This is the sixth of
a series of ten posts about my recent trip to Mountain Bike the Continental
Divide between Banff, Canada to Antelope Wells, New Mexico. Further information
about the expedition can be found at www.bikingthegreatdivide.com
Day 20: Green Mountain Reservoir - Salida (112 miles)
I had a feeling that today could be a long day! I was planning at least
100 miles and I needed to get a bike repair.
I left the campside at 05.00 and re-joined the main route at the junction of the TransAmerica Trail where I then make quick progress down towards Silverthorn. As it was still to early for the Silverthorn Bike shop to be open I continued on the past Frisco to Breckenridge. Where the boys in the shop fixed my bike in record time.
The climb up and over to Hartsel was a hard one and a strange one not
least because after the divide crossing and then again after Hartsel you cycle
through an massive expanse of land with mile after mile of deserted gravel roads
laid out at right angels to the main track. According to the guidebook these
are ‘subdivision’
roads but for what ever reason although the planning and building of a
settlement had started there are hardly and houses along the route. The whole
thing was quite eerie as many of the roads (going absolutely nowhere) had
roadsigns. I couldn’t help wondering if the whole place had just been forgotten
about by state planners?
I met another cyclist (Russell) in Hartsel. He was doing the
TransAmerica Bicycle Trail (a future project perhaps?) and we cycled for a bit
before our routes separated and I headed south. Like me he was cycling solo and
it was also his first big cycle tour. We swapped a few stories and laughs about
our individual routes.
The journey between Hartsel and Salida went well. There was a lot to
look at as the route climbed up into the San Isabel National
Forest towards the Watershed Divide. At the top it was
starting to get quite late but I remember feeling remarkably good for such a
long and varied day. The early morning visit to the bike shop seemed a distant
memory.
As it was starting to get late and I wanted to be in Salida before the
supermarket shut, I started down the decent fast. I really started to build up
speed and then coming around a corner I
was face-to-face with another bear just to the side of the track. In a
split decision I decided that by putting the breaks on I would probably stop
right next to it so in a panic I just peddled faster and faster speeding past
it completely out of control. I stopped after five minutes and tried to stop
shaking – my heart was racing (and not because of the exercise!).
Arriving in Salida at about 9.30pm. Most of the restaurants were shut –
however, I managed to get the guy from Pizza Hut to deliver to the campsite!
Only in America!
Day 21: Salida
– Cochetopa Pass Campsite (90 miles)
My good friend Mark Salmon
had warned me about Marshall Pass from his previous mountain bike adventures in Colorado.
In fact there was a great deal of twitter banter in the build up to my assent
of the pass.
I left Salia at 04.30h and started the 25 miles of uphill. I was expecting the accent to take me most of the day but actually the track was of good quality and a steady gradient and as a result I averaged about 6mph to the top. I was glad I had left early as by the time I got to the top at about 11.30 it was already starting to get hot.
The decent down the other side of the pass to Sargents was great fun and
I stopped in the café for some lunch (another cheeseburger) and sat with some
other cyclists who were doing the same route in the other direction.
One of the things that I had noticed bout traveling by myself was that
I purposely started to go out of my way to meet and introduce myself to other
people. Otherwise I think it could have been a bit of a lonely experience.
After lunch I set out again. My target was the campsite just after the
Cochetopa Pass Continental Divide Crossing. It was pretty ambitious considering
it was 45 miles away (up hill) and I had already had a pretty long day.
Anyway, off I went and passed through some fantastic scenery that was
further enhanced by the rain showers which had also started. When I got to the Upper
Dome Reservoir I considered stopping there. It was another ten miles to my
proposed camping spot and starting to get late. In the end I pressed on until
my legs felt so tired I got off my bike and started pushing up towards the
divide crossing.
From behind me I could hear a vehicle approaching. An old camper van
stopped by the side of me, ‘this is for you’ the passenger said
and handed me a can of Pepsi! I said, ‘thank you’, but they had already
driven off. It was one of the most surreal moments of the whole trip as I just
sat by the track drinking a cold can of juice!
I got to the divide crossing at about 21.00h and cycled the two miles downhill to the campsite. It was only then that I realised that the campsite had no good water supply. In the end I found a boggy stream (luckily it was raining) and managed to filter a few litres to try and re-hydrate and cook dinner.
