So it was an easy decision to buy tickets when I saw that Chicago was performing at the Pikes Peak Center in Colorado Springs. We were almost too late — there were only a handful of seats scattered around the balcony and the very back of the lower level. We ended up in the fifth row of the balcony.
We drove down early and ate tacos at Chipotle in downtown Colorado Springs. We got to the center around 7:15 and bought a program, a hat, and a magnet before finding our seats.
The concert began with a long jam session and a song I wasn’t familiar with, but they soon began playing their classics. I’m not as big a fan of their ’80’s ballady stuff, but they got most of that out of the way in one chunk. It was a very lively concert. The band members really seemed to be enjoying themselves and exerting maximum energy. The 2014 concert, when we saw them perform with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, was great, but we both thought this one was better. The video screens made the music visually captivating too.
Three of the original members were still around — a third of the total band. They guy who did most of the vocals, Neil Donnel, had a more authentic Chicago sound than the lead singer at the last concert. Again, the drums during “I’m a Man” were the highlight.
I’ve Been Searching So Long
Make Me Smile, which was interrupted by a long jam session and medley of other songs. It’s my favorite Chicago song.
Old Days
I’m a Man — The drum duet in this next video is worth watching.
25 or 6 to 4 — I wonder how many times I’ve heard this song in my life, and what’s the longest stretch of time I’ve gone without hearing it? It’s about writing a song, but we used to pretend that it was about writing a term paper.
This was definitely the way to see a concert. A small venue with good views and sound, free parking within 300 feet of the door, and on the interstate headed for home 10 minutes after the music stopped. We were home shortly after 11.
Palmer Lake, Colorado — Pike-San Isabel National Forest — Ice Cave Creek Trail
A friend and I hiked up to the upper Palmer Lake Reservoir, then made the loop up over the ridge to the northern end of the Ice Cave Creek Trail. We hiked that trail back toward the reservoirs. We were near the south end where it winds down to the reservoir trail when I saw a small bird fly across the path and dive into a small spruce down the slope. From its direct flight and the way it headed for the center of the tree, I thought it was a woodpecker. I walked to the place where I could best see into the spruce and scanned with my binoculars.
Not a woodpecker. The owl was perched on a horizontal branch about five inches from the trunk, facing me. It was just above my eye-level about 45 feet away. My friend came up and I pointed out the owl. For the next 20 minutes we watched it and tried to get photos and videos. Neither of us had cameras, so all that follows was taken by holding our phones up to our binoculars.
The owl didn’t do much. When it wasn’t staring back at us, it was swiveling its head from side to side. We saw it throw up a pellet at one point. For a minute or so, it fluffed up its feathers and then preened under a wing.
It was tiny, about the size of a bluebird. It was brown and white, with white spots on its brown chest and brown streaks on its white belly. It’s eyes were yellow. It had prominent white eyebrows which gave it an angry look. We could see a couple of yellow toes, which were huge for a bird that size. Its long, thin tail was dark with thin white stripes.
Northern Pygmy-Owls are often active in the daytime, but they sit on interior branches in evergreens and so are not easy to see. I knew they were around — I hoped I would luck on one sometime. When I first realized what it was, I got a little giddy. I climbed a couple feet up-slope to get this photo without the view-blocking branch.
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On a beautiful evening after a long and uneventful day of birding, a friend and I wandered over to Coors Field to see a Rockies Game. We parked in a sketchy dirt lot under a highway ramp for $20 and hid anything that might be conceived as valuable.
We bought our tickets at the gate. We sat in the upper deck just on the home plate side of first base. From this angle we could see the mountains in the distance. Our view of first base was obscured by the railings around a stairway, so we moved down to the front row. The view was better here, but after an inning four women showed up with tickets to the seats we were in. By this time, other people were sitting in our seats, so we moved down a section, still in the front row. The park wasn’t very crowded.
The game was a tight pitchers’ duel for the first five innings, but the Mets hit three home runs in the sixth including Pete Alonso’s league leading 48th. Charlie Blackmon hit a meaningless home run for the Rockies in the 9th. The Rockies looked lifeless, like the last-place club they are. There really wan’t much excitement in the game, but we had a pleasant, relaxing three hours and were home by 10:45.
