Author: Greg Pezoldt

I woke up at 5:30 because I heard a few drops of rain on my tent. I jumped up because I needed to put up the rain fly. I left it off since the previous evening was clear. Well, you know about how the weather can change quickly in the mountains.

Today was going to be an exciting, but strange day. I was going to be a “cyclist” today instead of a bicycle tourist. By this I mean that I would be riding without the bags. Just the bike and me. Also, for the first time since the beginning of this trip, I would be wearing cycling shorts without the “civilian” shorts over the top. Today I was going to ride Trail Ridge Road, a short little 4,000 foot climb up to the highest point you can drive to in the park.

I set off around 10am trying to let the weather settle a bit since it still sprinkled rain every now and then. Without the extra weight, I found that I was still using the same gearing, but I could spin the pedals at a higher cadence and climb faster. Big surprise, huh?

The first part of the ascent was nice. Cool cloudy weather, ideal for this ride. I got a hint of things to come when I stopped at a pull out. A woman approached me and mentioned that she had considered riding the road too, but decided against it due to the weather. I told her that the weather was really nice, but she said the weather at the higher elevations was pretty nasty. I thought to myself….. Pa-Shaw . I was wearing thermal underwear and my trusty rain jacket. How bad could it really get? Well, it got pretty bad. Wind, rain, mist and misery galore. So bad that I thought it was going to start snowing at any minute. At one point a car driving by took a photo of the crazy cyclist. I did make it to the high point of the road but there wasn’t a sign that I could see and the weather was so bad that all I wanted to do was turn around and get the heck off the ridge. Plus, you couldn’t see anything worth taking a photo of anyway except clouds. Sorry for the lack of any photos.

On any other day I might have turned back or even have decided to do this ride on another day. For me, today was the day. I was going to leave the park tomorrow no matter what. Whether that was a bad decision was not really an option for me. Today was the day!

The 21 mile descent was REALLY, REALLY cold! I was shivering so bad I could barely steer my bike. I stopped at every stop to go into the restrooms just to warm up for a few minutes. I might have been as cold as I have ever been on a bike. The hail storm on the Tiger Summit was close though. Call it a tie! Luckily, the weather warmed as I lost elevation. Arriving at my campsite, I put on warm dry clothes faster than you can even conceive. Really fast. Next, I needed some warm food so I rode the half mile out of the park to the nearest restaurant. I am feeling better now.

In the afternoon after I went to the restaurant, the weather cleared and I took some photos of the great scenery of where I had been.

The ride up to the top of Trail Ridge Road was the last hurrah for the real mountains of this trip. I know there are “mountains” on the east coast but not like the Rockies and Cascades. So riding up to 12,183 ft ASL was not only a challenge, but symbolic as well. Tomorrow I ride to Ft. Collins to visit Danny Long who Natalie and I rode the North Cascades with. And then it is out into the Great Plains. That will be interesting.

I am going to Estes Park. Not to see the town, but because it is the east entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park.

So leaving my camp in the morning , it was on to RMNP. The road was all above 9,000 all morning. Up and down, up and down. I knew there was a long downhill somewhere since Estes Park is “only” 7500 ft ASL. I just wasn’t sure where it was.

Above 9,000 the views are fantastic. You can see Long’s Peak and RMNP from a long way away.

But first was Estes Park. The long downhill came from right above town so it was a screaming descent dropping a couple thousand feet very quickly.

Of course lunch was on my mind. It seems it always is. I found it st the Estes Park Brewery. Estes Park is a tourist town and it was BUSY with all of the tourists. Very busy. Unlike the tourists, I did not loiter after lunch except I had to go into the rock shop to see the cool rocks and fossils there. But only for a minute or so.

Then it was on to the Park only 3 miles away.

I was lucky to get a campsite. Most parks have a hiker- biker designated area but not Rocky Mountain. The campgrounds were all full but luck would have it that someone had double-booked two sites. So I got the other one. Like I said, lucky.

So with camp set up and dinner made, I headed off to sleep. I would fall asleep thinking of the BIG day planned for tomorrow.

