Colorado Trip Reports

Like John said...I didn't have any need for the crawlbox just playing around in the snow yesterday, but Moab was an absolute treat a few weeks ago on 7 mile. I can't even begin to tell you how nice it is to just idle up or down shit and lightly feather the accelerator over an obstacle without having to worry about working the clutch or sending it too fast. I guess it's like having an auto, except that it's 4.7 times better. Total game changer. Looking back I wish I had done the crawlbox as one of my first mods but realistically it's not a mod for the faint of heart and there's no way I would have been mentally or mechanically prepared to tackle it when I first got into the hobby. Now I feel like I can tackle anything. I also love being able to throw that lever back and forth between 2wd and 4wd going from pavement to snow and back to pavement. I know it's basically the same as turning a knob, but it's totally not.

 

10/12

Chihuahua Gulch and Peru Creek

After the trips from 2 weeks previous, I hoped to avoid the masses on this one. It had snowed the Thursday before and A-Basin and Keystone had opened (the latter opening on Friday). I figured that the snow would scare away the plurality of people while the remaining would be too busy snorting a few grams of coke before skiing down hills and crashing into trees to be out and about.

Turned out, I was correct in my assumptions.

Peru Creek led me to Chihuahua.






The beginning of Chihuahua...now we're talking.








Obligatory crotch shot. Not sure how I managed this, but you have my permission to use as needed.


I repeatedly got stuck here. What the hell? 4LO, low-range, rear locker...I just couldn't move forward.

Well. My parking brake was on the whole time that I tried. Brilliant. Not gonna lie...I looked around to make sure nobody saw me.










Parked up to get some pictures and drink my new celebratory drink...Dr. Pepper. Real party animal here. A jeep with Nebraska plates that read, "Crawler" rolled up at this point. Seemed nice enough...he mentioned that the rest of the trail was easy. With his rig, Everest would have been easy.


Corduroy road. Wood planks set atop a swamp. Hard to tell from here that there would ever be a swamp...


...until all of this comes into view.




I have hundreds of pictures of mountains...never gets old.


End of the road. Only hiking from here...leads to some 14'ers.


Dammit! I left the horse at home.





Back down.

Finished up Peru Creek.


Cinnamon Gulch road will take you here.



Saw this...decided to go farther up the road to check it out.


Which apparently isn't much of anything anymore. However, I could have kept going up Cinnamon Gulch itself to get to a tram house. Decided against this as the snow was getting deeper and deeper.


Coming back down the gulch road, I realized that I had missed a spur road...took me to the mine itself!



Strange noises coming out of here.




Back to the main road.






Another dead end.


The parking lot was right before this for the hikers. You'll never guess what was parked there. Oh. You did guess. And you were right. A Subaru.


For your Christmas cards.

 

10/13

A weak trip report. I had the intention of running a quick one...Bull Park Road near the Springs. Old Stage Coach Road took me there. I didn't take many pictures of that initially given that it wasn't the main event.

F.S. Road 376. The end of this road provided the entrance to Bull Park. Once I got there, I was surprised by a multitude of signs that indicated the road was closed. I ran it for a little while but I didn't like the sneaking suspicion that I shouldn't have been there. The last TrailsOffroad report that I read didn't even show the signs that I saw or the fencing surrounding the parking area and initial water crossing. The most recent FunTreks book doesn't even list the trail.


Came back down and continued on Old Stagecoach.


The farther away from the Springs, the more it looked like the east coast.


Generally, people were in a rush on this road...I wasn't worried about anyone stopped in the tunnel. Kind of sad, really...such a hurry to nowhere.


The plains in the distance. Carries its own beauty.


Turned around and started back to the beginning.



The backside of The Broadmoor. Judging from the goofy of network of roads around it (and the general state of the world), the inbreeding of that set did not bode well.


Downtown Colorado Springs.


Garden of the Gods in the distance. Garden of the Tour Buses would be more accurate at this point.

 

September 23, 2019.

Just as the trail had some gatekeepers obstacles near the bottom, so too were there some larger gatekeepers before we could proceed much further towards the top. Several of these offered easier and harder lines, our approach summarized nicely by this meme...

All the photos and the whole story in: Redhead Down #8: Exploring the Champion Mill









​

catch up on the whole story
[part 1] [part 2] [part 3] [part 4] [part 5] [part 6] [part 7] [part 8]​

 

Nice, One of my favorites!

 

10/14

Mosquito Pass

Columbus Day (or whatever day it's called now); snowed last Thursday; Leadville is already 10k feet and the pass is 13k; should be an easy, fun day.

Started from the Leadville side.


Start of the trail to the left. The mine in the background, Diamond Mine, is still active.



I'm intrigued by the cliff face...it looked like there were hiking trails that led up to it...I will have to revisit that area next summer.


Down by the mine, there was a county road that went right...it looked like it went toward the cliff as well as the structure at the bottom.


It almost looks like all of that silt in the middle was carried from the top...hmm...glacier? Rockslide? Aliens?


The road starts easily enough...wide and relatively smooth.


What are you looking at? Keep scrolling.


A little farther up from here there is a crossroad...bear left to hit Birdseye Gulch, right to continue to Mosquito.


The shelf road starts...


...provides incredible views...


...and boom.



