Dragonman

Posted on May 23, 2022 by Roger

Dragonman is all about guns — selling them, shooting them, owning them. Dragonman is Mel Bernstein, owner of a gun shop, shooting range, and military museum in the prairie east of the Colorado Spring Airport. His museum is only open to guided tours, and then only on Sunday mornings during the warmer months. (We understood the “warmer months” restriction because we went on a chilly day, and the unheated museum was cold.) It all sounded interesting to me, so I invited my son-in-law and daughter along.

I’m not sure I would describe what we saw as a collection — it was more of an obsession. You name it, especially if it has to do with WWII, and Dragonman has a pile of it — vehicles, uniforms, guns, flags …

The drive into Dragonland is lined with shot-up cars and mannequins with dire warnings about what will happen to trespassers or anyone who messes with the Dragon.

Dragonman and two other guides took turns explaining things — probably because they had to give their voices a break after yelling. There were maybe 70 people on the tour — far too many for everyone to be able to hear and see what the guides were talking about. The tour took two-and-a-half hours and was an odd mix of history, showing off and bragging about individual pieces in the museum, and humor. It was very American, patriotic, and red-blooded — the sort of thing that drives the left crazy — which made me happy. Some of the history was simplistic. How many of the claims about the various items were stretched for dramatic effect, I can’t say. Near the end of the tour, we went through three large rooms filled with gas pumps, mannequins dressed in 50’s clothing, hot rods, and Elvis kitsch. The tour went on and on and on until it became too much — it seemed like Bernstein can’t help himself and has to buy everything he sees.

He fought in Viet Nam, so he has to be in his late 60’s or early 70’s, but he claims he has no intention to stop collecting stuff. Here he’s holding up a pistol that is the identical make and model of the one Booth used to kill Lincoln.

I’ll let the pictures and video tell the story.

Inside a half-track.

All the mannequins were covered in plastic, which was a little creepy.

He claimed that his collection was 100% authentic and 90% operational.

Supposedly this was Saddam Hussein’s scrapbook in which he posted newspaper articles about himself.

Gas masks for babies. When Dragonman listed biological weapons, he included Covid 19.

The item on the bottom is a belt buckle gun that actually works. On top are wooden bullets, used by the Germans for practice.

Items from the Holocaust.

WWI trench binoculars.

Demonstrating a still-operational and loaded German cyanide capsule — or so we were told.

A single-use gun dropped behind lines for the resistance.

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The Broadmoor Manitou & Pikes Peak Cog Railway

Posted on May 16, 2022 by Roger

The incline railroad up Pikes Peak was on our goal list from the start of our time in Colorado. We didn’t get around to it during our first couple years and then it shut down for major repairs. It only opened again in late 2021. Before long it was 2022 and our time in Colorado was growing shorter. My wife’s friend came out for a visit and we grabbed the opportunity to finally make the trip. The tickets were $68.50 each.

We drove to Manitou Springs the morning after I returned from Arizona. We were on the first train of the day. After some strange brouhaha in the parking lot in which some guy asked me how I got there and told me I was in the wrong place — and then let me park there anyway, we boarded the train.

The trip up the mountain was faster, far less scenic, and less uphill-feeling than I expected. What views there were were out the windows on the other side of the car, and they didn’t last all that long.

This was our view most of the way up.

In a desperate attempt to make the trip interesting, a guide kept up a steady stream of information, giving advance notice of every tiny waterfall along the way, etc. He said that Bighorn Sheep were sometimes seen on the trip, and several people in our car got all excited. Not far from the top, I spotted a small herd of females and young on the scree above us and pointed it out — immediately become a hero to several women who thanked me later and let me go ahead of them when detraining.

At one point the guide said, and I quote, “Zebulon Pike wanted to name Pikes Peak ‘Grand Peak’ after his friend Edwin James.” I feel like I’m missing some information.

When we got to the top, we were informed that we had 45 minutes, by which time we’d better be back on the train because we couldn’t catch another and it was a long hike down the mountain. That barely gave us enough time to enjoy the views, visit the gift shop, buy and eat some of the famous donuts, and admire the new visitor center.

