Aspen, Trespassing

Cate and I arrived in Aspen just at the start of the Food and Wine Classic--a beautiful event for people with more money to invest in eating and drinking than we have. We arrived, dirty, wet, and snowed-on, and went to a bar where I changed into my new orange long underwear. As I washed my hands in the bathroom, a tipsy woman rushes in, locks herself in her stall, and yells from the stall, "Are you wearing orange PANTS!!!" Giggling, I said yes, and she said, "Oh my god you're totally ROCKING those!" I had to rush out of the bathroom before she saw how dirty I was. Aspen is a fan of my pants.

Cate and I also met a pair of men from the hills of western Virginia, who won an Anheiser-Busch sweepstakes to go to the Food and Wine Classic. They spoke with strong twangs, and said, "We don't drink wine."

We spent Saturday roaming around town, enjoying the ridiculous crowds. We got to test drive a couple pedal-assist bikes, which were SO MUCH FUN! They go 20 miles an hour uphill! If only Cate and I had motors on our bikes. Afterwards, we gravitated to our natural habitat, the Aspen Brewery, where they have a dog and never charge us for all the beer we drink.


Bike shoes (and red pants?) win us discounts at the Aspen Brewery.

On Sunday, we went rafting on The Slaughterhouse, class IV rapids. This was a lot of fun!


Cool booties.

Anyways we finally left Aspen, again, and Cate and I continued on our roundabout route. We followed a bike path for 35 miles, but then got tired and decided to camp on the bike path. This was a strange experience, since the bike path is extremely well-traveled, and it was kind of obvious what we were up to.


Why have such a convenient picnic table if you don't want us to camp here?

Between the ranch manager keeping a close eye on us and the millions of bicyclists going by, we couldn't set up our tent until after 9pm. In the morning, many cyclists were jealous of our pancakes.

The next day we went over Cottonwood Pass to Gypsum, CO--a very beautiful ride up a verdant canyon, though we had to watch out for a missing goose.




Where did it go?

About 10 miles before the top of the pass, the road changed to dirt. Sadly a road crew was enthusiastically watering the road in front of us, and we got VERY muddy.


No we have not showered since then.

Out of Gypsum, we started up a rough, rutted, one lane dirt road over BLM land. After about 5 miles of steep up, the road crossed a private ranch. The owner of this ranch believes that the county road is his private property, and he drove over to us to inform us we were trespassing. He managed to confuse us into thinking that the road had actually gone around his property, and we had missed the turnoff. We almost turned around to go find the road--which did not exist--when he sighed and told us we could continue. "Oh this road does go through?" we asked. We were still confused. Thanks, buddy.

Around 5:30 that evening, we were still biking because the BLM land we thought we could camp on was dry, dusty desert, though it had a great view of the green and beautiful private ranches by the Colorado River. We stopped to fix a flat tire, and one car passed us, stopped, and the driver said, "Do you need a place to camp? You can go right there, I don't mind," and pointed at the lush, treed ranch right in front of us. Thank you ranch man. You are a man of few but important words.


What a beautiful place to camp.

Sadly this man left out the words, "Be careful of the sprinklers that will emerge and drench everything at 4:30 in the morning." These would have been useful words.

The next day, we biked through the Colorado River Canyon for about 25 miles, which was fantastic. Finally we climbed out of the canyon for about 10 miles, and rejoined our route after 11 days of detouring!


Biking next to the Colorado river.

Since we rejoined the route, we have noticed a bunch of Great Divide racers headed in the opposite direction. These riders carry next to nothing, and go about 100 miles a day, following our same route.


We offered a granola bar to this British gentleman, who stopped to chat for a small second, but he couldn't possibly take it. Race rules.

Finally we arrived in Steamboat Springs. We had been looking forward to Steamboat for awhile now, because of the hot springs! So we stopped for dinner in town, and then rode about five miles, climbing over a thousand feet of elevation, to the hot springs. It would be worth it to get to hot springs, we told ourselves! It was worth it, especially after it got dark and we could surreptitiously eat cookies and take our clothes off.


Riding back down to Steamboat in the morning. This is first time we have ridden behind cars that were actually slowing us down.

Getting High in Colorado

Since Cate and I left Salida, we have been adventuring as much as possible. We knew we had some time to spare, and we got it into our heads to climb some of Colorado's famous 14ers. This turned out to be a fantastic idea, both because we went to some beautiful places, but we also met a lot of interesting people. We spent only one day since leaving Salida on our route--we have spent the rest of our time biking to mountains to climb or avoiding closed roads.


We stayed with Linda and Bernie in Salida and had a very nice rest day.

Out of Salida, we spent a day up on a high, hilly, and competely treeless plateau. When we saw trees on some hillsides, we decided to head in that direction to camp. We ended up camping on someone's very sketchy and abandoned ranch, and we hope they didn't mind. Because if they did they would probably shoot us. There was a nice sunset up there!


North of Salida, in abandoned ranch land.

