Day 2: Garden of The Gods and Pike's Peak!

Day two of vacation was another fun and nerve-wracking day of watching Jayke spider monkey up every rock he could get near and a long nervous drive up...and back down Pike's Peak.  

First stop was Garden of the Gods.  Jayke was more than eager to climb any and all rocks possible.  He clearly doesn't share my fear of heights.  I spent most of the time yelling at him to "get down!" and "stay away from the edge!"  I finally had to give up before everyone around us thought I was a crazy woman.  I decided moving along out of the area on to the next thing was the best idea and probably the only way I was going to keep him off these rocks...and save my sanity.

The picture below looks way worse than it actually was.  It was an easy climb up the back side of this rock formation.  I was able to get below for the shot that makes it look like he is a rock-climbing extraordinaire.  I really didn't allow him to climb anything difficult at all...much to his dismay.  He was quite aggravated with my lack of willingness to turn him loose.  I kept promising there would be more rocks to climb around the next turn...we just didn't stop at them.

The tallest point in the background is Pike's Peak, our next stop.  We called to try to get a reservation on the cog train but it was sold out for the day.  Not very good planning on our part but I will take the blame for that since it was I who decided we shouldn't drive up.  Jeff was confident he could do it and I figured I could always get in the back seat and curl up on the floor board if necessary.  Jayke was nervous about it too and I wasn't very good at reassuring him since I, myself, was terrified!

We got a little lost trying to find the road up and stopped off in some park where Jayke had to attempt to take off on some trail.  Once again, I had to reign him in which disgusted him.  I don't think falling or running across a rattle snake even crossed his mind.  I kept telling him that is why I'M THE MOM!

We finally found the road to the peak and started up.  It wasn't bad at all for a long time but then...

I managed to ride up and back down without getting in the back seat and even took picture and recorded a video.  I noticed while watching the video, that you could hear me moaning and cussing most of the way.  You could also hear Jeff laughing at me in the background.  As you can see from the pictures, no guard rails and nothing but sky over that edge!

It was pretty chilly at the top, 37 degrees with the wind chill.  I don't think it was all Jayke thought it would be.  He was over it pretty quickly and retreated to the warmth of the car, after hitting the gift shop, of course.  Jeff and I walked around to see the view from different directions.  The weather wasn't that great to be able to see very far.  I'm not sure if we saw 5 different states or not but we were trying!

Here's the train I WANTED to ride up.  In the end, I'm glad we drove.  It ended up not being nearly as bad as I had imagined it would be.   Jayke slept the whole way down...some mountain explorer he is!

When we got back to Dona's house there was more excitement!  A BEAR was on the side of their house trying to get their bee hives!  WE were able to see the baby bear briefly before he was scared off by all the crazy people with rocks and flashlights.  Jayke says this was the highlight of his trip.  I imagine we were all quite a site as we were told of the bear and all went racing through the house throwing small children out of our way!  Even more entertaining when while we were watching for the bear, several of the bees got in the house and even stung one of their protectors.  Kelly's Jeff soon changed from "team bee" to "team bear" after one of the little buggers stung his face!

Bear watching

Wonder what we would have done had mama bear come charging down that hill???