MY 50-STATE STRATEGY

This sign sits astride the Continental Divide above both and between Breckenridge and Alma, Colorado. Beathtaking views up here.

TIME TO MAKE THE DONUTS

After pledging my allegiance to salad bars for the next little bit, I hit the road, headed west out of Denver, my swelled belly surely leading the way, its blushing glow lighting my path.
Cruising out I-70, I passed through the Eisenhower Tunnel, which I mentioned several posts ago, then preceded to drive south.
I found I had become a real lead-foot since I no longer had the trailer in tow while visiting The Centennial State.
With the trailer behind me, I must keep pedal-to-medal, so to speak, to usually maintain even the minimum speed limit. After a short span at the start of this trip getting used to driving with the trailer, I have, for the great majority of time since, forgotten that it is back there. I’ve adjusted my driving habits accordingly as far as speed and turning radius, etc. and now, as a matter of routine, with-or-without the trailer, take corners wide and keep pressure on the gas pedal.


Peaks in "The Summit" area south of I-70 west of Denver.

 Still I was shocked when a local policeman stopped me for speeding through the town of Alma, Colorado. With the lights on his cruiser blazing after he called in my Florida plates, the cop breathlessly approached the car and said, “Ya blew right by me!”
Stunned by the accusation, as I had been purposely slowly tooling through the short distance of the burg’s main thoroughfare to acquire some perspective on the town, I still politely asked in reply, “I’m sorry, sir, how fast was I going?”
“Well … 37,” he sputtered, “In a 30 zone! I’ll need to see your license and registration.”
Happy now, convinced I was merely a scofflaw rather than a rank outlaw, I surrendered my papers and sat there, waiting patiently as I (as my late father had once characterized the effort), “catalogued my sins” traffic-enforcement wise. Then positive I was covered in that area, even recent parking tickets promptly paid, I relaxed.
The cop returned and asked me if I had “Any guns, knives or nuclear weapons in (the truck cabin)?”
Secretly amused to realize Homeland Security extends even up to this tiny town atop the Continental Divide, I nodded in the negative.
He rightly handed me back only a written warning along with my papers and, now relaxing himself, asked what I doing so far from Florida. I quickly summarized my trip in total, while deftly dancing around its local component. Soon he was giving me tips on just the best areas and overlooks locally from which to snap photos and we merrily parted company, he surely bound for the local coffee shop and its donut dish, with me crawling back through town, this time going 26 in a “30 zone.”
(Editor's note: The next day, I was pulled over again, this time by a Utah State Trooper for speeding on Route 191 just north of Moab, Utah. But, this time, I was pedal to the metal on the wide-open empty highway. The trooper seemed sympathetic, but it still cost me $75.)
I was in the area to scope out the town of Breckenridge, home to one of my nieces who is was then spending the early summer in Hawaii, and also to investigate the strange juxtaposition of Breckenridge, a small town with big money, and Alma, a small town seemingly with big problems – in the vast expanses among the peaks of the Rockies virtually right next to each other, although separated by 16 miles, gleam vs. grittiness and, big on this small list, the Continental Divide (see above).

Scene just north of Alma, south of Continental Divide.

A (now-passed) pal from Key West, Doc T, had alerted me to this combination. Doc T had lived down below the peaks in Alma for an extended period some 15-or-so years ago and he apprised me of the stunning contrast I would find driving through the mountains – the billionaires’ ski chalets in Breckenridge balanced against broken-down Alma, next along the road, just over the high hills.
And he was right. Pretty-in-pastel Breckenridge sparkles while the shambling hamlet of Alma seems to barely scuffle along, dull, drab and mostly brown.
According to my research, Alma had, as of the 2000 census, a total population of just 179 and, at an elevation of 10,355 feet, it is the highest incorporated municipality in the U.S. Most of Alma’s folks must work over the hills in Breckenridge and, due surely to the permanence of their employment, the per capita income in Alma is slightly higher than the income of the young transients in Breckenridge, many toiling just to fuel their skiing jones.

John C. Breckinridge

Breckenridge has a general head count of just about 2,500 residents, a figure that greatly swells during ski season. However, my niece reported, via phone, that the population has shrunk slightly this summer, as she and about a dozen-or-so of her friends have descended upon Hawaii, no doubt now working to fuel their swimming and surfing joneses.
Early on, the town desired a post office and the townsfolk shrewdly decided to name their town after the Vice President at the time, John C. Breckinridge. The ruse worked, and Breckinridge got its post office. But later, as Civil War broke out, Breckinridge himself sided with the Confederacy and the fickle pro-Union citizens of Breckinridge wanted to change the town’s name in revenge. One i became an e, and it’s been Breckenridge since.
I was only in Alma for a short period (to make some photos for Doc T), but while I must report that, with the general shabbiness of its structures withstanding, the valley the town is confined to is surrounded by spectacular alpine scenery and it’s comforting to know that not all the beautiful places haven’t yet been designated, “Beautiful People Only.”

This stop’s a No-Brainer!

Moving along west, I lodged for the night once again in Glenwood Springs and then set out the next day for Fruita, Colorado, a farming community lying near the state’s western border.
I drove through some fearsome thunder-boomers and close lightning strikes, once pulling off the road for safety and napping while the weather raged. The Colorado River was bubbling brown and white alongside the road, threatening briefly at several turns to swell over its banks. But, finally, the storms subsided and the western edge of the state loomed large.