The new center is fancy and shiny and doesn’t have nearly the character of the old one, which is now gone.

From our house, we can actually see the morning sun reflecting off the picture windows of the visitor center, which is 17.3 miles away, as the crow flies. Our house is down there somewhere in the center distance.

We saw the things and did the stuff and got back on the train on time. The trip down was a quick and uneventful as the trip up. We sat on the same side of the train, which just backed down the mountain, so we had the same views.

Pikes Peak is a must-see destination, but it’s much more of an adventure to drive up. The railway is faster, but not worth the money.

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Cubs vs. Diamondbacks — Chase Field

Posted on May 14, 2022 by Roger

In early May, I spent 12 days birding by myself in New Mexico and Arizona. Birds were so much my focus that I didn’t stop at any attractions or do anything that didn’t give me a chance to see birds. Except on the final night of the trip. I planned to drive home through Phoenix (to see the Rosy-faced Lovebirds that have established a population there) and, on a whim, I checked to see if the Diamondbacks were in town. They were, and they were hosting the Cubs!

I saw the lovebirds the evening before, and all day I regretted my decision to stick around for the game because it was 104° in Phoenix. I hung out at the zoo for five hours to bridge the gap between when I had to be out of my hotel and when I could get into the ballpark. I arrived at Chase Field shortly after the gates opened.

Chase Field is a domed stadium. The roof can be opened immediately over the field. The longer wall in the photo above is on the outfield side. The panels were opened before the game, allowing the miserably hot air into the stadium and making it stuffy.

I walked around the stadium on the lower and upper levels. It’s an impressive ballpark that somehow doesn’t feel like a giant warehouse (like Miller Field in Milwaukee does). I bought a ridiculously expensive lemonade and chicken sandwich from Chick-fil-a and a keychain and pin in a gift shop, then found my seat.

The pool in right-center field, just beyond the outfield fence.

Randy Johnson!

I was in the upper level behind home plate. It was a long way up, but a gave me a good view of the action. You can see the now-opened panels on both sides of the scoreboard. I know it gets even hotter in Phoenix, but, in my opinion, this day was certainly miserable enough to close the windows and let the air conditioning do its thing.

It was a slow game. Kyle Hendricks pitched for the Cubs and struggled some, but hung in there. The Diamondbacks scored first in the 2nd inning when a walked batter scored on a single. The Cubs tied it in the 4th when Yan Gomes hit a home run. That was the Cubs second hit — they only had four the entire game.

After the game started, three jerks sat in the row in front of me. One of them couldn’t say an entire sentence without some vulgarity and he never stopped talking. Another one  thought it was funny to say “Cold beer here,” every three minutes. And the third thought he was attractive and took his shirt off until a Diamondback employee came and told him to put it back on. They quickly became an irritant. Around the 6th inning, I moved to another seat down the right field line.

Zac Gallen pitched for Arizona. He struck out 9 and had the Cubs looking pretty helpless. The score was tied 1-1 going into the 9th. The game was approaching 3 hours long and I had a 2+ hour drive to Flagstaff yet to make. In the top of the inning, the Cubs “rallied” on three walks, two singles, and a broken-bat ground out by Jason Hayward to take the lead 4-1. I left then and was surprised that I couldn’t get the game — or any news about the game — on the radio. I learned later that the Diamondbacks threatened in the bottom of the 9th, but the Cubs hung on to win 4-2. I enjoyed the park, but the game wasn’t a thriller, the heat was horrible, and I’m not sure it was worth the effort.

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Bird #595 — Rosy-faced Lovebird

Posted on May 13, 2022 by Roger

agapornis roseicollis

Chandler, Arizona — CVS Pharmacy on Chandler Boulevard

Friday, May 13 — 3:21 pm

When I planned the trip to Arizona, I had eBird generate a list of birds most-frequently seen in Arizona that weren’t on my life list. This small parrot was high on that list. It’s natural range is southwest Africa, but a population has established itself in and around Phoenix. It’s countable because the population is self-sustaining and has been for 15 years. I thought it might be fun to drive home through Phoenix and see a parrot. I didn’t take into account the ridiculous temperatures in Arizona. It was 98° degrees when I got to my hotel and forecasted to be 104° the next day. When I arrived in town and checked into my hotel, I wasn’t particularly interested in going birding.

