A beautiful Sunday in Colorado. A nice 80 miles riding to White Ranch to Golden Gate Canyon State Park and taking Golden Gate Canyon Rd. back to Golden. Find some new-to-me trails to ride around in Riding feels strong, I'm about 5mph slower loaded than unloaded, a little worse on the climbs. Pretty pleased at that.
Gap Road at Golden Gate State Park
Through the looking glass at Panorama Point
Some strange barometric activity
Having covered our plains with highways, factories and cities, having subdivided our hillsides into suburbs, having deepened and dammed up the rerouted our rivers to make seaways or sources of electric power, we have left only the ocean and the mountains to remind us of what we cannot do to the landscape.
-- Isabella Bird, A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains 1873.
The ride plan was to ride back to Idaho Springs and find Oh My God road, which I missed out on, my last time coming up this way, opting to instead take the paved Central City Parkway to Central City. Oh My God promised perfect training terrain: high grade, dirt road. Fully loading up my dirt lady, I left my front door towards Golden and the normal route up to Idaho Springs, via I-70/HW-40/etc around 8:00am.
Once in Idaho Springs, I settled down to my lazy ways, taking time to visit the women at the sandwich shop to buy lunch, the bike shop to figure out my back wheel and the coffee shop to get something to make it through a long ride. I must be getting more approachable in my old days; conversations seem to start a lot easier with folks at mountain towns. It may just be the bags on the bike that invoke curiosity around the strange pseudo-traveler.
The bike shop wrench on hand turned out to be a part time guide for the Adventure Cycling Association - the same non-profit that mapped out the route used by the Tour Divide. Fun to chew the fat with him as I was trying to patch/slime my rear tire and he was trying to ring up (quite unsuccessfully) my credit card. I ended up paying with dollar coins the change machine at the Boulder bus station gives you back. I had $15 worth of dollar coins after last taking the bus and was more than happy for him to take six of them. Talking a bit about the race, he showed genuine excitement and a little bit of jealous. "You fucker!" I think is how he actually summed it up. He's hoping to ride it in a few years as a tour guide, too. What a fun job that would be. "Well, I worked for the phone company for 37 years.", his response. A righteous reward.
My last $1.50 in change went to the coffee shop, as I got a single espresso, which turned into a double (dirt bag trick if you must know: espresso machines usually make two shots at once, so if it's slow, the barista will usually give you both, if there's no one else waiting - remember to tip). Asking for a map and directions to Oh My God, the barista persuaded me outside, "Got a minute?" leading me out back of the shop, through the coffee roasting area. "See the canyon over there? That's where you wanna go. You'll see a hand painted sign on a piece of found wood. That's it". Also asking for a road atlas that she was also happy to provide, I sat down to drink my coffee and eat my sandwhich and figure out where the hell else I'm going.
Oh My God leads to Central City, a very unfriendly-to-cyclist town, as cycling is actually outlawed in nearby Blackhawk and unless you want to backtrack, one cannot go through the state highway system to do anything else,
but, I thought I could try taking some of the dirt roads just above Central City and do some exploring. There seemed to be one that - bang! almost a straight shot to Rollinsville, a good 15 - 20 miles away as the crow flies. From Rollinsville, it's a short downhill to Nederland, where I had also penciled in a todo, to see if there was a way to go from the damheel in town, to Walker Ranch park, which we just hiked the 8 mile loop of, last Thursday. Trying to find an all-dirt route from Nederland to Boulder and a route from Nederland to Walker Ranch could provide a good portion of it. From there, it may be possible to pick up a trail in the Boulder Mountain Park and get all the way to Baseline. Who knows?
Noticing the atlas was about the same vintage as my own self (well, not really - maybe in Road Atlas yearss), I questioned it's current accuracy but! details. A road called, "Apex" seemed to shoot straight north, after getting out of Central City. At one point, the solid line just sort of dash-dash-dashes out. Not sure what that was all about, but there seemed to be alternatives through another system of roads... that... also... dash-dash-dash out. Forgot to look at the key to the atlas. Gah, more details, time to go.