I don’t know if it was because I was exhausted, dehydrated or because of
the noises in the forest. But for the first night on the whole trip I did not
sleep well at all?
Day 22: Cochtopa
Pass Campsite – Del Norte (64 miles)
I was not feeling at all sharp when I got up (mainly due to the lack of
sleep). I started the day by filtering more water from the boggy stream and
tried to hydrate as much as possible. I was slow to get moving and didn’t get
going until 07.30h.
I had planned today as a short day and was only aiming to get to Del
Norte. But the 64miles seemed to take forever and I pushed most of the way up
the Carnero Pass.
I kept going and as it started to get very hot I turned onto Old Woman’s
Creek Road and once again started to pedal up hill. Eventually I got to the turning for
the 665 the map read ‘very primitive road’ – it was more
like single track. The funny thing about it was when I looked at it I thought
to myself, ‘not more uphill’. But a soon as I got onto it I realised it
was downhill for a couple of mile and I actually found the riding quite
technical and very painful on my saddle sores!
Eventually the downhill ended and feeling tired I pushed my bike up towards, ‘Bandlands Gap’. The first part of the decent down from the Gap down towards Del Norte was awful. The track was full of sand and various things that had been shot by local people for target practice. This included washing machines, road signs and sofas.
I was pleased to get into Del Norte at a decent time (about 4pm) and I
headed to the campsite to find that there was a motor bike rally on. I amused myself
during the evening by drinking some beers with some of the Harley Davidson bikers
who seemed quite amazed with what I was doing. Unfortunately, no matter how
much beer they drank I still couldn’t convince any of them to swap bikes!
Despite the noise from the motor bike rally at the campsite with the help
of a set of ear plugs I was in bed and asleep by 8pm – and I slept like a baby!
Day 23: Del
Norte – Horca (74 miles)
I had breakfast at a local café in Del Norte and managed to get on the
road by 07.30h. The sleep and the fairly restful afternoon had done me some
good and I felt recharged and ready to tackle Indiana Pass.
Indiana Pass represented one of the longest climbs and the highest point on the route. I made slow by steady progress to the top stopping for a few rests but I’m proud to say that I didn’t push. I was so determined in my head to cycle all the way to the top.
One of the problems with the route today was the lack of water. There
was a lot of it but it was all (according to the maps and guidebooks) regarded as
contaminated. The recommendation was not to drink any of the water even if it
had been filtered. As a result and because of the heat I strapped an extra 2
litres of water to my BOB Trailer and I was really pleased that I did.
Much of the contamination comes from the previous mining operations in the area. I could really see the extent of the industrial landscape when I arrived at Summitville as the mine and the visual pollution there was huge. At Summitville there was also a group from the United Sates Geological Survey and the geologist let me listen in on his talk as I was eating my lunch. I didn’t admit that I was a geography teacher in case he asked my any difficult questions!
From Summitvile it seemed to take ages to get to Platoro. As the crow flies
the distance is quite small (less than five miles) but there were lots of
uphill and downhill switchbacks over the actual 20+ miles. Before my final
decent to Platoro I spent a some time talking to a local ranger who was stopped
in his truck. He was really encouraging of what I was doing and told me the café
in Platoro was worth a visit.
The café was great. In fact if I wasn’t keen to push on with another few
miles I think I would have stayed there for a night. The food was excellent, the
staff were fantastic and it had the best cahirs of the whole trip. In the café there
was leaderboard of the Tour Divide riders who had passed through earlier in the
month. I also noticed that the last rider to pass through was not that far
ahead of me.
After a great meal I carried on the 22 miles down the Trail to Horca
where I rewarded myself with a couple of bottles of Fat Tire Beer and ate some
dinner with a family from Texas.
After dinner I cycled to two miles to the Elk Creek Campground where the campsite
warden took one look at me and said, ‘are you going north or south?’. ‘South,’
I replied. ‘Then your almost there,’ he said smiling and patted me on the
back.
We chatted for a while over a drink by his trailer before I set up my
standard National Forest Service Bivi (on top of the picnic table!) and headed
to bed.
In my next post in this series I
will describe the route between Horca, Colorado and my Improvised
Camp in the Gila National Forest,
New Mexico.
Mountain biking sure is a fun thing to do, as it improves your physical and mental endurance to a different level. It is also a fine way to appreciate the environment and to save some travel money while you're at it.
Posted by: Ted Kruchten | April 04, 2011 at 08:16 AM