But I was there, and the bird was there, so I decided to get it done. I checked eBird and saw that Rosy-faced Lovebirds nested in the palms in front of a CVS pharmacy a mile down the road from my hotel. I drove down there and stood in the parking lot while a homeless guy looked on.

Immediately I saw a lovebird perched on a palm frond. For the next five minutes, I watched it doing very little. It once moved to another spot about six inches away from where it had been and faced the other way. It squawked a few times, but that’s about it. Birding at its most thrilling.

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Bird #594 — Botteri’s Sparrow

Posted on May 12, 2022 by Roger

peucaea botterii

Pima County, Arizona — side road off Madera Canyon Road near Florida Wash

Thursday, May 12, 2022 — 9:21 am

I sat in my room on Wednesday night and wondered if I’d stayed in Patagonia a day too long. I had a list of target birds for the trip, and I’d see all the ones I had a practical chance of seeing except for two — Varied Bunting and Botteri’s Sparrow. A bunting had been seen a few days earlier on the Lake Patagonia birding trail. I’d tried to find it on Tuesday and missed it. I found out later on Thursday that it had been seen again that day. I wish I had gone back and tried for it again — this is the one big miss of the trip. The other birds I didn’t see all involved long drives on rough dirt roads and/or being out late at night.

That left the Botteri’s Sparrow.  The problem was that the best spot was at the foot of Madera Canyon, where I’d just been on Wednesday. It meant an hours drive each way, but I’ve gone a lot further than that for a lifer and I felt like I’d exhausted the immediate Patagonia area. I woke up at 5:00 (no alarm) and by 7:00 I was in the Proctor Road parking lot where the birds have been seen regularly as recently as the day before (when I drove right past the place).

Botteri’s is a big, plain sparrow that lives in desert grasslands with scattered mesquite and ocatillo. People had been seeing it right from the lot. I’d only been there about 15 minutes when I saw two birds chasing low through some brush. One landed low in a bush where I could see it through a gap in a closer bush,  but by the time I got my camera on it, it was gone. It looked like a big, plain sparrow with rufous coloring on the wings, a pale bill, and plain grayish white on the breast and belly. Was it a Botteri’s? I think so. Was it a good enough sighting to count? No.

I spent the next hour and forty five minutes walking back and forth in the parking lot and on the entrance road without so much as a glimpse or peep of a possibility. Finally, after two hours, I gave up on Proctor Road. There was another spot on Madera Canyon road that I’d have to pass anyway where someone had see one recently, and I was going to try there but I didn’t like my chances.

But as I was heading toward that spot, I passed an unmarked paved side road. On a whim, I stopped, backed up, and turned. After maybe 150 yard, the road ended at a cul-de-sac . I stopped the car and, before I got out, I could clearly hear a Botteri’s Sparrow singing from a large stand of ocatillo. I took a video of the area with the bird singing to prove I’d found one. I tried to see where it was but couldn’t find it. I looked up the song on eBird and found a recording that I think, by the description, was made at that exact spot — maybe of that exact bird. I played it a few times, and the sparrow landed first on an ocotillo stalk about 10 feet away and then in a mesquite not much further off. I got good looks and photos and am pretty sure the bird I’d seen earlier in the morning was a Botteri’s.  But I know this one was. I watched for about 10 minutes as it moved around the cul-de-sac, then I headed back to Patagonia happy with my 24th lifer of the trip.

Botteri’s Sparrow is a large, plain looking sparrow with a long bill and buffy-gray belly.

The sparrow can be heard singing (faintly) in the first clip of the video, and making chip notes in the second and fourth. The singing in the third clip, I’m pretty sure, is the recording on my phone.

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