Mike's monument in downtown Fruita.

It’s here at its southwestern corner that Colorado gets into the desert wonderland business. This fertile valley, due to its proximity to the Colorado River, makes the Grand Junction-Fruita area a desert oasis
The name Fruita here on the Colorado Plateau apparently seems, at least to me, to mean fine for farming. Although it’s Greener around here than the Jolly Giant, it appears corn is Fruita’s chief crop, not melons, grapes, berries or cherries, as its name would suggest. This is the third such bountiful area dubbed Fruita that I’ve traveled through along the trail, and they all have this oasis-style atmosphere to them.
A sleepy town of just about 2,500 households, Fruita is interesting nonetheless, with several building-sized murals about town and a well-attended dinosaur museum near some famous digs in the area. The town is also a gateway to the formidable Colorado National Monument. But I had journeyed here with none of those tourist enticements in mind. I was shooter for bigger game. Because Fruita’s largest attraction is its Chicken!
Mike The Headless Chicken to be exact. (That website is priceless.)
Permit me to briefly explain. Near the close of World War II, on Sept. 10, 1945, a local farmer, Lloyd Olson, fancied some fowl for Sunday dinner and proceeded to behead one of his own roosters with a good, sharp ax. However, Olson’s aim was high, leaving some of the bird’s brain stem intact. After flopping about in its mortal throes, the bird suddenly regained its feet and starting blindly fumbling about, then began flapping its wings and preening around as many a proud pullet often will. This strange occurrence, no doubt, overshadowed the family’s eagerly awaited Sunday sit-down and surely was the number one topic around the Olson table. There’s no record of what type of fare Mother Olson served up that fateful day.
As for Fruita, it’s never been the same.
Amazed and baffled by this turn of events, after several days Farmer Olson began to feed the bird with an eyedropper through its open neck. Mike began to gain weight and soon was crowing and pecking – sort of – just like any other chicken living without its head might.

Poster for 2006 "Headless Chicken" festival.

Being a male, this rooster would never lay the proverbial golden egg, but for Olson and the sharp promoter he hooked up with, H.B. Wade, the bird turned into a goldmine. Folks from all around began turning up in Fruita to eyeball the miracle chicken for themselves, Salt Lake City scientists had their say, Time & Life editors dispatched some shutterbugs and, before you knew it, the next stop was Hollywood.
Truly the talk of Tinseltown, “Miracle Mike” was put up in the plushest of people palaces, fed the finest grains, and soon this cap-less capon was a star. A legend set in large-letter type, Mike’s progress was daily fodder for the national newshounds.
Ripley’s Believe It or Not and The Guinness Book of World Records soon set the story of Mkle in print and a sideshow legend was born. Mike, now insured for $10,000, toured the country, appearing in circuses, headlining freak shows, on stage, no doubt, right after the bearded lady and a two-headed cow
Mike’s appearances were very lucrative for the Olsons, earning the family around $4,500 per month. That total wasn’t just chickenfeed back in the ‘40s, the equivalent of $45,000 a month today.
Mike was now considered The Prince Of All Things Poultry. However, uneasy sits the crown on a headless “hen” and Mike choked to death sometime in 1947, ending his reign as the carnival King Cockerel.
Each May, Fruita celebrates Mike’s life and lore, fare or fowl, with a weekend of festivities, including a 5K run, a chicken dance and an auto show. With food, entertainment and raffles, it’s a regular barnyard bonanza.
Fruita memorializes Mike with a Headless Chicken statue at the corner of Aspen and Mulberry Street. It’s made of old tools, wrenches, chisels and the like, some horseshoes, a few railroad spikes, etc. – just about anything metal that its artist, Lyle Nichols, could find to weld into that form (see above).
And, thanks to Mike, I’ll never be able to call anyone a birdbrain with the same sense of conviction again…

Monumental Minutes

My plan had been to enter the Colorado National Monument at its Grand Junction entrance and follow its Red Rock Drive for the 23 miles, exploring inside the park through to the Fruita entrance gate, from where I would then begin the search for Mike the Headless Chicken. But the storms mentioned above precluded that notion, and the events happened in reverse order.

 The 600-ton Balanced Rock.


With just a short while to explore the Monument I entered at the Fruita gate. The park service brochure describes the 32 square-mile area as, “One of the great landscapes of the American West. Big, bold and brilliantly colored.”
As I drove up to the Visitor’s Center, about four miles from the gate, the scenery was indeed breathtaking,. The road rises along the way, up almost 1,100 feet along the cliff walls, to about 5,800 feet, I observed many a geological wonder among the many switchbacks and hairpin turns, including a splendid example of the Balanced Rock, this one a 600-ton version (these formations appear to be a staple of National Parks in the West) and the Book Cliffs, some very tall blade-like rocks, seemingly arranged like books in a bookcase.
The camping options at Saddlehorn campground reminds one of the Arches with sagebrush, red clay colors and varied vegetation high up on a plateau, surrounded by canyon walls. Many sites here also contain unusual rock formations.

There is a full-service Visitors Center at the park’s west end. I wish I had more time to explore here, but that storm I met heading west cost valuable time.

The Book Cliffs in the Colorado National Monument.