After Denver, all I really knew was I was going to go to Estes Park. I wasn’t very sure what route I was going to take. My friend Shirley was living in Littleton, but had recently moved north to Wheatridge. This changed my thinking.

It turned out that there was a bike path all the way to Boulder so I decided to take it. I would figure the rest out later. The bike path paralleled US Hwy 36. It is a very heavily traveled Hwy so the bike path was a great option.

Once in Boulder, my priority was lunch. Once lunch was taken care of, I needed to turn my attention to an exit strategy. I ended up choosing to go to Nederland through Boulder Creek Canyon. As you might imagine, the canyon was nice.

Now there ins’t a pass going to Nederland. But it was still a 3,000 ft climb through the canyon. Nederland sits at 8253 ft ASL. I was pretty tired after that so I wanted to find a place to stay that was not very far at all from town. The lady at the gas station told me where all of the camping places were. I picked one that was 5 miles north of town. She didn’t mention it was uphill! So what is another 700 or 800 feet?

This campground was bare bones. Not even an outhouse. But it was free so I guess I cannot complain.

In hindsight, I think there might have been an easier way to go toward Estes Park, but then I wouldn’t have gotten to see Boulder Canyon. I guess things work out.

As I mentioned, I am taking a rest day in Denver.

Here are the latest statistics of the ride so far:

Miles Traveled: 2521

Highest Elevation: 12,095 ASL

Crossed Continental Divide: 7

National Parks: 5

National Monuments: 3

State Parks: 6

Bike Path Miles: 147

Flat Tires: 3

Note: in 1987, I did a cycling tour in New Zealand. I did not keep a record of the total miles I traveled, but I always said it was around 2,500 miles in total.

Now passing the 2,500 mile mark, I am going to say this is now “officially” the longest bicycle trip I have taken.

Also, I will not be crossing the Continental Divide anymore times. I am in the Mississippi and eastern drainages for the rest of the trip.

I wasn’t planning on riding all day today. I was heading north to Denver, but I was not going to attempt riding through downtown Colorado Springs nor downtown Denver either. I would just ride the more rural areas in between to 2 large metro areas today.

So Paul and I ran some errands in the morning and had a last lunch before I got him to drive me up north out of the congestion of the city. I had decided to ride Hwy 83 to the Castle Rock area so I only needed to start in the mid afternoon to get there at a reasonable time.

I was out of the Colorado mountains and on the eastern side of the front range.

The ride was really nice, but a slight headwind might be foreshadowing of hard days to come in the coming weeks in the Great Plains. I hope I get more tailwind than headwind out there, but those are stories for the future.

As for today, I am only going so far and I am having another reunion with another friend! Shirley Berg is meeting me in Castlerock and going to drive me into Denver so I can avoid that urban traffic challenge.

Shirley and I worked together for a few years at the Chelan County Public Works Dept many years ago and we have kept in touch as she has moved around over the years.

After meeting me in Castlerock, we went and had dinner and a couple of beers and had a great time catching each other up on everything.

I am going to take advantage of the city and take a rest day tomorrow. I plan to replace my rear tire even though it still has some life left in it. I need to do it sometime soon and this seems like a good time to do it with the myriad of bicycle shops in the area. And I will get to do some much needed laundry here too. I think the general public will appreciate that as much as I will! Whew!

Fueled up with that amazing dinner from last night, I packed up my gear, said goodbye to Michelle and Terri who was another traveler sat the RV Park whom I had met and began pedaling toward Ute Pass. As far as I can tell, Ute Pass might be the last pass of this adventure. I am getting real close to the Great Plains and I don’t see any more named Passes on my route. It is kind of sad to me to think this is the last one. I may be surprised yet since I still plan to ride to Rocky Mountain National Park but I have decided not to ride Berthoud Pass since it a little too far out of my way, but there may be other passes that I am yet unaware of. We will see.

Anyway, I am getting to far ahead of myself here. The ride up to the Ute Pass Summit was an 8 mile gradual climb from the town of Florissant. It was another pretty easy climb which is surprising to me since all of these last 3 passes have all been over 9,000 feet.

