Fort Carson, Colorado: The 4th Infantry Division Museum

After Nebraska we headed south to Fort Carson, Colorado. The Fire Team had only seen one Independence Day fireworks display in their lives, so we wanted to make sure that they got a good one this year. Of course, it's Colorado Springs, so we spent an hour huddled under a pavilion with 50 other people waiting for a torrential rainstorm to pass, but once it did the weather was awesome and the fireworks were great. 

We were stationed at Fort Carson from February 2009 to January 2011, so we spent a lot of our time in the Springs catching up with friends from several different eras of our Army life, as well as some family. But, we also carved out some time to see and do some cool stuff. Of course, one of the things at the top of our list was the Fourth Infantry Museum. 

John has some history with 4th ID. He was in 1/22 from 2002-2004 when they were still at Fort Hood, Texas and he deployed with them during the initial invasion of Iraq. Fast forward a lengthy recruiting assignment and John and the 4th ID both moved to Fort Carson, where John went to Afghanistan with 2/12. We were only at Carson for 22 months (we don't like to stay in any one place for very long!), but I would be remiss if I did not mention that our time in Colorado was well spent, forging relationships with some of the most precious people we know (including the amazing moms who encouraged us to homeschool, who we can never repay for their inspiration and support!). 

All that to say, how could we pass up the 4th ID Museum? We couldn't, so here it is...

He was particularly fond of this head gear.

The museum had a 'please touch' table with different head gear and military equipment on it. One of the pieces was an L-angle flashlight. I'm officially old. 

The personal items are the most interesting to me in a military museum. I loved these old cards they had on display.

WWII map

Vietnam era momentos

We spent most of our time in the Iraq section of the museum and John answered lots of kid questions about the war, Saddam Hussein, and the Iraqi people. 

John and I took a few quiet minutes together to remember that time in our life and our marriage and to thank the Lord that He had brought us so far. 

We had been married just over a year that spring. John bought me tickets to a concert for my birthday that year, but on the day that it was scheduled there was a freak ice storm in Texas and the concert was cancelled. They rescheduled it for a Friday a few months later. I was working at a bank investigating fraudulent credit card purchases at the time. My phone rang as soon as I got to my desk that morning. It was John.

"Hey, we got the call, I'm leaving for Iraq"

"When?"

"Tonight"

Needless to say, I gave away those concert tickets and took the rest of the day off to spend with my husband (and to this day I have not seen Kenny Chesney!).

I remember that day as clearly as if it had been last week. It's the day I started the tradition of dropping John off as if it were just another duty day, kissing him goodbye at the car, instead of dragging out the last few hours in the gym. It's the day I first felt a whole new kind of fear -- the kind that settles in to the corners of your mind and the pit of our stomach and the deepest crevices of your heart and doesn't leave until you have your arms around his neck again. It was the first day of the 365 that would teach us so much about ourselves, and our marriage, and shape our future in ways that I could not even comprehend that night as I sat, blubbering, in my 1985 Bronco watching my soldier husband smile and wave and walk into the gym, for what I anticipated might be the very last time. 

But, enough about that...

Back to the museum.

The 4th ID gets the credit for catching Saddam, and as such, they have a cool display about his capture.

I still have this exact newspaper in storage! 

I was hoping to see this famous statue, which was sculpted by an Iraqi artist from a melted statue of Hussein, but it's still at Fort Hood.

The museum is small, but contains some really interesting pieces, and if you have any history with the 4th ID, you can't miss it. If you don't have a history with 4th ID, it's still really cool, and it's free, and it's located outside the main gate of Fort Carson, so no ID card or pass is needed, so you can't miss it either!
And also, every blog post reminds me that I clearly have a habit of looking at cool stuff at museums, but not taking pictures, so you'll have to trust me on this one (again!) and I promise to work on it in the future! 

Outside the building there are several vehicle static displays, which are always G's favorite. He loves guessing what era a vehicle came from and what it was used for. At eight, he usually ends up schooling me in this area, which I think makes him enjoy it even more. 

With the Iron Horse.

The Rocky Mountain view from the museum parking lot. Fort Carson definitely has the best view of any stateside duty stations. 

John talked a lot about paint colors and camouflage techniques while I just trailed behind taking pictures. 

A statue of Kit Carson, after whom the installation is named.

