The Flying W Ranch rises from the ashes

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Whoever claimed that time travel wasn't real, was bluffing. The portal, certifiably, is located where Chuckwagon Road meets the Rampart Range. There, sits a plot of land surrounded by jettisoned red rocks, where traffic fades away.

Visitors enter through iron gates and become transported to the Old West; where blacksmiths, trains, and paired oxen descend on a property where they serve up wholesome melodies and memories of the past (and the best-baked beans and smoked brisket anyone could ever imagine.)

Hard to believe that this oasis was literally obliterated just ten years ago during the Waldo Canyon Fire.

The Flying W Ranch was one of the first landmarks confirmed to have fallen during the inferno of 2012. That moment was one where Colorado Springs residents felt vulnerable to the fast-approaching flames. The fire was no longer just far away in the foothills, it was clawing at their door.

"It took 60 years to build, and 60 seconds to destroy," says the Flying W General Manager, Aaron Winter, recounting that June, ten years ago. "Your whole life flashes before your eyes."

From the day the fire was reported, Winter, and other staffers began evacuating the ranch's many animals, and loading up the landmark's many antiquities -- even though, he admits, he was skeptical the Waldo Canyon Fire would reach the grounds.

"Ever since that Saturday, I kept saying, 'It's not going to come to the ranch, it's not going to come to the ranch.  It's impossible, it's not going to happen.' When it finally did, it just kinda hit."

Winter showed us to where he stood, pointing in the direction of where the flames came rushing down the mountain.

"The fire came right in that bowl. Straight down. I still have dreams about it."

Obvious fire breaks still remain, put in place well before 2012, but even they were no match for the fire that defied physics.

The fire took out all of the property's historic buildings -- leaving only Marion's Cooking Library -- which was untouched by the flames.

Waldo would shutter the ranch for years, as insurance on historic buildings would prove scattered at best, and the once pristine landscape was charred, littered with blackened trees.

But, through endless volunteer hours, log by log, the place came back to life, re-opening in 2020 to a different kind of challenge, COVID.

"I saw the power and the love of our community," smiles Winter, referring to the hundreds who helped the place recover.

Now, as the ranch resurrects, in its 70th season, it's back to doing what it does best: enlivening the spirit of the Old West.

For more information on the Flying W Ranch, click here.