Travel local: Florissant Fossil Beds

Back with a new installment of Travel Local.

Today's location is the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument.

Worth visiting? Yes.

Worth visiting more than once? Once is probably good.

Worth it for non-locals too? Yes.

Fees? $3-$5 for those 16 and older.

Pets? Leave the pups at home. They're not allowed.

Musical inspiration for the trek? Old Seasons, New Day, album by Switchfoot's Jon Foreman. (Free on NoiseTrade right now.)

The Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument sits about 35 miles west of Colorado Springs. Established in 1969, the property has been a site for scientific research since the 1870s and excavations for fossils continue today. You won't find dinosaur fossils, but you will see massive petrified redwood tree stumps on the grounds and tiny fossils from plants, spiders, insects, fish and seeds — and even fish vomit (the kids will love that!) — in the visitor center. In the late 1800s, researcher Samuel Scudder discovered that Florissant had more fossil butterflies than any place else in the world.

A one-mile hike will take you through open fields and past a handful of different redwood stumps, including the one pictured above. It's an easy rolling hike, but for those with mobility concerns, various stumps can be found right outside the visitor center.

One of the more interesting aspects at the Monument is the Fossil Learning Lab, housed in a nearby yurt. A park ranger manages the space, and will help you use microscopes and magnifying glasses to discover new fossils in shale from the area. (Our ranger was super chatty so don't hesitate to ask lots of questions if you have them.) Samples of different types of fossils set around the yurt help hunters identify what they find. The yurt's hours are random, so call before you go to make sure it will be open when you're planning to visit.

Other site activities include indoor historical exhibits, 1878 historic homestead grounds to visit (currently populated by a family of bunnies), and ranger treks — including free wildflower walks and twice-weekly yoga hikes.

I give the Paint Mines one and a half thumbs up, so my recommendation is to get out and travel local!

P.S. If you have a place around Colorado Springs or the state that you'd like me to visit and review, leave a comment and let me know!

Sunday sadhana

To me, sadhana is a daily spiritual practice allowing time and space for an individual to turn inward.

As Yogi Bhajan (of the Kundalini yoga tradition) says, "Sadhana is self-enrichment. It is not something which is done to please somebody or to gain something. Sadhana is a personal process in which you bring out your best."

Sadhana could be taking a walk in nature, doing breath work or yoga asanas on a mat, spending time meditating or chanting, reading and reflecting on a poem, or simply watching the sun rise.

Please accept this post as a possible starting point for your own practice today.

The video and image today come to you from my journeys to Canada and Maine last week — taken outside the Cliff House Resort & Spa in Ogunquit, Maine. 

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Sunday sadhana

To me, sadhana is a daily spiritual practice allowing time and space for an individual to turn inward.

As Yogi Bhajan (of the Kundalini yoga tradition) says, "Sadhana is self-enrichment. It is not something which is done to please somebody or to gain something. Sadhana is a personal process in which you bring out your best."

Sadhana could be taking a walk in nature, doing breath work or yoga asanas on a mat, spending time meditating or chanting, reading and reflecting on a poem, or simply watching the sun rise.

Please accept this post as a possible starting point for your own practice today.

The image comes to you from my journeys to Canada this week — sunset while flying into Halifax, Nova Scotia. And an apropos poem by the amazing John O'Donohue.

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For the Traveler, by John O'Donohue 

Every time you leave home, Another road takes you Into a world you were never in.

New strangers on other paths await. New places that have never seen you Will startle a little at your entry. Old places that know you well Will pretend nothing Changed since your last visit.

When you travel, you find yourself Alone in a different way, More attentive now To the self you bring along, Your more subtle eye watching You abroad; and how what meets you Touches that part of the heart That lies low at home:

How you unexpectedly attune To the timbre in some voice, Opening in conversation You want to take in To where your longing Has pressed hard enough Inward, on some unsaid dark, To create a crystal of insight You could not have known You needed To illuminate Your way.

When you travel, A new silence Goes with you, And if you listen, You will hear What your heart would Love to say.

A journey can become a sacred thing: Make sure, before you go, To take the time To bless your going forth, To free your heart of ballast So that the compass of your soul Might direct you toward The territories of spirit Where you will discover More of your hidden life, And the urgencies That deserve to claim you.

May you travel in an awakened way, Gathered wisely into your inner ground; That you may not waste the invitations Which wait along the way to transform you.

May you travel safely, arrive refreshed, And live your time away to its fullest; Return home more enriched, and free To balance the gift of days which call you.

Travel local: Paint Mines Interpretive Park

You know all those places you always mean to get to that are nearby to wherever home is for you?

And then 20 years go by, and you still haven't gotten to them?