Now it is primarily a long downhill into Woodland Park and then continuing down into Manitou Springs. There a great treat awaits.

I am going to visit Paul Erickson who happens to be my best friend from my college days at Montana State University.

I haven’t got to see Paul since his wedding to LynnAnn too many years ago. It was a great reunion. We relived a lot of crazy memories and talked about our futures too. It is one of the real highlights of my trip!

Today I would start a 2 day effort to get to Colorado Springs. It is 92 miles and there are three 9,000 plus passes to cross in order to get there. No rest for the weary. And the “best” part is the first pass starts right out of the starting gate this morning so not much opportunity to get warmed up. Trout Creek Pass.

I am riding on US Hwy 24 going up the pass and all the way to “the Springs”. There is a LOT of traffic. Luckily the shoulder is pretty wide or I would be pretty nervous. The climb has its moments. It is steepest on the initial portion but then moderates on the upper sections. All in all, not too bad except for the copious amount of sweat that was mixing with my sun screen and then burning my eyes! I had to stop at least twice to flush my eyes with water so I could see were I was going.

I made the summit. It was up on a broad flat top with scattered pine timber. Nice. And then some additional good fortune. There was a Hwy junction just past the summit where most of the traffic veered off toward Denver leaving me with a much less traveled road to negotiate.

I would ride on across a broad flat plain to Hansel, CO where I knew there was a cafe for lunch. Not much else but lunch was all I really needed there. While having lunch, I could see the weather changing. Changing to windy with thunder storm cells building in the distance. By the time I finished lunch, the wind was a gale and the sky’s were getting pretty dark. With these weather cells, it is real random where they will center. Just because you see one right in your path doesn’t mean it will still be there when you get there. With that chance, I decided to carry onward. Especially since the gale wind was a tailwind for me and I wanted to take full advantage of that!

So off I headed out into some pretty nasty weather. But I made good time with a few miles averaging almost 25 mph! As I approached the beginning of the climb up the second pass of the day, the weather really caught up with me and I got slammed with one of those storm cells. I got pretty wet, but that was the chance I took. I just grinned and bared it.

Wilkerson Pass was a pretty short, gradual climb. Actually one of the easier climbs for the trip.

There was a nice Visitor Center at the top where I got a chance to escape the rain and warm up a bit. And as luck would have it, the weather cleared and the sun came out so I actually dried out quite a bit.

With the sun out and a long downhill to enjoy, I headed out toward Lake George for the end of my ride for the day. The miles ticked off rapidly and Lake George arrived before I knew it. I found a nice RV park that offered tent sites and hot showers.

While I was just relaxing and enjoying the sun for a few minutes I happened to look toward the West and saw another huge storm cell heading my way. I got in gear and hastily set up my tent and stowed all the gear just in time before it hit. Wind and rain again for the second time today, but this time I would be able to take shelter instead of riding through it. This was much better than the first one this afternoon. So much so that I actually enjoyed this one from the comfort of the porch of the RV office. A nice warm and dry view.

A great end to the day was Michelle, an employee of the RV Park inviting me to have dinner with the staff. What a fantastic offer. Her friend, Linda was baking lasagna with garlic bread and some wine. Wow! What a great time we all had. An amazing end to a wild day. Thank you Michelle and Linda for the dinner, but more importantly the amazing generosity and kindness shown to a complete stranger.

Today was going to be an epic day. One way or another no matter how it turned out.

It started a bit on the “iffy” side. I had listened to the wind in the trees all night. Wind always makes me nervous. When I woke up, the wind was still rustling in the trees. Once I got on the road, I figured out that it doesn’t take much wind to rustle aspen trees. The wind was no going to be a factor today.

Today was the day to climb Independence Pass! A true monster. And I had a plan! My camp was at approx. 9200 feet and I had to climb to 12,095. So basically 2900 feet. My previous experience would say that this would take about 3 hours. So my great plan was to go for 2 hours and take a break before taking on the last 1000 feet. Seemed like a great plan.

