Bishop's Castle

When we left Aspen on Friday, I told Steve that I didn't want to know where we were going. I knew that we were going to take 2 days to get to Santa Fe and Steve had mentioned all kinds of different ideas for where we might meander on our route.

I wanted to be surprised.

And, I was.

We drove and drove, the final stretch on windy mountain roads through a torrential hail, lightning and thunderstorm.

And then we pulled up to a clearing with a medieval vision rising among the pines.

Unbelievable.

Jim Bishop is a freak. He's a bit of a libertarian crossed with an anarchist who's been building this castle since 1969 singlehandedly.

The castle is full of wrought iron (Jim being a wrought iron worker since his teens) and gets more and more treacherous the higher you climb. I chickened out about 2/3 of the way up but Steve made it all the way to the highest point.

Yikes.