I've decided to actually start visiting the places on my "tourist" list for Colorado Springs, the surrounding areas, and Colorado more generally — which is quite long, thanks to years of working at the Colorado Springs Independent — and report back here as to whether they're worth the trek or not.

Meet my new series: "Travel local."

We'll start today with Paint Mines Interpretive Park.

Worth visiting? Yes.

Worth visiting more than once? Yes.

Worth it for non-locals too? Yes.

Fees? Nope.

Pets? Leave the pups at home. They're not allowed.

Musical inspiration for the trek? The self-titled album by Tow'rs.

Paint Mines Interpretive Park is perhaps one of the coolest local places I've visited in many, many years. Owned and run by El Paso County, the Paint Mines are located east of the Springs, near Calhan, about a 40-minute drive from downtown. Your ride out will be punctuated by rolling hills, black and white cows, and if you're lucky, some pronghorn. That's about it.

Which is why the Paint Mines are such a surprise.

Park at one of two lots (the one closest to Calhan has a restroom facility), take a peek at the map to figure out where you are, and jump on the trail. Within a 15-minute hike toward what's labeled "formations," you'll start seeing out-of-place-looking rocks. Then large swaths of geological formations, including spires and hoo-doos. Colors in the rock range from black to white, and a whole variety of reds, pinks, oranges and yellows. It's stunning, really. (American Indians used the colored clay in their art way back when.)

Wander four miles of trails on the 750-acres — it's easy hiking, but bring hats, water and sunscreen. There is a distinct lack of shade out here. And leave the pups, bikes and horses at home; they're not allowed on the grounds. (Though we did see a guy hiking with a parrot on his shoulder.)

Right now, there are lots of wildflowers out and about the Paint Mines too, and I imagine with all the rain we've had, it'll stay that way for awhile. If you're so inclined, take your camera and plan to spend some time not just shooting the rocks, but photographing a wide variety of blooms too.

I give the Paint Mines two thumbs up, so my recommendation is to get out and travel local!

P.S. If you have a place around Colorado Springs or the state that you'd like me to visit and review, leave a comment and let me know!

What hiking Camelback taught me

There's a line in my last post on kayaking for my #41before42 project about how as I age I'm craving physical challenges more and more.

I was particularly struck by this when I stood at the bottom of Scottsdale, Arizona's Camelback Mountain, prepping to head up a mile.

Twenty years ago, you would not have found me at 7:15 in the morning, dressed in hiking gear with water bottle in hand all gung-ho to climb straight up a mountain. Honestly, you probably wouldn't have found me doing that even 10 years ago. (It was only about five years ago that I started hiking much at all.)

But a few weeks ago, on assignment for Adventure Girl during a press trip organized by the Scottsdale Convention and Visitors Bureau, I popped out of my guide's car at the trailhead and took a deep breath.

Camelback is similar in many ways to the Manitou Springs Incline. You first have to claim a parking space — getting there as early as possible helps, and weekdays are easier than weekends. There are two trails up: Cholla and Echo Canyon. My guide — one of the CVB staff who regularly hikes the area — had chosen the latter, a 1.2-mile trip to the summit. The beginning of this trail consists of railroad tie stairs and small rocks. Then there are two "rail" sections, where I had to haul myself up steep walls of rock while clinging to a metal handrail.

Once we got past the second rail, the hiking turned primarily to scrambling large rocks, a section where I wished I'd had my own "Camelbak" instead of my water bottle. (Thankfully I did have a nice hiking companion and a carabiner, so we hooked my bottle onto her pack when things got tricky. Of course coming down I wished I'd had my trekking pole. It would have helped my knees and given me more confidence to move a little faster.)

The big difference between Arizona and Colorado, of course, is the altitude. Camelback climbs 1,200 feet in a little over a mile, from 1,424 ft. to 2,704 ft. The Incline starts at 6,600 ft. and climbs about 2,000 feet in just under a mile.

But just because you might breathe easier due to the lower altitude, you still have to fight the heat of Arizona. And while we started hiking Camelback early enough that I didn't feel it on the way up, I did feel it warming on the way down.

Round-trip, the hike took us about 2 1/2 hours — and that included a 10-or-so-minute break at the top, where the views are stunning everywhere you look.

I have to admit, on this side of the hike now, I kind of feel about Camelback like I do about the Incline. I did it once, and that's good enough for me.

As I'm aging, I am finding myself more inclined to tackle new physical challenges, but I'm also finding myself less inclined to do them more than once because someone else thinks I should (or because I think someone else thinks I should).

Would I recommend Camelback if you happen to find yourself in Scottsdale?

Definitely.

Will you find me on that trail again?

Probably not.

But that doesn't mean I won't seek out a different one in the area. And actually, I think the McDowell Sonoran Preserve might be calling my name.