Part One - Silverton, CO

In late July, 2011 some friends and I went dual sport / adventure riding in the Rockies. Although not the first trip "out west" for any of us, being easterners this trip was quite a treat since the terrain and scenery are so dramatically different from what we see at home. We started our adventure at Silverton, CO spending 5 days there before trailering up to Moab, UT. After 3 days of riding around Moab, our last 2 days riding were spent back in Colorado in the vicinity of Crested Butte. Lots of pictures and a brief narrative follows:

What trip west of the Mississippi would be complete without a picture of the Gateway Arch at St Louis?

And, when driving in Kansas and eastern Colorado, one does not have to wonder what kind of weather to expect. You can see it coming from 25 miles away

We arrive at our home for the next few days, The Grand Imperial Hotel in downtown Silverton, CO.

The central street in Silverton is paved the side streets aren't.

The front desk at the Grand Imperial Hotel has a very 1800's feel. The computers were subtly out of sight. When we arrived the regular desk clerk was away for a few minutes so the temporary clerk just gave us keys and said we could "officially" check in later... this ain't New York City ;-)

Our lovely 2nd floor room with iron beds. No air conditioning here but none was needed. We had to close the windows at night to stay warm.

Our view

And a rustic western bar replete with modern labels and circa 1800's nude paintings.

Day One (actually only 1/2 day)

We wasted no time hitting the trails. Just north of Silverton is Cinnamon Pass, the first of MANY pass crossings for the next several days. Following the road over Cinnamon Pass takes one eventually into Lake City.

Even in late July there was still lots of snow at altitude. None of the passes we attempted around Silverton were closed but as you will see later a number had big snow walls on each side of the road.

Out of Lake City we take the road that will cross Engineer Pass back towards Silverton

So, rather than going directly over Engineer Pass, we took a left turn towards a high basin south of the Engineer Pass Rd. It turned out to be pretty challenging due to the loose rock surface. Little did we realize that this was to be de rigueur for the next few days. This kind of big, lose stuff is pretty common on these high pass roads.

Back tracked and here we are at Engineer Pass traveling westward - obviously late in the day but still pretty striking. Note the dune buggy. One sees all kinds of vehicles up here - everything from bicycles to all wheel drive "tour" busses. We even encountered a pair of Ford Model T Roadsters one day. Most of the time traction is not a problem but ground clearance is. Those Model T's with their big wooden spoke wheels have problably 18" of clearance... plenty for this ride.

Surprisingly, one actually climbs a bit more to get over Engineer Pass. On the other side of this ridge, the road starts down and eventually intersects Animas Forks Rd that will take you south back into Silverton or you can continue northwest and the road will connect with CO550 between Silverton and Ouray. Since we got a late start and it was almost dusk, we headed back to the Grand Imperial Hotel. Later in the week, we connected to here from CO550 going west to east.

Day 2

First thing on day 2 we set out to Clear Lake which is west of Silverton and CO550. It's an entertaining and beautiful ride up a twisty mountain road which was surrounded by copius wild flowers much of the time.

Clear Lake is completely snow melt. It IS definitely clear and it's also COLD!

From Clear Lake it was back down to CO550 and then a bit further north to Ophir Pass.

Now, why is they call these the "Rocky" mountains?

Didn't need kick stands at Ophir Pass ... just lean it against the snow pack

We continued down the western side of Ophir pass into Ophir and eventurally onto CO145 and intoTelluride for a convenience store lunch. It's a loonnngg, steep and loose grade down to Ophir meaning one had to use the front brake very carefully. Both Jon's (DRZ400) and my (DR350) rear brakes ceased working coming off the mountain. When they cooled down they were OK... boiled the brake fluid I guess. At lunch I bought a bottle of brake fluid at the convenience store and replaced mine.

Out of Telluride we continued down CO145 to Hermosa Park Rd from which we had some striking views.

Some things you just can't explain

Approaching Silverton from the south side on 550. Silverton has been snowed in many times. In the early 30's one winter was so bad that supplies had to be air-dropped to keep the citizens alive

Day 3

Enroute to Imogene Pass there were many cool overlooks, some mud (unusual), a couple of water crossings and many large bolders to ride over.

Oh Yeah, we were having a GOOD time!

Approach to Imogene Pass from the Ophir side

Awesome place Imogene Pass.

Also, a very HIGH place at almost 14,000 feet. A word to the wise, if your bike is not fuel injected and has a non-CV (constant velocity) carb go prepared to re-jet it. My DR350 ceased to pull up here and I had to change out the jets (leaner). The air is thin and that effectively causes the mixture to become too rich. Apparently CV carbs handle altitude change better than the flat-slide, "pumper" on my DR.

On the Telluride end of Imogene Pass one get's a great view of the descent on Black Bear Pass. Black Bear is one-way. We didn't ride it this time but Norm did. His take was that it wasn't worth the risk. This photo was shot mere minutes before a huge black cloud blew over the ridge and drenched us in a gulley-washing deluge. Jon, Norm and I wussed out and rode pavement back to Silverton. Galen and Dan rode back over a very wet Ophir Pass without any problems.

Day 4

We started day four by paralleling CO550 towards Ouray on old mining roads. There were a number of abandoned mining tipples (as there were almost everywhere) and it was interesting to imagine what it was like here during the glory days of silver mining

This time we attacked Engineer Pass from the CO550 side (just north of the tunnel). This proved to be a much more entertaining approach mostly because of the 4-wheeled traffic. At one very steep and tight section we came up behind a line of stopped jeeps. We worked our way to the front to find one late model Wrangler with the hood up. It was stategically stalled in a place where there was a drop off on the right and a rock outcropping on the left. There was no easy way to ride around so we bravely climbed the rocks on the bikes. Fortunately is was only about 20-30 feet long and maybe 10 feet high but it was irregular "steps" with an abrupt drop off at the top. One had to maintain enough momentum to not stall on the steps yet not have so much speed at the top to catapult over the ledge. Fun stuff... but we all made it without a problem.

Threatening skies on top of Engineer Mountain this time. But it didn't rain until much later. Something to be aware of when riding out here is that the thunderstorms can come up very quickly. Flat landers are accustomed to seeing the weather coming. Here it just blows over the top of a ridge and you're in it!

The Lake City side of Engineer Pass has a more gradual slope and, when we were there, LOTS of colorful wild flowers were in bloom.

Yours truly, doing what I love :-)

As I said, you see all kinds of vehicles. The job of the pedestrian here is to find a path that won't drag the oil pan off the small SUV he's leading.

We headed "home" via California Pass. By the time we got there it had rained on us a bit and we encountered a friendly Park Ranger in an ATV at the top. He walked around and looked at license plates and made friendly conversation. Nice Guy.