From here, we planned to go to Fairplay, and in the next day or two, climb Quandary Peak. We had heard at we needed snow shoes for the climb, so we planned on biking all the way to Breckenridge, biking back to the mountain and camping, climbing the mountain the next day, and then returning to Breckenridge to return the show shoes. It sounded like a complicated plan, and so when someone mentioned that he was climbing another 14er near Fairplay, we started grilling him about his equipment. We were sitting outside of the grocery store in Fairplay at the time, having finished our ride that day pretty early. Surprised by our interest, the man, Pastor Dan, offered that we could come with him the next day--he had a whole group of people from his church planning on hiking Mount Sherman, and no one was planning on bringing any special equipment. We though this sounded like a great plan, even though it involved us biking 10 extra miles uphill to camp with Pastor Dan near the trailhead that night. After buying some beer to take to the top of Mount Sherman, we hopped back on our bikes!


Biking to the campsite near the trailhead of Mount Sherman.


Early start the next morning--we were at the trailhead before 7am.


The early start meant we didn't need snow shoes--the snow was still frozen enough to walk over.

Up on the ridgeline, with the peak in the background.


Enjoying Dale's Pale Ale at the top of Mount Sherman, elevation 14,036'!


Demonstrating the "diaper technique"--raincoat around the waist, held up by one hand between the legs. For good form, other hand should be in the air for balance. Diaper technique enables superior glissading speed than butt technique or backpack technique.

After we got back down to the trailhead at 1pm, we were pooped and decided not to bike any more that day. The next day we biked about 28 miles over Hoosier Pass to the base of Quandary Peak, so that the next morning, early, we could hike this 14er as well.


At the top of Hoosier Pass, we met Nick Crumpton, who happened to be biking up from the other side and wearing his Princeton shorts. He also happened to be hiking Quandary the next day, and gave us some information about it. What a small world!


Cate and I have camped in some weird places. This strange concrete structure gave us an excellent patio to set up our kitchen, though the hollow tunnel coming out underneath made weird noises in the wind.

We woke up the next morning at 4:30, and after coffee and muffins, we set out on our bikes about a mile to the trailhead. This hike started down in the trees, and by the time we emerged, the brief sunrise had disappeared and it was snowing. As we followed the east ridgeline up, we scampered over the snow in our sneakers like lynxes, and the sun emerged at odd intervals as we hiked above the clouds.


As we emerged from the trees, it started snowing.


But eventually we climbed above the snow up on the ridgeline.


Right before the final ascent on the narrow ridge. The summit was shrouded in clouds.


Last stretch before the summit.


Enjoying Shlitz Tall Boys at the top of Quandary Peak, elevation 14,265'! Photo courtesy of Nick Crumpton, Breckenridge photographer, who we met again at the summit. You can check out his website here. We had to wait about 20 minutes for the clouds to break to take this photo.


On the way down, we almost walked into this mountain goat. He was shaggy and unafraid of people, and we named him Titus.


Me and Titus. Note jacket is in correct diaper technique position.

We summited by about 8:30am, and were back at the trailhead by 11:00. After a nap at our campsite, we rode the 9 miles down to Breckenridge, where we stayed with Kate Brewer, a friend of Linda and Bernie, who we stayed with in Salida. Her house was really nice, and we met her son, daughter-in-law, and grandson, who were all very interested in our trip. After dinner at the Brewery and dessert at the house, Cate and I were pooped.


Me and Kate in from of her house.

Sadly we had to leave Breckenridge the next day, because we got the ok to head to Aspen for the weekend! This meant we could detour off of our route even more, and spend even more time in Colorado, so we rode our bikes to Leadville the next day , spending almost 15 miles on a bike super-highway.


Our favorite sign. Cate almost died taking this photo. Note man with strange helmet.

Sadly we had to turn off the bike highway and get onto a real highway with no shoulder. This road brought us over Fremont Pass. A lot of mining activity and clean up was going on, which was very interesting, though there were too many trucks for our taste.


Lakes just shouldn't be this color.


Crazy big mine and lots of trucks at the top of the pass.


In Leadville, Cate's friend Tyler offered us lodging at the Outward Bound base camp. We joined their group dinner for everyone living on base, and didn't join them for body shots, but had a good time anyway. It was nice hanging out with a bunch of people our age!


We spent the next two days after Leadville biking to Aspen. Today we went over Independence Pass--the highest point of our entire trip, except for the bits we hiked.

Antonito to Salida

On our way back from Aspen, Max and Luke dropped us off about 18 miles from our route. We camped that night in the flat and dusty San Luis Valley, and biked the 18 miles up into the mountains. We managed to stay on the route for about 25 miles, through Platoro, over Stunner Pass, and then we had to exit again, back down and out of the mountains, before we hit snow again. Unfortunately, this meant we missed the highest point of the entire Continental Divide--Indiana Pass, at 11,900 ft. It would be a long while in Aspen if we waited for that to melt.

Smoke from the wildfires in Arizona meant a heavy haze covered the valley and the mountains for the first four days back on the trail.