Oh My God turned into a very well-maintained dirt road and led right to Central City. A nice steep grade with no one on it, except for me, except when I had to relieve myself. Some mining trash to entice the tourist. Seemed a much faster route to take than the Parkways to be honest.
In Central City, I simply found the main drag north west a started walking up. Asked a few locals if this was the way to Apex. One didn't know, another, an older women visiting the Central City graveyard (multiple, large areas - mining is somewhat dangerous) thought it just might be. There weren't too many routes to choose from. Took it anyways.
To my delight, the road stayed dirt and just kept climbing. Snow started skirting the edges of the road and drifts became deep in the surrounding trees. The climb just kept going, until I reached the area that on the map at the coffee shop must have been where the solid line turns to dash-dash-dash,
The road turns into an unimproved old track of discernible vintage and oppourtunity, as it was completely underneath snowdrifts, with a sign poking out prohibiting motorized vehicles. Will have to check it out another time when the snow is gone. Perhaps August.
A main road seemed to continue after veering to the right in the first of what turned out to be many switchbacks. More elevation gained. This affords good views. An unknown massif (to me) presented itself, dominating the western horizon,
Later in researching it, I found it to be James Peak. To the south Grays/Torreys could even be seen, and Mt Evans looking strange seen from the North, with Grey Wolf and Mt. Spalding (I believe). What I was on, I had no idea. Keeping on the road, waiting for an intersection to take to get to Rollinsville (still having hope!)
The road kept going up switchbacks. If I started this route on Oh My God, this road must be, Judas, Why Have Your Forsaken Me? road. Grade turned steep, the terrain, rocky and myself: spent. Time to push. Push all the way to... a transmitter station? And the end of the road. A summit. A dead end. Another conquest of the useless. Researching later, I found I had stumbled up Dakota Hill, at 10,925 ft.
Getting up meant going down the rocky, steep road, awash in rivulets from melting snowpack. A total bonus. I took a fork south east that appeared very early in my start up Apex Road that I knew would find me at HW 119, hopefully near the Golden State Canyon turnoff, which itself is at the top of the pass and which would make a nice easy descent into Rollinsville and then Nederland, via a paved road.
No such luck. Instead it took me to almost the bottom of the hill, almost back to Central City. Bollocks. Starting to get late, I had little options that looked attractive. Going back up HW119, to Golden Gate Canyon, down into Golden would take over 3 hours, when all said and done, I'd be in Golden after dark. Going back up Oh My God and back to Golden, even longer. There was really only one other route out of Central City: take HW 119 the other way (east) - through Blackhawk and back into Golden. Don't know the road or the terrain. Could be all downhill, could be hilly, long and hard. Eh, whatever, high time I got myself into trouble today.
Passing through Blackhawk, breaking their little no-bike law yet again. Passed the police SUV just inside the town line. Didn't do a thing. The HW turned out to be a nice gentle grade down. Seemed to be a perfect route to lose around 3,000 feet of elevation.
Which it was, until the Highway abruptly stopped at a junction with HW6 and HW6 doesn't allow bikes, as it's a windy road, with little shoulder through a busy corridor to Blackhawk. Probably more unseen problems. Didn't really think this one out, Justin. Decided to just go for it, what the hell. Shouldn't take too long to get back to Golden and off this HW. The sign to Golden says... 15 more miles. The "no bikes" sign was also fairly obvious.
Made careful but good time. Passed another police car. Again, no reaction. A beautiful route Rocky cliffs surround you the entire way. Became a little more comfortable, until the tunnels started showing themselves. About four of them. Dark and narrow. My strategy became: wait for all cars to pass and none within eyeshot behind me and book through the entire tunnel. The, "no bikes" sign right before the tunnel helped improve my speed considerably. Golden never seemed to be appear. Just another mountain to pass around. And then another. Until, yes, I was out. Relief.
