Sunday, September 17, 2006
Over the Continental Divide
We have had three huge days, and at the same time no connections to allow posting. Favorable winds and strong legs produced 290 miles, including crossing the continental divide at Monarch Pass in a 91 mile day.
We rested in Telluride where the aspen were turning, producing beautiful swaths of yellow on the mountain sides. We were told that stands of aspen are generated one tree from another, so they are genetically related. Perhaps that is why the leaves were turing not in bits or splotches, but in very sharply deliniated lines, so that the separation between green and yellow was dramatic, as though it had been painted.
Telluride is Berkeley without enough oxygen. Telegraph Avenue with an expensive ski resort attached. The setting is one of the most spectacular in the world, and in the town the rich and the hip/hippies mingle without mixing. We did the laundry, got massages, rode the gondola, and slept.
Friday we left Telluride in a steady rain and 45 degrees, down a steep, narrow, winding mountain road. Though it stayed cold, the rain abated enough, and the wind was favorable, and we got to our destination of Cimmaron. Actually, the motel we expected to stay at was closed; the local report was that the elderly owners had accidentally poisoned a few guests at their restaurant through inattention to cleanliness. We found a hunters' cabin a few miles down the road, where the poisoning is yet to come, and we got out alive.
Saturday was the kind of day that makes you want to keep doing this. Again we started out in rain and cold, but favorable wind. We worked our way up the Gunnison River valley and canyon. The first hour we made 5.75 miles in a steep climb, but then had a few hours of 20 miles an hour in a gradual uphill before and after the town of Gunnison. We had intended to stop at Seargents, a place with only an RV park and motel, but there were no accommodations. The plan was to rest there and attack Monarch Pass in the morning. But with no place to stay and the favorable wind we kept going and made the top of the pass (about 11,320) in late afternoon. The grade was not too difficult after what we have been doing, but the low temperature and high wind were frightening. It was exciting to suddenly be blown forward, accellerating 10mph, until you realized that the next gust might not be in the right direction. Judy actually got blown off the road, and we all took to riding in the middle of the traffic lane. We arrived triumphant, cold, and very tired, and then descended a few miles to the Monarch Mountain Lodge, a ski lodge out of season, where we were practically the only guests.
Today we came down the mountain very fast, and freezing. We warmed at the bottom of the descent, and there Tom and Judy O'Hare left us to return home. Peg and Jessica Poceta (Bill's wife and daughter) had joined us and took up the support. Again we had favorable winds as we descended the Arkansas River canyon, a beautiful, deep and winding passage through the last of the Rockies. We were unable to find a motel where we wanted to stop, and so ended up going 103 miles today very fast (almost 17 mph) to the outskirts of Pueblo.
We rested in Telluride where the aspen were turning, producing beautiful swaths of yellow on the mountain sides. We were told that stands of aspen are generated one tree from another, so they are genetically related. Perhaps that is why the leaves were turing not in bits or splotches, but in very sharply deliniated lines, so that the separation between green and yellow was dramatic, as though it had been painted.
Telluride is Berkeley without enough oxygen. Telegraph Avenue with an expensive ski resort attached. The setting is one of the most spectacular in the world, and in the town the rich and the hip/hippies mingle without mixing. We did the laundry, got massages, rode the gondola, and slept.
Friday we left Telluride in a steady rain and 45 degrees, down a steep, narrow, winding mountain road. Though it stayed cold, the rain abated enough, and the wind was favorable, and we got to our destination of Cimmaron. Actually, the motel we expected to stay at was closed; the local report was that the elderly owners had accidentally poisoned a few guests at their restaurant through inattention to cleanliness. We found a hunters' cabin a few miles down the road, where the poisoning is yet to come, and we got out alive.
Saturday was the kind of day that makes you want to keep doing this. Again we started out in rain and cold, but favorable wind. We worked our way up the Gunnison River valley and canyon. The first hour we made 5.75 miles in a steep climb, but then had a few hours of 20 miles an hour in a gradual uphill before and after the town of Gunnison. We had intended to stop at Seargents, a place with only an RV park and motel, but there were no accommodations. The plan was to rest there and attack Monarch Pass in the morning. But with no place to stay and the favorable wind we kept going and made the top of the pass (about 11,320) in late afternoon. The grade was not too difficult after what we have been doing, but the low temperature and high wind were frightening. It was exciting to suddenly be blown forward, accellerating 10mph, until you realized that the next gust might not be in the right direction. Judy actually got blown off the road, and we all took to riding in the middle of the traffic lane. We arrived triumphant, cold, and very tired, and then descended a few miles to the Monarch Mountain Lodge, a ski lodge out of season, where we were practically the only guests.
Today we came down the mountain very fast, and freezing. We warmed at the bottom of the descent, and there Tom and Judy O'Hare left us to return home. Peg and Jessica Poceta (Bill's wife and daughter) had joined us and took up the support. Again we had favorable winds as we descended the Arkansas River canyon, a beautiful, deep and winding passage through the last of the Rockies. We were unable to find a motel where we wanted to stop, and so ended up going 103 miles today very fast (almost 17 mph) to the outskirts of Pueblo.
