Santa Fe - Day 1

We left Denver this morning on our way to our last destination, Santa Fe.  We stopped on our way to the Fallen Firefighter Memorial in Colorado Springs.  Every September, fire fighters from all over the US and Canada come there to remember those who lost their lives in the line of duty.  Since we have never had the opportunity to go then, we thought we would stop since we were driving through.

There isn't much to say about the memorial.  It was beautiful, but looking at all of the names on the walls leaves you speechless.

The largest sculpture in the center of the memorial. It's a firefighter climbing a ladder.  I didn't see a title to this one, but I think he's climbing a ladder to heaven.

One of the other sculptures.  A firefighter crying.

Empty boots and helmet

Just part of the walls.  Names of firefighters who have dies in the line of duty are listed here by date.

Look carefully at these walls.  These are some the firefighters who died on 9-11

A poem.  Enlarge and read.

After stopping at the memorial, we finished our journey to Santa Fe.  We are stopping here because Ethan's hitting coach coaches a professional baseball team called the Santa Fe Fuego.  He works with several of the boys from Valley's team and told them that if they were ever in Santa Fe, they could come and hit with the guys and shag balls.  So, when we planned this trip, a couple of Ethan's teammates decided to join us.  They were already here when we arrived and planned on not only going to tomorrow's game (which we had planned) but to also go to tonight's game.  So we dropped Ethan off at the ball park just as they were getting practice started.  

While Ethan was hitting and shagging, Stan, Nikki and I went to find the hotel and get some dinner.  Then Stan dropped us off at the hotel and joined the boys at the game.  Hopefully I will get to join them tomorrow and get some photos.