Terribly hungry from the exertion and having burned through the sandwhich of 5 hours ago, I again booked it to the all-you-can-eat $10 pizza/salad bar to indulge myself and carry a few calories for the rest of the week. Nothing is as disgusting as watching out of shape people attack a salad bar. I'm trying to be nice, but hell is other people, as Sartre would say. I'm at a buffet. I'm eating at the buffet. I don't understand my own sensitivity to all this. Pizza going in my mouth, too, but it's a killer for my appetite, seeing piles of cold pepperoni being stacked on a thin bed of lettuce and then drowned in ranch dressing.
Road home after stuffing myself. Back at the doorstep around 20:30, ~115 miles more put on the bike, now fully loaded and many miles on dirt, with a sizable gain in elevation.
To Read:
No one inside. But right outside is something moving. Crawling. I watch in disbelief as the driving crawls out the vehicle to the side of the path. I call 911 and report what's happening. The man continues to crawl, then sit up, then try to walk away, all the while himself calling someone to get him out of there.
I tell this to the dispatching, in complete disbelief. This man has just literally walked away from a flipped over truck and now is trying to leave the scene. I can't tell if he's from another planet, completely and utterly, over any acceptable leave drunk off his ass, or just dazed from what just happened. Or all three. I suspect, if he isn't from planet Krypton, he'll pass out and wake up in incredible pain, once... whatever it is that is keep him conscious abates from his system.
The police come in minutes and pick up the guy, who almost collapses. I write a report. Shocked at what I just saw, I continue down the path towards the start. "Well," I thought, "at least now I'll have a good excuse for being a little late!". Just laugh it off, I thought.
I get to what I believe to be the start of the ride: E-470 and Mineral. But I'm not thinking straight. I looked a map before leaving, but didn't, you know really look at it. That tired. Exhausted already. E-470 and Mineral are literally 100 yards away from each other, parallel and I'm between them, wondering where the park and ride would be. Then I realize that I'm completely lost.
From the south of Denver, E-470 runs East to West but also abruptly turns North when it reaches the foothills. I can't belive this, but I wonder to myself, with mere minutes left before the beginning of the ride, that maybe the start isn't anywhere near where I am, but 10 miles away, when E-470 and Mineral actually intersect each other.
I feel foolish,
and defeated, but what the hell, I'm out here, might as well just do any old ride I want to, so I plan to go into the mountains and do this and that and not stop until the sun (which hasn't yet risen) threatens to bow down 16 hours later. Fuck the world! I'll save some money, I thought, since I won't have to sign up for the ride, either.
I get food and caffeine from the gas station. I pause and eat.
I start to finally realize that I and my bike are in absolutely no shape to do any riding today. I realize that I am about to fall asleep standing up and that I am cold. Very cold. A few early waking people are around me don't look cold. I wonder if my body temp. is just low for some reason. I realize that I forgot to change the tires on my bike - my back wheel has a tear in the sidewall that's being held together with a big rubber patch from the hardware store and a wish. If it blows, I'm stranded. I realize I had no idea what I'm doing.
I might not even be able to get home.
I ride home, at a distinctly slower pace than riding all the way to nowhere. I just can't concentrate on powering the bike. Barely holding it together, I make it back to my house, 20 miles away, safely. I take a shower, I go to sleep and I don't wake for almost six more hours.
Sometimes long rides can be made to look easy, sometimes you just have to admit you are just a weak individual, with limitations and can't do everything you want.
White Ranch Open Space Park, clear skies
Snow Squall moving In
Snow still around at the top of the ridelines in Golden Gate
Barker Dam, Nederland
Public Sculptors of a former professor of mine in Boulder
At around 1:00 am the previous night, I settled on the idea to try the, "Ring the Peak" route around Pike's Peak. You can learn about the route here and here. I just thought, "Yeah, whatever" and took a few hours snooze and headed out the door from Denver, towards Pikes Peak, via the Rampart Range Road, a nice 50 mile track of fairly well maintained dirt road, with a nice elevation gain (up to 9,400 feet or so) and relatively little traffic. Time to try out some gear and get another overnighter in.
