Wildly Dangerous and Often Precarious Trip to Denver

    …I was suddenly awoken to the sharp, piercing, yet not entirely unflirtatious feeling of cold air penetrating my sleeping bag. “Huh, that's odd, I don’t recall unzipping my vent” thought my groggy and still half asleep brain. “I better check on that” thought my quickly much more awake brain. In short order, I ascertained that my sleeping bag zipper had broken and the first thought that occurred to me was “this is hardcore, awesome.”

    It all started in the Summer of 2021 while racing the Tour of America’s Dairylands stage race in Milwaukee. Along this particular adventure whose story is to be saved for another date, I had met a girl named Anna in the parking lot of the local catholic college students building. We quickly became friends and kept in loose contact through my last fall semester in college. In one of the letters we exchanged, Anna offhandedly mentioned that I should come out to Denver and that she would show me around the area and introduce me to the other fun people in the area. Seeing that I had a quite extensive winter break I decided to head out to Colorado for a few days of car camping and then up to Denver to meet Anna and her friends.

    Day 1: Kansas City Missouri to Trinidad Colorado

    I embarked on my journey from Devin’s house in KC after a few delicious pancakes and a week’s worth of wood working work worked. The drive that lay ahead of me was 11 hours because I despise road tripping on the interstate and instead aim for state highways or roads. My trusty source of entertainment was exclusively Irish folk music, sea shanties, and a few bluegrass bangers that I wanted to learn the lyrics too. The drive through Kansas, as anyone who has made the drive, neither needs nor deserves any description solely because one really cannot be given for the flat and barren landscape. There are remarkable things though to anyone with a keen eye. Upon arrival in Ulysses Kansas, I stopped by the local catholic church (Mary, Queen of Peace) to pray for a bit and was pleasantly surprised to find the doors unlocked and two Hispanic women inside devoutly praying what I could only translate by best guest to be a rosary with some additional devotion afterwards. The second remarkable thing occurred when I stopped about an hour outside Trinidad Colorado and saw nothing. This nothing was so awesome that I saw everything, in the sky that is! The stars and their uncorrupted beauty were on display as I fired up the camp stove to make dinner in my driver seat. After this lovely evening, I arrived in Trinidad Colorado and made camp in the parking lot at Most Holy Trinity Church.

    Day 2: Trinidad to Sand Dunes to Canon City.

    Day two actually began quite early, around 3am, when the lower zipper on my sleeping bag failed and I was treated to the cold air in the back of my car. Luckily I slept with extra blankets (as the weather was around the single digits that night) and was able to make it through to the morning. After waking up for real I attended the 8 am Mass and was thoroughly impressed by the beautiful stone work and stained glass of this unassuming church in small-town Colorado. I then made breakfast, broke camp, and hit the road.

    The rough game plan was “drive to Great Sand Dunes National Park, unload the bike, explore.” Around noon thirty the weather was predicted to be a sunny 45 degrees so I had all morning to spend driving. The preferred interstate according to Apple maps ran parallel between the flats of east Colorado and the first mountain range. As I looked with great forlorn towards the mountains, I deeply desired to be driving in them. In answer to this silent prayer, I soon caught sight of a sign proclaiming “Scene Byway: Highway of Legends, Exit Now.” Ca-Ching. This road was awesome! It devolved from highway to road to country road to gravel road to single lane gravel canyon pass before it eventually deposited me back on the interstate.

    Once I reached the Sand Dunes I parked in a nearby state park which was quieter (no one there) and cheaper (free.) I then explored a little bit on bicycle and made dinner. The day ended with a lovely drive up to Canon City where I parked at St. Michael’s parking lot.

A look into my house for a few days. Gets a little messy around mealtime.

    Day 3: Canon City to Denver.

    Day 3 began with a pounding heartbeat and an adrenaline spike. I was awoken to the sound of a sharp knock on my car window. Like a firefighter who had just received a call, I threw on my clothes and jumped in the driver seat. It turned out the Parish security/maintenance worker saw me come in the previous night and just wanted to check on me! I enjoyed another 8am Mass and made a new friend in the parking lot afterwards.

    I eventually got around to biking and explored the area from Phantom Pass (stopped at landfill) to Royal Gorge (turned around at the tourist trap bridge.) Lunch was at my new friends’ wife’s restaurant where we chatted some more about what it means to be a Catholic man and a humble scholar of the faith as well.

    That evening I traveled up to Denver where Anna and a deliciously delightful pizza party took place.

 

Riding around Canon City

    Day 4-7: Adventures of Denver.

    Things here turned into a bit of a blur so I’ll change the pace of this writing a bit to just hit on some highlights of what I did.

• Hiked at Red Rocks Amphitheater
• Visited and hiked at Mother Cabrini Shrine
• Hiked some lil trail near the Shrine
• Got some very sketchy burritos at a Mexican shack
• Went to the Denver Stockshow and Rodeo (Wild Cow Milking is a wild event to watch)
• Did some donuts in an icy parking lot
• High Solemn Mass and Sunday espresso with a new friend
• Ultimate frisbee with some young Denver Catholic hooligans
• Went to a Denver Theology on Tap and had an EPIC conversation on the way there
• Rollerbladed a touch
• Crashed my bike descending a mountain in Boulder
• Got really good at First Aid (definitely cashed in that Merit Badget)
• Went under the radar and sat in on Anna’s classes at the Augustine Institute (Master in Theology is much different than Engineering lectures)
• Tried to get into a speakeasy but ended up playing darts at a dive
• Suffered a few days not moving
• Drove back to Kansas City, where I was hoodwinked into going to a Exodus90 meet and greet with the founder and giving a testimony of my experience with the program (thanks Devin, you know I love extemporaneous speeches to strangers)

Playing at Red Rocks

Some new friends!

Taken about 5 seconds after crashing my bike. Gotta stay positive.

Sunrise in Lone Tree

    I’ll draw this story to a close with an excerpt from my Journal on January 9th while at a coffee shop after Mass.

“Denver is full of possibility, the call to adventure, presence of intoxicating beauty, and population of avid sportsmen (and women) is overwhelming me. I feel as though I could not possibly live here lest I succumb to being restless and full of wanderlust everyday. I feel a certain melancholy for ordinary things, boring things, mundane things, where I must hunt for the beauty and behold it like a prized treasure when I unearth it. The mountains, amazing young people, and lifestyle here is certainly beckoning me, but I do not desire it presently for I have been warned of its allure in prayer.”

    The trip was really really fun and I have some interesting lessons that I learned along the way about the nature of life, adventure, and taking the unexpected contradictions with faith and hope. I met some really awesome people (if you're one of them, I promise you’ll get a letter soon.) Cheers to another fun trip.


Sincerely,


John Rausch
AMDG