Pete Alonso, with Tony Wolters behind the plate for the Rockies.
Nolan Arenodo, with Wilson Ramos catching for the Mets.
I had forgotten that Phil Regan — at 81 years of age — was the pitching coach for New York. He went out for a mound visit in the later innings and actually trotted off the field.
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A friend is in town for a week. We headed to Denver to bird on Tuesday. Our first stop was Sand Creek, where I saw the Groove-billed Ani 10 days ago. It’s been seen in the general vicinity every day since, but I had no idea where along the half mile of creek it was likely to be found. Since it spends chunks of time hunkered down in the vegetation, I figured we were in for a long search.
I parked in the same place I parked last visit and hiked to the top of the creek-side berm to see if other birders were around. We spotted two women along the creek just below us. They pointed out a sandpiper wading in the shallows and asked for help identifying it. It was my first Colorado Solitary Sandpiper, a bird I used to see regularly in Illinois.
They didn’t know where the ani was, but they pointed to a small island about 75 yards downstream where it hung out on several recent days. I headed that direction but had only gone about 15 yards when I spotted something dark on top of a patch of matted reeds on the other side of the creek. It was the ani, just hanging out next to a bottle someone had discarded.
It sat there looking around for maybe 10 minutes. A few other birders came by and we chatted with them. The ani took off upstream, landing briefly a few times, then perched on a branch on our side of the creek about 40 yards from where I’d first seen it. It acted a lot more alert here, calling, flicking its tail, and grabbing at something with its bill. After maybe three minutes, it took off again and disappeared below the bank we were standing on.
We headed to Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge, just a couple miles away. We walked a loop trail around a pond and saw very little. We did manage to spot a couple Wilson’s Warblers, and we saw a Snowy Egret in the distance, but that was about it. I wanted to drive the loop road through the refuge and past the buffaloes, but the road was closed because the local prairie dog population has plague. The whole refuge felt dead and depressing.
Our next destination was Red Rocks Park to look for Peregrines and Barn Owls. We stopped at Bob’s Atomic Burgers in Golden for lunch on the way. We struck out on the falcons at Red Rocks, but we could see three Barn Owls on their cliff. Two women were standing nearby. They knew about the owls but weren’t sure where to see them. When they saw me looking through my scope, they asked if they could take a look. Of course, I said yes. This seems to be a regular occurrence when I’m looking at owls, but I don’t mind.
We drove to Chatfield State Park to look for the Sabine’s Gulls that have been there in the past few days. We also struck out on the gulls. Except for Canada Geese, Ring-billed Gulls, Killdeer, and White Pelicans, this park was also dead. We did manage to find two Baird’s Sandpipers. To get to them, we had to hike across an extensive, soft mud flat.
We’d spent an entire day birding in four places that should have been productive and saw a total of 26 species. That’s pathetic. I suppose any day of birding in Colorado that includes a Groove-billed Ani and Barn Owls should be considered a good day, but it wasn’t what I expected. But we had fun, so no complaints. We called off the birding around 4:00 and decided to go see the Rockies/Mets game at Coors Field (next post).
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I pondered the idea of seeing a Broncos game the next time the Bears were in town. Tickets are still too expensive, but I have a bit more discretionary income these days. When I found out the Bears were visiting during week 2 of the 2019 season, I went for it.
Kickoff was at 2:25. I left home at 11:00 and arrived around 12:30. All parking is on the other side of I-25, in the lot for the Pepsi Center. It was a half mile walk from there to the gate.
I had nothing with me except my camera case. As I walked up the steps to the gate, a guy in a uniform told me my case was too large. I questioned his decision. He held up a 8½ x 5½ piece of paper and told me that my case was larger than that. He held it up to my case to prove his point and discovered that he was wrong. He waved me through.
I went through security and was given a towel to wave. I didn’t notice many of these being waved during the game, but I saw a lot of people wearing them on their heads as protection from the sun. It was hot. Game time temperature was 91°, with 41% humidity.
