The Garden of the Gods

MANILA, Philippines - Around 1858, American adventurers in search of fortune headed west across the Great Plains, crying “Pike’s Peak or bust!”

Although there was gold to be found on the slopes leading to Pike’s Peak, not everyone struck it rich in the Rocky Mountains. But the estimated 100,000 people who participated in what was later called the Colorado Gold Rush found a landscape blessed with nature’s bounty and an invigorating Alpine climate, 6,000 feet above sea level.

The prospectors worked with Native American Indians who had long roamed the mountains and plains. The lifestyle of that period in the American west can still be glimpsed in certain areas in Colorado.

I didn’t see Pike’s Peak, but I joined a tour, with a cowboy as a guide, of the gateway to the snow-capped peaks – an area of sandstone and limestone formations in El Paso County, called the Garden of the Gods.

Just a short drive from downtown Colorado Springs, Garden of the Gods is a public park sprawled across 1,300 hectares, where visitors can hike, bike, walk their dogs and climb the steep rock formations.

The story is that one of the surveyors in 1859, the peak of the Gold Rush, described the area as a “capital place for a beer garden,” but his companion called it a garden of the gods, and the latter name stuck.

Someone drunk on beer or high on peyote must have seen visions as he contemplated the spectacular rock formations, and gave them names such as the Kissing Camels, the Three Graces and Cathedral Spires.

Cadets of the US Air Force Academy march in front of the most popular attraction in their campus, the Cadet Chapel.

The names have endured, and are printed on pamphlets for visitors. Those who don’t like hiking can ride a horse or rent a Segway, but they will miss scrambling up the steep rocks and being treated to a panoramic view of Colorado Springs.

Our group was not warned about rattlesnakes so I guess the snakes learned long ago to steer clear of humans along those well-trodden hikers’ paths. But we were told that the mountains are home to many wild animals, although like the snakes, the dangerous ones such as bears and wolves stay out of sight.

Driving in a quiet, upscale neighborhood one night in Colorado Springs, our vehicle nearly slammed into a deer. The animal quickly scampered away.

The furs and preserved heads of wild animals that roam the mountains are on display at the Garden of the Gods souvenir shop. At the Trading Post, built in the early 1900s in the style of the Pueblo Indians’ home by an Italian merchant, Navajo rugs, sand paintings and traditional pottery are on display together with contemporary jewelry and glass sculpture.

There is another spot that gives a panoramic view of the city: the United States Air Force Academy. Its most unique feature is a chapel used by different faiths. The chapel’s design is clearly inspired by aviation principles, reminding visitors of airplane parts.

Nestled along the slopes of the Rocky Mountains, the academy is the Air Force equivalent of West Point and Annapolis. It offers 32 majors including astronautical engineering, geospatial science and space operations.

Colorado Springs is home to five military bases, and military personnel – both in the active service and retired – account for about a fourth of the city’s population of 410,000. The president of the City Council, Scott Hente, is a retired Air Force officer who attended the Air Force Academy and was deployed to Saudi Arabia during the first Gulf War.

The massive mountain range is where US forces train for deployment in the forbidding mountains of Afghanistan. A section of the mountain range has been developed as a refuge for the president of the United States in case Washington becomes the target of a nuclear attack.

The academy’s most popular tourist attraction is the all-faith Cadet Chapel. Built from 1959 to 1963 at a cost of $3.5 million, the chapel with its 17 spires towers 150 feet into the Colorado sky. Contributions from individuals and organizations of different faiths financed the interiors.

There are three levels in the chapel. The main entrance opens to the upper level, which is the Protestant nave with a pinnacled ceiling 99 feet high. Tetrahedrons with stained glass windows form the walls. A marble slab shaped like a ship serves as the altar. Above it hangs a cast aluminum cross over 46 feet high, 12 feet wide and weighing 1,200 pounds. Pews made of American Black Walnut can seat 1,200, with each pew end resembling the propeller of a World War I plane. A massive classical pipe organ sits above the main entrance.

The newest addition to the worship area overlooks the chapel and sits on top of a hill. Called the Cadet Chapel Falcon Circle, it is a place for Earth-centered spirituality.

An entire pew near the altar is permanently cordoned off from the public to commemorate the soldiers who have lost their lives in America’s wars.

A smaller classical pipe organ is installed at the middle level of the chapel, which is for Catholics. Behind the altar, fashioned out of Italian white marble, is an abstract mural of mosaic glass depicting the firmament. Marble figures 10 feet tall of the Virgin Mary and the Archangel Gabriel are superimposed on the mural to depict the Annunciation. The Carrera marble was drawn from the same quarries where Michelangelo sourced his stone.

A cross six feet tall and made of nickel-silver is suspended above the altar. Panels of amber glass, with windows of multicolored cast glass, line the side walls from floor to ceiling. The pews, also made of American Walnut, seat 500.

On the same middle level is the Jewish Chapel, which is designed like a circle within a square and seats 100 in individual chairs. The foyer surrounding the circle of the synagogue is paved with 1,631 pieces of Jerusalem stone donated by the Israeli Defense Forces.

On the foyer is a display cabinet for a Torah Scroll that was saved from the Nazis and is called the “Holocaust Torah.” It was found in an abandoned warehouse in Poland in 1989 and donated to the chapel the next year.

The walls of the synagogue are adorned with the paintings of Israeli artist Shlomo Katz, rendered on curved wooden panels with an overlay of gold leaf.

Also at the middle level is the 300-square-foot Buddhist Chapel or Dharma Hall. Constructed out of a rare, fragrant cedar used for temples in Japan, it features a Burmese Buddha figure and a Chinese incense burner from the 19th century. The altar and alcove, made of American Cherry and Ash, were designed by a Japanese woodworker.

Towering 150 feet high, the Cadet Chapel has three levels. At the Protestant nave, a classical pipe organ sits above the main entrance.

At the lower level is the All-Faiths room and Muslim prayer room, simply adorned with prayer rugs.

The building is designed to insulate each chapel from sounds in adjoining worship areas even if religious services are held simultaneously.

All academy cadets are required to undergo a “religious respect program” and be aware of religious diversity. As of last September, there were 11 faith groups in the academy, including “Earth-centered spirituality” whose adherents include pagans, Druids and Wiccans. Eleven cadets identified themselves as Muslims.

Earlier this year, the 15 cadets who identified themselves as followers of Earth-centered spirituality finally had their own worship area, but outside the main chapel. On May 3, the “Cadet Chapel Falcon Circle” was inaugurated, at the top of the hill a short hike from the main chapel, with a panoramic view of the academy and the valley below.

It is a perfect place to contemplate the history of Pike’s Peak, and the natural forces that created those magnificent rock formations of Colorado.