The climbing was hard, but about the same effort as the other big passes I have gone up on the trip so far. But the altitude. That would be the big difference on Independence Pass. So on I pedaled. So right at 2 hours I stopped. Not because I needed to though. I WAS AT THE TOP!

I was pretty pleased with that effort. So much for the plan, right?

I also crossed the Continental Divide for the 7th and final time for the trip.

Today, there were lots of cyclists at the top. I was the only one touring so I got to claim bragging rights for the hardest climb of all of them. I didn’t tell them that I did it in a 38-26 gear.

Next was the second most fun part (climbing the pass was the funnest part). The downhill. I covered a lot of ground and lost a lot of altitude quickly. Very quickly. On to the Twin Lakes where I had a much deserved lunch. Then lastly down to Buena Vista along the Arkansas River.

Today was truly epic. And Epic in the very best sense of that word.

Note: I know I should have taken more pictures. I think that was the altitude causing my brain to malfunction. That is my excuse.

I got up, packed the bike and headed for the transit center. It was 2 blocks away. So far, so good.

The bus was on time, my bike fit on the rack and we got back to Carbondale on time. So far, so good.

Riding up to Aspen was nice. Mostly nice I should say. There is a bike trail that runs all the way to Aspen, allowing me to completely miss traffic in the very busy Hwy up the valley. The only catch was there has been a fire near the town of Basalt which I would have to ride through. The smoke was irritating but only for about 15 minutes. Then I was past it.

I covered the 30 miles up valley pretty easily. There were challenges though. Lots of sketchy riders coming the other way on rental bikes. No helmets and not very good bike handling skills either. There were no injuries to report thank goodness.

Aspen is full of VERY rich and famous people. Or as my brother says- rich and shameless. And also lots of tourists. An interesting mix of people.

I found out that a place I have always wanted to visit but was not sure where it was is right here. The Maroon Bells. I had to go!

Maybe you recognize them. They are in lots of photographs that you see. And for good reason.

So after a lunch and seeing the Maroon Bells, I headed up valley to hopefully camp. This was the last dicey part of yesterday’s plan. To be able to find a camping spot. I got to the first of 3 potential camps and found an empty spot. Dibs! So the day worked out great. I am not sure if I was smart, lucky, or something else entirely, but I’ll take it. It is also worth noting that since I was only 8 miles from Aspen…… that my campsite was in an aspen grove!

This morning is somewhat overcast and perfect for climbing the last 2 miles over McClure Pass. Needless to say, the final climb was fine and I have again set a new high elevation standard.

This high point will not last for long but it is the standard for today!

The downhill was fun too as you can imagine. It was a fairly quick ride into Carbondale with one quick distraction. I was told of a hot spring along the Crystal River which was the exact river I was following to Carbondale. How fortunate.

The springs were great. Several pools to choose from with different temperatures in each one.

After the nice soak, I continued the rapid descent to Carbondale. I was even able get onto a bike path for the last 6 miles into Carbondale. In Carbondale, I had several things to accomplish. First was find lunch. That was easy. Next was to figure out how far I was going to ride past Carbondale towards Aspen. There are several campgrounds past Aspen that set me up perfectly for the climb up Independence Pass, but they are just too far to ride there today. So I needed to find an intermittent place to stay today. I stopped at the Forest Ranger Station to inquire about camping and there really was nothing that was a reasonable ride and on pavement. Next I looked for private campgrounds and RV Parks. Nothing. Next was looking for a motel that was reasonably priced. Nothing. This was looking really bad!

Finally, I decided that I needed to ride to Glenwood Springs, in the opposite direction that I needed to go in. But it was only 10 miles and downhill. Then the plan would be to put my bike on the bus in the morning and go back up to Carbondale and start riding from there again. I can make it to Aspen easy enough for lunch and then go on to the campgrounds toward the pass afterwards. Problem solved. And the first part went perfect except for the afternoon rainstorm that I ended up riding through before Glenwood Springs. So a motel room is was for today. Now everything is dry except for the laundry I did in the motel room sink. So far so good for the alternative plan.

For tomorrow, I hope the rest of my plan works out. Stay tuned.