Colorado – 2007

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We had so much fun in ‘06 we thought we’d do it again!

Follow along on our 3 week trip mountain biking our way across western Colorado. Fruita, Crested Butte, Telluride, and Durango.

Fruita, CO June 22 – 24

18 Road Trails:
Vegetarian / Joe’s / Kessel Run

We hooked up with Jerry from OTE Sports (http://www.otesports.com/) in Fruita, CO on Friday night (June 22, 2007) when we rolled into town. Jerry invited us to join him and some friends the following morning for a ride in the “18 Road” area. We got started about 7:30 am, as the temps were headed for the 100 degree mark that day. We had a blast!OTE is the place you want to visit anytime you are in the Fruita area. Head into the shop, introduce yourself, and you’ll be treated like a local – and likely be invited to ride with them.

Kokopelli Area:
Mary’s Loop / Horsethief / Rustler’s Loop

The following day the two of us did a couple of the well known loops in the Kokopelli area. We got started early, but by the end it was really smokin’ hot!

 Crested Butte, CO June 25 – 30

Crested Butte Colorado and the Fat Tire Bike Week (http://www.ftbw.com/)View from our condo in Mt. Crested Butte.

We hooked up with our friend Chuck. We met Chuck last year, he’s out from Texas. The three of us road “Lower Loop” trail right from town. We all had lunch and dinner together several times!

Wednesday June 27th we hooked up with a guided ride. We all met down in town and then headed for “Upper Loop / Tony’s / Whetstone”, not a very long ride, but quite rocky in spots. The elevation wasn’t helping either!

We’ve been enjoying hanging out at the festival. We have made a few new friends, drank some beer and just goofed around.

Jessie of Brodie Bikes was really cool. We hung out with him. He road in the Chainless race

Thursday June 28th we road one of our favorites, Snodgrass trail. We road it as an out and back, why ride the dirt road back when you can double your fun on the beautiful single track? This isn’t the most technical trail, but is is one of the funnest, and you can’t complain about the scenery!

Friday the 29th we rode the “Lower Loop” trail system again. This is fun, as it takes off right from town.

Latter that afternoon we came back into town and watched the always fun “Chainless Race”

Saturday the 30th we did the 401 trail. About half way through the ride I was really dogging it. Man, the elevation was kicking my ass. Above 11,000 feet. It didn’t seem so hard last year when we did it, but I guess I was a year younger too!

Yep, ride this road to above 10k feet.

Take the single track another 1000 feet higher.

Start working your way down.

401 Trial Video

Telluride, CO July 1 – 4

Telluride, CO – Yes the home to off road driven luxury cars and 5 million dollar old mining shacks turned homes. We arrived on July 1st and got settled in. The view from our room is pretty nice.

Later we explored the town on foot.

Seems they like bicycles pretty well here too.

Monday July 2nd we did a pretty fun ride. We started by taking the ski lift (free during the summer) up the mountain. The trail was quite fun, but we did run into some problems on the way down. We had a very good map, the only problem was that most of the trail heads weren’t marked, the signs were either missing or just non existent. This made it a bit frustrating. Funny, the town can pay to keep the lift running, and staffed, from 7am to midnight, but can’t afford to mark the trails.

Tuesday we did a ride on the north end of town – Eider Creek / Deep Creek / Aldasoro trail. This is marked as “Advanced / Expert”. Everyone said that the Deep Creek trail was some of the “best single track in Colorado”… Well, between the dozens and dozens of down trees and the steep climbing, the trail wasn’t that fun. The scenery was amazing, but I don’t think I need to do this trail again.Pix…

We got good at crossing downed trees!

At least the scenery was nice.

July 4th – No riding today, but parade and tonight fireworks!

On our way to Druango we found some more amazing sights.

 Durango, CO July 5 – 7

We pulled into town around lunchtime on Thursday, July 5th. There are many dining options here, so finding a meal is easy. This is one crazy town though! Every afternoon the whole sky clouds over with thunderclouds. There is lightning and thunder and it rains pretty good for a bit. They tell us it is monsoon season. We know it first hand now!

Luckily, each morning begins fresh again with clear skies and sunshine. It actually gets pretty warm by late morning. Friday we did a ride in the Telegraph trails area, at the east end of town. It was nice to ride straight from our hotel. We made a good loop that had some moderate climbing with fun, twisty descents. It actually looked a lot like riding in southern California, with scrub brush and dry conditions. Only the mountain peaks are taller here and we are riding at 6, 000 feet.

Saturday morning we got going early as we had to drive north of town to hit the bottom of the Hermosa Creek trail. Often this is ridden as a shuttle (shuttle to the top and then ride the entire 20 miles down hill), but we figured we’d just start climbing from the bottom and turn back when the time was right. We were keeping an eye on the sky’s, as the day before the lightning and rain really came down starting about 1pm. Next time we’re in Durango we’ll arrange to do the entire trail.

Sunday we headed out. A LONG drive across Arizona ending in Mesquite, NV. This was just a stop to break up the drive home. It was well over 100 degrees in Mesquite. The trip was coming to an end. The following morning we loaded up and shot for home. Five hours later we were home.