My initial idea was to actually ride to the Pikes Peak Barr Trailhead, climb six miles of the Barr Trail to the Barr Cabin, stay overnight in a campsite near the cabin, push for the summit, still six miles away in the wee hours, however I could (hike, bike, hike and bike) and ride bike back to Denver, that same day. Essentially compressing a trip I did last year from three days, into two. A lofty goal, to say the least.
The snowfall on the mountain warranted a reconsideration and the amount of gear I wanted to pack left out anything except the bare necessities of riding bikes, so not even hiking shoes were green lighted. The previous trip at least included hiking shoes, poles, snowshoes, a hiking day pack, stove - and all these things seemed essential.
The current in development of the RD rig looks a little like this:
Coming from a world of touring bikes with racks and panniers, handlebar bags and all that cal, this rig is essentially stock, except for the compression bag tied to the handlebars and the small Ergon backpack. Some notes:
The compression bag carries my entire sleep system and the backpack carries everything else - enough, at least to camp at altitude below freezing. It's attached to the handlebars by part of a nylon backpack I hacked up and sewed to work as a sling to wrong around the bag and attach the the handlebars. Used a bungee chord to make sure everything wasn't going to explode spontaneously, but that wasn't really needed. As good as it worked, I'll use this as just a prototype and take time in sewing something a little more together as a few rough spots did appear in the idea.
The Ergon backpack worked well, having just enough space to carry everything, except my food inside. A little peeved that the zipper broke half way into the trip on such a fancy piece of kit. Had to be emergency fixed with bungee chords and using the provided rain fly so that the contents didn't explode everywhere. The zipper itself was a waterproof variety, which makes one wonder why they used a flimsier waterproof zipper and provide a rain fly - is the backpack waterproof, or not? Will try my hand at repairing the zipper. Being proficient with a needle and thread is essential ultralight skills, but I don't know how many people are packing such things on the TD. I will surely be.
Attached on the bike, on the seatpost is a dual water bottle holder. This is the third one that I've used - the others, same designed have broken. There's a flaw in the design at the attachment point of the holder: the bolt that tightens holder to the seat post creates a weak point in the holder itself and that's where it breaks each time. Hydration is really really really a big problem for me, as I seem to go through water like a fish. Four water bottles are absolutely essential for any ride over 3 hours.
The aerobars are a clip-on variety and seem to work well with my body. I have a strong back from doing some gym time in the winter and a ton of hiking with a ridiculously overloaded pack up 14ers last summer, so the somewhat extreme position it lends me doesn't hurt my back. The position actually helps me rotate my hips and gives me a really powerful position on the bike I can hold for what seems forever and just plow through road. I can change my position to more of a technical, upright position still, while, for example, navigating some rough patches and bumps or whatever. The saddle is some Specialized hoo-ha. I'd love to plunk on a Brooks saddle, but it just won't work with that dual-position stuff, unfortunately. I think the key to keeping your ass happy on these long rides is not to sit down all that much. Being very much aware that taking the pressure off as much as possible leads to a happy ass. Again, I'm pretty happy with my upper body strength from gym time, bouldering, hiking and street fighting (kidding) that it's easy enough to employ those muscles to lend a hand. Not having a backpack on would help keep weight bearing down and I hope to ditch the backpack, as soon as I can.
The bike itself fits me like a well-worn baseball mit. The incredibly radically sloping top tube scared the crap out of me, especially when I compared it to other frames I've seen, but the effective top tube height is pretty optimal. If you take a gander at my crotch:
Rampart Range Road was a nice little ride and I made the 90+ miles from my doorstep to Woodland Park terribly faster than I had previously, on my Crosscheck haulin' a trailer. The road itself meanders enough to make life worth living and gives you glimpses of Pikes Peak as it slowly reveals itself to the traveler. A little concerned by mid day as clouds began forming above and a small storm was raging on the top of Pikes Peak - well, small enough that I could see it from 40 miles away,
But after a few hours, the clouds broke up and it was sunny, again.