I walked an entire loop around the lower level of the stadium, buying a burnt cheeseburger and fries on the way. I also stopped in the very crowded Broncos merchandise store and stood in line for 20 minutes to buy a $6.75 pin. I then walked up the ramp to the very top level. I came out as far from my seat as I could possible get, so had to make another loop around the upper level, which was packed.
I’d purchased a souvenir cup with lunch that came with free refills. Before I found my seat, I took it to another stand. The guy explained that health code restrictions prevented him from taking my cup into the stand. I had to place it on the counter in front of the registers while He filled another cup and then poured it into mine. I was getting lemonade. The guy said it looked like water and asked me to check it. I told him it was cold and wet, so it was fine.
My seat was on the west side of the stadium, exactly in line with the south end zone. I was maybe six rows from the very top of the stands. I don’t know what percentage of the crowd was Bears fans, but there were a lot. Most of the people in my immediate area had Bears gear on. I was in the middle of a row between a large older guy and a younger beer drinking guy. I didn’t speak to either of them, but had no issues. In fact, the beer drinking guy left at halftime and never returned. There was one Bears fan a couple rows behind me who shouted some obscenities at the beginning of the game, but otherwise everyone seemed pretty good-natured.
The sun was beating on my head for the first hour but then went beneath the stadium behind me. It was still warm, but there was a breeze so it was quite bearable. The pre-game festivities included the Broncos cheerleaders, sky-divers, a horse, an Air Force flyover, and a huge American Flag.
The game itself wasn’t overly exciting. It was 6-3 Bears at halftime. The entertainment was frisbee-catching dogs. I stood up for a couple minutes, but I never left my seat until the game was over.
Two fan things during the game that were pretty cool:
Whenever the Bears attempted a pass and failed, the announcer would say Trubisky’s pass to _______ is — and then he would pause and all the Broncos fans would shout a slow, measured “IN COM PLETE.” You can hear an example of it on my video.
Near the end of the game, when it looked like the Bears had it sewn up, Bears fans behind me were chanting, “Ditka, Bears. Ditka, Bears. Polish sausage, Ditka Bears” over and over.
Whenever the Broncos scored, huge bursts of flame shot out from the top of the scoreboard. It was quite a ways off to my right, but I could feel the heat. The flames were followed by fireworks as the Broncos horse ran across the field.
The Bears finally got the ball down to the Broncos five-yard line in the third quarter. They made three attempts to get into the end zone and failed all three times. But the Broncos kindly committed a penalty that gave the Bears a first down and three more tries. Finally on the sixth attempt, Bears running back David Montgomery managed to just barely push the tip of the ball over the line for a TD.
The way both teams were playing, it looked like the Bears had it won. But the Broncos had three long drives in the fourth quarter. They scored a field goal on the first. On the second, Kyle Fuller intercepted the ball on the goal line. On the third, the Broncos scored a touchdown to make it 13-12 Bears. The Broncos were setting up for a two-point try when they committed a penalty that moved them back. They tried for an extra point to tie the game. The kicker missed it, but the Bears were offside, which moved the Broncos up to the goal line again. They changed their minds again and went for a two-point conversion. They made it. It was now 14-13 Broncos with 31 seconds left.
The Bears completed an early pass. A dubious roughing-the-passer call on the Broncos moved the ball another 15 yards. Several pathetic incompletions later, and it was 4th and 15 with 9 seconds remaining on the clock. The Bears had to get at least 20 yards to be in field goal range, and had to complete the play in time to call their last time out. Trubisky scrambled and completed a pass to Allen Robinson and called time out. The clock said the game was over, and the Broncos were pouring onto the field. The fans in the stands were going crazy. But the refs determined there was 1 second left.
As time expired, Eddy Peiniro kicked a 53-yard field goal into the wind to give the Bears a 16-14 victory. As I took the long walk back to my car, Bears fans were screaming and giving each other high fives. I didn’t have any Bears gear on, so I was ignored, but it was fun to see.
It is very unlikely that I’d ever spend that much money to go to another NFL game, but the huge stadium, the large and enthusiastic crowd, the spectacle, and the outcome made it a lot of fun.
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