And that's where the fun part of our visit ended. 

On the grounds is also the Mountain Post Global War on Terrorism Fallen Soldier Memorial. On there, we recognized more names than we were comfortable with, mostly from John's 2009-2010 Afghanistan deployment. We took some time to point them out to our fire team, and share some personal stories about memories forged with some of the patriots who gave the last full measure of devotion.

In particular, we talked about this guy...

Sergeant Sean M. Durkin, who died April 9, 2010 after being hit with an IED. Our own Sayer Sean is named for him and we miss him everyday, every time we say their name out loud.

It was a solemn, but necessary, visit. It is our most sincere desire that the sacrifice made by those listed on these slabs is never in vain, and so we teach our children that they should do all they can to ensure that doesn't happen. But, as we walked away from the memorial that day I realized how hard it is to come up with words that really capture the spirit of the names carved into this, and numerous other, memorials. Really, it is difficult to come up with words that capture the spirit of the War Generation, the faces that I scroll through on FB, or the one I wake up with every morning. Their spirit that says, indelibly, "I'll fight for the things I hold most dear. I'll die so that my brother may live. For those I love, I will sacrifice." So, all I could do that day was thank God for the sacrifices represented on that memorial, and for every person I know who embodies that spirit still. 

Nebraska: Carhenge and Chimney Rock

When we left Badlands we headed south so that we could drive through the Pine Ridge Reservation and see the Wounded Knee Memorial. I'm glad that we took that route and were able to spend the drive talking to the Fire Team about that portion of America's history, as tragic as it may be. But, we opted not to take pictures of that part of our trip. Somewhere between the tragedy of the history and the destitution of the area taking pictures didn't seem appropriate. 

We stopped that night in Chadron, Nebraska, which has nothing going for it but that it is the home of the Museum of Fur Trade. The girls and I could have moved right along, but the boys not so much, and I'm glad that it was that way. It was an interesting museum that held a wealth of information about the fur trade and the role it played in the development of the nation. At $2 a person, it couldn't be beat.

From Chadron we headed to Colorado, stopping at two major roadside attractions -- Carhenge and Chimney Rock.

Carhenge is in Alliance, NE and it is what you would think it is based on it's name - an exact replica of Stonehenge made of cars. There are some other pieces of car art on the grounds, but Carhenge is the main attraction. A man decided to make it as a tribute to his dad sometime in the 1980's and reading the guestbook tells that people come from all over the place to check this off of their roadside attraction bucket list. 

A few other pieces made entirely from car parts...

After Carhenge we headed to Ballard to visit Chimney Rock. Chimney Rock is a vintage roadside attraction. It served as a major stopping point on the Oregon Trail, presumably because it's incredibly unique shape made it nearly impossible to miss. The kids read about the rock last fall when we did our Oregon Trail unit study, so it's been on our road trip list for a long time. Unfortunately, we ended up visiting on a day when the visitor's center was closed. P was super bummed, but John reminded her that there was no visitor's center when the pioneers rode by here, so she was seeing it in the most authentic fashion.

Patton's bummed face.

So, Nebraska was pretty uneventful, but we did get a couple of roadside attractions checked off the list!

Next up, Colorado...

Badlands National Park & Minuteman Missile National Historic Site

Badlands. 

Another place that I didn't know I wanted to go until I got there, and another place for which this blog post is not going to do justice. 

Sometime during our Black Hills tour we decided that we didn't want to go to North Dakota on this leg of the road trip, but we weren't sure where we were going to go instead (don't worry, Kati! We'll be through on our way back from Minnesota!). I vaguely remembered John mentioning the badlands, so we looked at it on the map and headed that way. 

Badlands has two campgrounds -- one that is cheap and one that is free. As far as we could discern from reading on the two there wasn't much difference, so we planned on staying at the free campground. Our national parks book said that the park is obscure enough that the campgrounds never fill up, so we weren't worried about getting a camping spot. What we didn't know was that a flash flood had washed out the road to the campground where we had planned on staying, pushing everyone to the other campground, which was completely full by the time we arrived. Badlands is really isolated, with about 60 miles to the next major city. We ended up paying an arm and a leg to the a campground that was slightly reminiscent of an 80's horror movie to park in a mud hole for the first night of our stay. I wish that I had a picture to show you, but in the moment and in my frustration, posting a picture of it's creepiness was the furthest thing from my mind.