Tried a few things to go farther. Snow bashing was yielding no fruit (another locker, bigger tires, and/or better tread may have helped here. Or a flamethrower, as discussed in an earlier post). I was nervous about using the traction boards, lest the truck lurch right off the cliff side. Shoveling would have killed my fat ass (and there was an s-curve farther up that was snowed in, as well). It was obvious that another rig had been stopped here previously...probably earlier that day.

So a decision...try to keep going and risk getting stuck even higher, or back down and live to tell the tale? Or die anyway? I chose to back down. This was the scariest moment of my off-roading experience...backing down a shelf road, on snow, ice, mud, loose rocks, and silt at 13k feet..a tippy spot where I actually made my peace with dying (no joke here)...and a hiker with two off-leash dogs that I almost ran over because they were freaking out over my pup.

If we had gone off that cliff...almost a sure death. I was stressed, to say the least.


Got to the bottom, cursed and praised whatever god of the day I was into at that point, and started my way back. But then I thought, "I did all that work to not even get to the top? Bollocks!"

I didn't actually say that, but I did decide to tackle the trail from the Alma side (south of Breckenridge).


Judging from trip reports that I've read in the past, this mill was accessable at one time. It's now private property. Every square inch of Colorado must be owned, built upon, and ruined. Every. Square. Inch.


Time to keep moving.


Another geological curiosity...the lines on the rock face.



The mine itself.


This was the continuation of the road. You may have to squint to see it. Given that it was already 4:30, and not knowing what lay ahead, I decided to turn back and head back to Cidiot Land.


Pikes Peak, I believe.



I'll be back next summer, Mosquito Pass. By then, all of it should be owned and a Wal-Mart and Starbucks will greet me at the top.

 

September 24, 2019.

...That last hour had been a rough one. And it's repercussions would be immediate and long lasting. They'd start the next morning as we started trying to clean up the mess and figure out what we were going to do next.

Read the whole story in Redhead Down #9: The Last Hour








catch up on the whole story
[part 1] [part 2] [part 3] [part 4] [part 5] [part 6] [part 7] [part 8] [part 9]
​

 

September 25, 2019.

...We weren't - however - headed home yet. In fact, Monte and I had planned to let Mike get a head start home while he and I returned to Mt. Antero to bag our 14er, but...

Well, you'll just have to read all about it in Redhead Down #10: Dealing with the Fallout








And that, friends, brings us to the end of the adventure.
[part 1] [part 2] [part 3] [part 4] [part 5] [part 6] [part 7] [part 8] [part 9] [part 10]

As always, you can leave your email here to be the first to hear about new adventures. The next one, especially, you won't want to miss!

Tell me the next adventure!



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11/9, attempted to get to East Portal via Apex Valley and 4N from Central City and found some city folk stuck in their Subie trying to shovel out with an ice scraper "for hours". Before I could even put the strap back in the truck they were gone without a thank you....I turned around here myself, knowing I couldn't make it back uphill through this drift if the trail was blocked further down.
How can you be that unprepared, dumb enough to attempt it anyways, and still ungrateful enough to not even say thank you?!?! Ridiculous.

 

Too many winter scene Subi commercials showing the car able to blast along through terrain which was interpreted to be the same as the conditions they encountered?

I've met folks so flustered over an experience that they forget such things as obvious as uttering "thank you." Or, they were so spooked over the experience that they wanted out of that scene and back to a scene they are comfortable to be in.

Good on you for helping. I'd like to think that they later realized they never said "thank you" and feel horrible. But, there's always going to be a sliver of the population who wouldn't be thankful, instead entitled... and nothing is going to change that. For those folks, I just let it go and my blood pressure thanks me.

 

I will admit, I do have a pretty creepy mustache going on right now...

 

All the fresh snow!
Jackson creak rd to(attempt) rampart rd

quite deep! It wound have been easly passable since the snow was still light and fluffy, But the road underneath was all ice.

had to use the winch to turn around twice...

 

That shittybilt still pulling rope?

 

Yep. Cleaned and packed with new grease, and put new bearings in the motor.

 

Today’s outing on Webster pass then slaughterhouse.
Best photo of jason ever




And slaughterhouse has some snow and lots of trees

 

Went up and over Yankee Hill yesterday.
The whole trail up from the central city side was cleared, we made it to the top in under 45 minutes. The main playground at the top only has one trail through it, of course we still had to make our own! After that we made our own tracks the rest of the trail There were a couple drifts right after the playground that had a thick layer of crust on top which made the going slow. Going down wasn't bad until the last 1/2 mile, which was 3ft of untracked snow and 4-5 in thick top crust. Took 2.5 hours and a bunch of winching.

 

I plan on going up to the shooting area tomorrow. Good to see it’ll be an easy trip up.

 

What route would you suggest coming from the four corners area and then back?

 

For that trip, out of Cortez, CO, I took
145 North past Dolores to Ophir - 68 mi ~1.5 hours
Ophir pass to 550 South to Silverton - 13.2 mi - took me 3 hours because I stopped to enjoy the views. If you stay in Silverton like I did, I recommend an 1890’s era bed and breakfast called Alma House.
I departed Silverton at 8:00 am and took 550 North to Black Bear pass trailhead over to Telluride. 21.8 mi allocate 3 hours. Had lunch in Telluride.

Took Imogene pass to Ouray - 17.2 mi allocate another 3 hours. I stayed overnight at the amphitheater campground. I headed back to Denver the next day. But if you have more time in Ouray, you can hit the trails around there such as Engineer, Poughkeepsie, California, Cinnamon, etc.
550 south towards Durango will take you back towards Arizona of course.