Finally a pass we could do! The snow line, we heard, was around 11,000 ft.

On the down side.

These mountains are filled with minerals. The fiery red of the mountains attracted prospectors in the late 1800s, who felt that iron oxide was a clear indicator of gold in these mountains.

Unfortunately, the heavy metals contaminate all the rivers and creeks in the area. This sign was informing us that a metal nail would dissolve in these acidic creeks after only eight months! Sadly, we had already been drinking this water, and would continue drinking it for the next day.

After Stunner Pass, we followed the Alamosa River back to the valley. Along this stretch, we saw our first bear! He was a little, cinnamon black bear who stood up to get a good look at us before heading back up the hillside.

Ice coming out of the mountainside!

We spent the entire third day of biking in the flat valley, which ended up being a good thing because we were in a town with cell phone service when Cate turned to me and said, "I think I have an eye infection." As she said that, a big fat droplet of pus was leaking from her eye, so I had to agree. She called an eye doctor, who drove from an hour away to treat her pink eye. Thankfully it didn't spread to her other eye or to me!

In Del Norte, our map indicated we could stay with a bike-friendly couple, but Cate called and he was on a bike ride, his wife was on a bike ride, but they had another friend, who was on a bike ride, but his wife was probably not on a bike ride. Each of the three bike riders was doing a different portion of the Great Divide trail! Anyway, Joanne let us stay in her extra house in Del Norte, and we really appreciated the shower and sleeping inside.

When we left Del Norte, we had a day of all uphill, leading up to Carneros Pass, back in the mountains. We started out on a rough road that seemed to be the place that Del Norteans brought their dogs when it was time to "put them down"-- i.e. shoot them and leave them in the desert. 

It was a relief to get off this road and follow a canyon up into the mountains. We got to our camp for the night about three miles short of the top of the pass, and had just picked out the best campsite when we heard a car pull up. It was a sheriffs car, with the lights on. This was very confusing, since we rarely see vehicles at all, and all are exclusively trucks or SUVs--not police sedans. He pulled up to us quickly, rolled down the window, and asked, "Excuse me, are those your bikes back there?"

As we were the only people in the campground, and wearing our bike clothes, it would have been difficult to claim, "Oh no, we have no idea whose bikes those are."

He said, "I'm sorry, I'm going to have to ask you to evacuate."

I think the young deputy expected us to be impressed by the importance of his job when he told us to leave, but we really didn't have anywhere to go, so we just stared at him.

"There's a wildfire near here, and we are evacuating everyone in the area."

Since we had been riding through smoke for the past four days, this seemed like an ok reason to tell us to leave our home for the night. "Where should we go?"

"Anywhere! You just have to get out of here!"

This was just a ridiculous thing to say--the poor young deputy's sense of self-importance won over his reasonableness. "We're on bikes," we said with a heavy amount of sarcasm, "we travel at about five miles an hour. You need to tell us where we can go... safely." 

He sent us up the pass farther, telling us that the wildfire was about five miles back down the way we came from. When we asked if there was a way we could get more information, he gave us his personal card. We didn't have cell phone service for another three days.  

Before he left the area, he set up this yellow tape-- "Sheriff's Line Do Not Cross"-- across our path... we had to cross it.

Do Not Cross-- but HOW ELSE ARE WE SUPPOSED TO EVACUATE?!!

Biking in a smoky haze after the deputy evacuated us.

At the top of the pass! A longer day than expected. 

So we went over the pass that evening, and then went down another five miles past it and camped by the side of the road. Three RVs pulled up to warn us about a wildfire in the area, but they didn't know anything more than what the deputy did, so... not much at all. We decided to relax until Bambi and the other creatures of the forest began running by, so we finally enjoyed this stream-cooled beer.

Thanks for canning IPAs!

The next day we got into camp really early because we had done eight miles the day before. We sunbathed and wrote stories to share with each other.

A real campsite! We were still the only people here.

We had a beautiful day the next day. We camped only two miles before another pass, and after that we had about 45 miles of downhill through very beautiful countryside.

What a pretty day!

We stayed that night in Sargeants, a town of 18 year-round residents that nevertheless has "all services"--post office, grocery, a place to stay, and a restaurant, all in one building! Timichi Creek Trading Post was a pretty nice place. We camped by the creek, had a beer at their bar, and hung around long enough for the owner to come and talk to us. He mentioned that the pass we were planning to do the next day was probably still snow-covered. But, he said, we could go find out! He sent his son and the manager of the store to take us and some PBRs to the top of the pass to check out the snow level. On the way up, the sun was setting and we saw many herds of elk near the creek. At the top, we discovered only one snow drift that we could easily walk our bikes through! We were pretty excited to be able to stay on our route, and it was a beautiful area. 

Leaving the small town of Sargeants--for the second time.

Self-timer fail.

Continental Divide again!

Totally doable.

Just kidding, we went around through this snow drift. Six days previously, the snow line was three miles from the top! Good thing we went to Aspen.

From the top, it was all downhill into Salida. A very nice couple of days.