Day 23 - Hartsel, CO to Salida, CO

Last night we camped in in the back yard of the Highline Cafe and Saloon along with 4 other GDMBR riders.  Quite the gathering:-)
We we're up with the dawn and ready for breakfast just after the 6:00am opening of the cafe... The 32F temperature made it difficult to get moving, but I set my new record for breaking camp at just under an hour. Probably had something to do with Mike doing it all in less than 30 minutes...

Today's ride looked pretty easy on paper, but the first 30 miles were tough- lots of rolling hills through high desert prairie - never leads than 8800' elevation - with rough washboard surface for much of it. 
Also, even in a really bleak, dry landscape, there were so cool new wildflowers! And while I didn't get a picture, we saw our first jack rabbit today too!
At 30 miles we hit a 1000' climb up to 9950', which mercifully was followed by almost 3000' of descending into Salida in the Arkansas River valley. 
A terrific downhill with pretty smooth hardpack dirt surface that ran the whole 13 or so miles onto town.  Spectacular views here as well as we overlooked the Collegiate Range the whole way down!

Once in town, we all had errands to run- primarily mid-ride bike maintenance - Mike had some more sealant put in his tires and new valve cores installed, and I bought a new chain ant swapped it in at our motel.  A good day, but a tough one... More of those ahead with a lot of climbing on the way to New Mexico.  We're now well over 2/3 of the way to the border, so it's time buckle down and savor the time we have left!
Cheers from the GDMBR :-)

Comments

  1. Jeff Chin's Web SiteJuly 4, 2023 at 5:31 PM

    The riding is epic and the scenery spectacular, but unless you also blog, you have no idea how much time it takes to upload the pictures and write the narrative. And do it in a timely fashion! And from a tent!!!
    Thanks, Scott, for providing us with an opportunity to experience your trip vicariously in what is pretty close to "real time"!

    ReplyDelete
  2. ninemileimagesJuly 5, 2023 at 12:19 PM

    You're getting close!!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 8 - Lincoln, MT to Helena, MT

Image
Wow. Today was one of those days you dream of when you're planning a ride like the GDMBR, where the weather is perfect: the terrain is challenging, but not so much that you're ruined at the end of the day; the people are all friendly, kind and generous; and the food is all delicious and even home-made! We began the day inauspiciously in the small town of Lincoln, with a damp chill in the air- 37F and foggy, but with a forecast for clearing sky's and warmer temps by mid morning.  After a big breakfast at Lambkins Cafe, Mike and I set off to tackle Stemple Pass-  a 16 mile, 2200' climb starting about 100 yards from the cafe.  Sure enough, within 45 minutes, the fog began to lift, and we each began shedding layers.   The road profile looked like a near perfect exponential curve, with easy grades to start, and the steeper and steeper pitches as we neared the top, with a good ...
Read more

Shakedown trip- 4 weeks to go!

Image
Getting close to time to head for Banff, but first a real test ride:-). 3 days, 2 nights camping at remote sites up in the Adirondacks.  About 30-35% gravel, with 3-4,000' of climbing over 40-70 miles each day.  It should be a pretty good test of both bike & body!  I started out about mid-day Saturday May 6 from Port Leyden on the Black River.  My route ran north along the Black River valley about 20 miles, then northeast into the Adirondacks Park to Stillwater Reservoir.  I got to the reservoir at about 5pm, and decided to catch a real dinner at the Stillwater Inn, where I enjoyed a really great burger and fries and a beer- Meier's Creek IPA even from back in Cazenovia;-) After dinner, I rode another 3 or 4 miles until I found a great campsite on a bluff overlooking the reservoir.  Camp went together pretty easily for the first time out in the wild, and I even enjoyed a pretty nice campfire before sleeping like a log.  Slee...
Read more

Day 31 - Pie Town, NM to Apache Creek, NM

Image
After yesterday's long slog along the GDMBR's gravel to Pie Town, last night we decided to consider a slightly longer route today, but sticking to paved highway instead of unpredictable gravel. Whether peanut butter mud or peanut butter powder, neither was something we wanted to experience at this stage of our journey! So after a pretty good night's rest at the Toaster House, we set off for Apache Creek along US 60 at about 7:00am.  Today we were not too worried about heat, as we would begin riding at about 7500' under oddly overcast  skies, and then climb to more than 8200' at Jewett's Gap, so for most of the ride we would see comfortable temperatures.  The wind was another thing though...but we apparently got lucky on that count for once!  The daily breeze didn't really kick up until after we got to Quemado and headed south.  Starting as a quartering tailwind, by the time we were descending along the San Francisco River, we had a full on tailwi...
Read more