Sunday, July 11, 2010

Breckenridge and Beyond

FRI 7/9 -- A much-needed rest day in Breckenridge, with my much-needed
honey, as well as long-time good buddies Jack and Laurie. Breckenridge
sits in just an incredibly beautiful setting, with the huge mountains
all around, and is also, once you chop through a lot of the touristy
stuff (e.g., approximately 10,000 t-shirt stores), kind of a quaint
little town, with lots of old, small little houses that people seem to
take great pride in maintaining and pretty-fying -- for example, with
gorgeous flower gardens. As if it weren't good enough already, we also
stumbled into town during Bike Week, which meant that I got a free
tune-up and general assessment of my bike while I gondola'd and chair-
lifted up and down the peaks on a beautiful summer day.

SAT 7/10 -- Breckenridge to Hot Sulphur Springs (75)
After a lovely day and a half together, I bid a sad adieu to Kris and
set off on what proved to be a beautiful and almost totally downhill
ride, slightly marred by 3 factors:
(a) Lousy map instructions about 15-20 miles into the ride made it
almost impossible to transition smoothly from the Breckenridge-Frisco-
Silverthorn bike trail to the appropriate road. I didn't get lost, but
that was only because I stopped about 6 times and asked locals where I
was. The Adventure Cycling maps are fabulous -- this is the first time
they've let us down, I think.
(b) A pretty strong headwind most of the day. Whaddya gonna do?
(c) A brief but painfully hard rain. [See (b)]

Much of the day we rode along the Colorado River, heading upstream.
(Apparently we're not too far from the headwaters -- 30 miles, maybe?)
The last 5-10 miles of the ride were along a gorgeous red rock canyon
-- too bad it was overcast and kind of spitting rain. But still really
wild and beautiful.

Hot Sulphur Springs? An interesting series of a couple dozen (?)
springs, diverted into man-made swimming-type pools, which were
succesively hotter as the elevation increased, but not something I
found very appealing. The middle name says it all.

We spent the night in a free campground right next door to the hot
springs, which I would highly recommend to anyone who (a) really
really likes mosquitoes, and I mean really likes them a LOT; (b) does
not care all that much for drinking (or cooking with, or washing up
with) water; (c) finds a working railroad track about 50 ft away -- 6
trains during the night! each repeatedly blowing its melodious warning
whistle! -- restful and sleep-inducing; and (d) takes great pleasure
in listening to other groups of campers have loud, boistrous fun
(fireworks included!) deep into the night. But if you're not one of
those people, take a pass on the free campground, is my advice.

(Sent from my iPhone)

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