to nuts, especially jewelry!!

Thought we would have lunch here, but the sign at
the steps said that the Diner was not open as such.
It is just a store and was not open when we stopped.

This was another location of a diner, but was not serving
food at this time!! We just might have to go hungry!!

This was a train engine that hauled coal out from the mine.

Flag at half mast in memory of Former First
Lady, Barbara Bush's death. 

 

The museum had interesting information about the Indians of this area.

Pottery from the Zuni tribes.

Pottery from the Tewa tribes.

Items found in the area by archaeology research people.

I loved the pottery replicas enhancing the highway medians.

 Of course the scenery along the highway was awesome!!.  Sometimes I had the camera out and sometimes, not. 
We often wonder what keeps the rocks in place!!

And the Ranch signs were interesting as well. There were much newer ones, but that not being history, I did not bother with the camera. 

The year 1937 on this one was interesting.

On Saturday, April 21st, we arrived at Monument, Colorado just north of Colorado Springs, at a park we stayed in on our previous trip through here. It was a long drive of eight hours and that is not our usual length of trip. Too long and some wind so we were so glad for it to end!!  Except for the muddy ground caused by the snow the night before we arrived, that is!!  And Gary drove it all.
We will be here for the week. But we are hoping that the snow is about over across the north west!!
 In spite of the snow the next day, there were many signs of spring.

LOS ALAMOS, NEW MEXICO

Tuesday, April 17th, it was time for us to get away from home for a change. So we drove up Historic Rt 66 to Walmart at Moriarty, NM. The day before we had gone up Rt 14 to check out a couple Thrift Stores. They were very interesting and unique.
In the mean time, Gary made plans to make a trip north to Los Alamos on Wednesday for a look at the First part of the plans for the a-bomb research. We got things backward by going to the test sight first.

Leaving our Park where they have a wall of the
many red rocks of the area. Beautiful!

We loved the scenery on the drive!!  Some sites we wondered, if they had been locations of mines in years past and mountains that looked to be Pueblo locations of many years in past history. We did go into a little village on a curve that was the home of a mine where we stopped for a bite to eat in the afternoon at The Hollar. I will show those pictures later.
Our travels continue up Rt. 66 on to Los Alamos.

Not a curve that we would want to take in the motorhome!

This valley in the mountains of northern New Mexico was chosen by the government for the research of nuclear weapons in the early '40's since we were in a war at that time. We new there was research being done by some of the other countries of the war.  Thus it was time for us to catch up. This valley had very few residents except for the Boy's Ranch, so the government was able to have the residents move out. Thus making Los Alamos a Secret City for their needs.

I won't retype the historical information, but will give you pictures that I took which give this information. 

 

 
Following are just three examples of graduates from this Boy's Education Ranch.

 

Many Nobel Peace Prize recipients for the sciences, education,
government and work done were pictured on their walls.

 A few of the homes used during this early period of Los Alamos still stand for museum use, and some are still lived in and not open for viewing.

I know this was a long Blog, but there was so much history here.
Los Alamos is now a thriving city and very interesting, and is still home of many research labs for sciences of all types, including medical. Thousands are employed here.
Have a great day and I will do our second stop of the day in a new Blog tomorrow.