Colorado Day 8

"It's going to be windy up there," Smokey the Bear warned.
As we pulled away from the ranger station, the Little Woman chuckled, "We've seen our share of wind."
At the top of Pike's Peak, the wind shrieked. Plus the mercury hovered around thirty degrees. The elevation is 14,110 feet. That's 300 feet below the summit of Mount Rainier in Washington state. And we rode up!
Okay biker trash, this is a fun and exciting ride. Fun because it climbs over a mile in elevation, winding and twisting like a snake trying to bite it's own tail. Many turns are first gear affairs. Exciting because once again there are few guardrails, and the howling wind tries to throw the hapless rider over the edge. That and the surprise, three or four miles of construction. At one section we followed the water truck as he saturated the area to a gooey mess. We enjoyed three or four miles of dirt road. Fortunately we left the trailer behind at the gate.
The pinnacle, at least today, was anticlimactic, because of the wind and cold, one didn't spend a lot of time meditating on the grandeur of God's creation. The air lay thick with haze too, making the view a bit fuzzy. Fortunately a gift shop offered solace from the cold. Among other things it offered. One can drive up or take the cog train, which looked very enticing. Maybe next time. I know it will get the Little Woman's vote.
Back to normal, and we stopped in Manitou Springs and ate at PJ's Restaurant for lunch. They featured Polish dishes. Weird, huh? I tried pieroskis or something like that. Stuffed Polish dumplings. Pretty good. We ate on the deck outside in amazed comfort, as we left the tundra just an hour before. Manitou Springs is a tourist trap, with all the tourist trappings. But typical Colorado, the architecture is 1900s revamped and very nice.
Our goal is to meet friends East of Denver tomorrow, so we stopped at a campground in the area. Nice place, but 150 yards from I-70 and the trucks roar past constantly. It's a KOA, which are usually a cut above the rest but I think this one is pricey at $33 with our discount. I can get a mid-week hotel room in Vegas for that price. Tonight, we wear the earplugs.