The next morning was the earliest morning we have had on the road trip so far. We didn't want to spend another night at the creepy campground, so we headed back to the park bright and early to get a camping spot and start the exploring. 

The Pinnacles outlook 

Mountain goats on the Pinnacles

Background info -- the Badlands was an ancient sea that left an incredibly unique and fossil rich land formation as it dried up. Native Americans described the area as being "bad lands to pass" and the description gave way to the name of the national park. Wall, South Dakota, about 19 miles north of the park, got it's name because it's location is on the "wall" of the badlands. 

This park is another whose size is very manageable (those parks are usually among my favorites!) and we were able to see every viewpoint, complete the Junior Ranger program, attend several ranger talks,  and see the visitors center and paleontology lab in two days. 

The park also has nightly programs with rotating themes. The night that we attended we learned about the area's Native American history. The badlands are also void of light pollution, making an excellent location for night sky viewing. After the evening ranger talk a volunteer gave a small lecture on constellations and gave everyone a chance to look at Venus and Saturn through high powered telescopes.

At the overlook where we took this picture we met a mother and daughter who were on an annual visit to the area. The daughter had recently retired from teaching grade school in the San Juan School District in Sacramento, where we know both teachers and students. After lots of discussion on who knew whom and what a small world it is, she gave me some great suggestions for reading material for G and P, proving once again that one of the best things about nomad lifestyle is the people that we meet. 

Bighorn sheep!
John commented often on how we would see signs for them but we never saw them. We finally saw them here.

We hadn't originally planned on hiking in Badlands. Mostly because the rattlesnake population far exceeds my comfort level, but John talked me into a short hike on day 2. The kids really enjoyed the open and unique terrain and the fossil hunting (though they came up empty). I didn't enjoy it quite as much as they did, but it was an interesting hike. 

Badlands has an open hike policy, so while there are a few established trails visitors can hike anywhere, which we have learned is not usually the case in national parks. 

The trail head for Castle Trail. Not the hiking landscape you normally think of. 

The little girls were such good hiking sports. 

Halfway through the hike. 

For me, the most impressive thing about Badlands was that we encountered the most knowledgeable rangers to date. When we got the kids Jr. Ranger books we met Ranger Jeff, a biologist who talked to them for about twenty minutes about the rattlesnake on display in the visitors center. He possessed tons of knowledge on snakes and graciously answered all of their questions. Later we attended a fossil talk that he gave and his insight was incredible and, again, his willingness to answer questions kept him chatting with our kids after everyone else had gone about their day.

Listening to Ranger Jeff at the fossil talk

Another unique thing about Badlands is that they have a paleontology lab that you can visit throughout the day. There you can watch paleontologists working in real time and we found them equal as willing as Ranger Jeff to answer questions. I didn't take any pictures because I was so caught up in the conversation.

The next cool thing about Badlands -- it's 20 minutes from the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. Minuteman is one of the newest sites on the national registry, so it's still pretty obscure and the visitors center is still a work in progress. It's absolutely unique, though, and worth a visit. The displays go through the history of nuclear warfare (with lots of great info on the Manhattan Project), the development of nuclear weapons here and abroad, and most extensively, the maintenance of the Minuteman Missiles. If you arrive super early you can book a tour of the preserved underground control room. By early, though, I mean before the rangers arrive. The day we visited they told us that people had started lining up for the tour at 6:30 a.m. 

At a site a few miles away you can see this now disarmed missile still in it's original chamber. 

Taking in all of the information on nuclear warfare definitely gives a different perspective of what is going on behind the scenes of world politics while the rest of us are going about our everyday lives. Of particular interest to me was a lengthy list of nuclear mishaps, one near Beale Air Force Base, CA, near where we lived for several years. 

The bigs picked up another Junior Ranger badge at Minuteman

Another national park and a national historic site checked off the list! 

Wall, SD: Wall Drug

Wall Drug. It's the ultimate ultimate roadside attraction. 

It became popular decades ago when the owners started offering free ice water and five cent coffee, both which you can still get today. Now they have shops, places to eat, odd attractions, and some museum quality displays. 

If you're driving through South Dakota, it's worth a stop, if only for the jackalope picture and a donut (don't miss the donuts!).