Wasn't looking forward to bivvying in a snowstorm, but whatever comes my way, I guess.
Hunkered down to a pizza, refilled the water bottles, packed the leftovers and headed on towards Chipita to Segment 2 of Ring the Peak, which, happily starts with a steep hike-a-bike. Even the paved road up to the trailhead was steep - steep enough I failed to make it on the lowest gear I had. That's some embarrassingly shit, right there. Of course, an audience was close by in the front yard of a nearby house.
I was able to finish the initial bid for the ridge line before sunset, but the rest of the route was done in the dark. Slowly. With much snow in the way. Thankfully, the route itself is well-marked,
if I hadn't the topo maps or trail descriptions, I would have been just fine.
Made extremely awful time until 12:00 am where I gave up any forward activity - around 13 miles in 5 1/2 hours, losing the battle after yet another snow-covered ridge to cross.
Dragging a bike through parts of a trail that are impassible because of snow or too steep for your (or, well, my) tired ass rates as some of the least enjoyable outdoor activities I can imagine.
Sleepiness set in and I crashed in a patch of ground that hadn't any snow on it. It's extremely delightful to camp with just a bivvy as setup time is measured in a couple of minutes and no wrangling of a tent. I may never go back to tent-style camping again.
Woke up to attempt the last section I planned to do of the trail, Horsethief but the entry point just showed more snow and ski tracks - that was enough for me to pull the plug. If only I had another day's insurance to finish it all up.
Stopped at Woodland Park for some more food -
This restaurant was bear-themed and they had dozens of the damn things everywhere. Great coffee though - I'll certainly try to stop in again. Friendly waitstaff that didn't seem to bat an eye as I took off my pants to sew up a tear in the seat of my pants while waiting for my order to complete. That's class on my part.
Love the sign above my head. Lost the bet with the waitress that I could finish the biscuits and gravy (and eggs and sausage) and potatoes dish with the side order of three pancakes. Dammit. Took the rest of the pancakes with me for a snack. Never did got to them.
Road home much the same way I came and felt fresh enough to make the 100ish miles in around 12 hours. Being in race touring weight, with tired legs and with major sections of dirt (and a headwind, and and and -), I thought that a fine time. In fact, I thought maybe it was too fast and one of the things I may work on is keeping a slower pace. Worried, slightly of blowing up in the first few days of the TD, without much to give afterward. I'll keep an eye out for that. I'm not a particularly powerful rider, nor am I twig-sized, nor will my setup be ultra super-critically light, so my only chance of surviving the, uh, racing part of this race is to take 'er easy and know the psychological part of being alone in BFE USA isn't too much of a big deal for me and that I can pass out sleeping most anywhere.
Gotta rely on your strengths.
Total Mileage: 213 miles
Sadly, my SPOT II ran out of juice before the first day's end. I hadn't noticed it blinking, "red" until the next morning. Blinking "red" is supposed to mean that the battery is at 30% charge, which should equate to a few days worth of use, not that the device is just about to die now, so... a little surprise there. I'm a little let down by this device in general, not because of what it is - what it is, is freakin' Star Trek technology - I mean, come on - it weighs like an ounce, tracks your using satellites and records your position in real time that can be monitored by anyone - anywhere in the world, but rather what it's made out to be. If SPOT just stated that, "when the light blinks red - get new batteries, real quick!" I'd just make sure to always have a fresh bunch of batteries ready, but they don't - they say, "you've got 30% charge, so think about getting batteries soon". It's aggravating, especially since the SPOT II stopped recorded my position hours before the red light starting blinking and most especially if this device is to be taken seriously as an emergency beacon, which I still think it shouldn't.
I certainly could not go on the adventures
I do, without the help and support I've been given along the way:
