Day 2 started with a tour of the Air Force Academy. We started with the base chapel which is world renowned and it didn’t disappoint. They have four sections. The main section is a Protestant or maybe non-denominational section. It was very large and had beautiful architecture and a huge organ in the back on the second level. The next level down had three more sections. One was for Catholic services, one was for Jewish services and the last was for Muslim services. No comment. The Jewish section had an original scroll that was found in an abandoned factory building in Poland in 1989 that had survived the Nazi holocaust. The scroll was written on parchment paper and is over 200 years old.

From there we stood on the patio overlooking the courtyard and were entertained by a group of new cadets being introduced to military fitness training. It brought back memories and was fun to watch. Especially the cadets that were in not so great shape that lagged significantly behind. Although I did have to give them a little slack, there were some that were definitely not used to the altitude there and I can remember when we started hiking at these higher altitudes I could definitely feel it. Next we went to a courtyard that had smaller scale displays of many of the Air Force aircraft used over the years. And finally we went to the visitor center and browsed the interesting displays they have there covering the history of the academy as well as a day in the life of a cadet there. And, of course, we shopped.