Today, we did something we haven’t done in FOREVER – we rode our bikes! It felt good! Well, other than the familiar “I can’t breathe!”.

We picked an “easiest”-rated trail, the Little Rainbow Trail, and at that, we only did half of it, but we still got six miles in, with 1,059 feet of climbing. We knew we wanted to start in the middle, where we went the other day, but we wanted to find our destination first, so we found the West trailhead. Here is what greets you as you step on the trail here:

This is how they ask for donations – maybe DORBA should try this? And here is the map they posted:

We’re doing the red trail, and we’ll start in the middle, end up here, on the left side – you can almost imagine the “You are here” if you really try.

Anyway, we go back to the middle and start riding – we know it’s mostly uphill, and it definitely is, but not too horrible – the main issue is still lack of oxygen. Dang, you’d think we’d be climatized after about a month at 7,000 feet. Or maybe we’re just fat and out of shape … NAH, that can’t be it! We’re in shape – round is a shape!

Ok, here’s what we got to see:

and a closeup of town from the trail:

Great views from the trail! The ride West was kinda hard for us, as I mentioned, and I hoped that the return would be better, and by golly, it was! Two monster hills, but other than that pretty much all downhill. It took us a bit over half the time to return as it took to get there. 56 minutes out, 30 back, and of course, both were kind of taking our time – the way out to breathe, the way back because a lot of the turns were a bit skittish, so we didn’t want to build up too much speed. should not take long to get used to the difference in terrain, but we’re out here for the fun, not to race.

Rest of the day – jigsaw puzzles! And some nips from the growler of Smoked Stout we got the other day. Mmmm…

Friday! Wow. All day we’ve been thinking it’s Saturday. Go figure.

So, we had some cereal for breakfast, and first thing on the agenda is to take the bikes in to get the tires put on. They don’t open until 10 supposedly, so we can take our time. Actually got up pretty early. Well, the sun is so damned bright up here that it’s impossible to sleep past about 7, even with a dark towel over the big window. We HAVE to get something to put on the skylight!

Ok, in to town, drop off the bikes … they’re REALLY busy. BUT – they can make it happen! Super nice folks – the guy who’s helped us both days here is Ryan Knobbe (I asked him if it’s pronounced like the tire – “knobby”, but sadly it’s not), and here he is:

VERY helpful guy, and extremely friendly, as they’ve all been in this shop. So, we drop them off, but now need a way to kill time. “How about going to the place next door for a cup of coffee?” he says. You see, Absolute bikes is right next door, literally, as they have a door between them – that’s how you get there. We tromp over and get a “would you also like to see a breakfast menu?” Well, food? Of course! Looks like it’s good, and it’s priced very reasonably … so of course, we sit to have breakfast. We’re gonna put on a LOT of weight on this trip. Here’s breakfast, after we’ve eaten most of it:

The Bear had biscuits and gravy, topped with two eggs over easy, and I had a bagel with eggs, green chiles, cheese and bacon. Both had decaf, and the total tab was barely over 20 bucks! Needless today, we’ll be back! AND a super-friendly staff. We’ve noticed that everywhere we’ve been in Salida – EVERYONE is  super-friendly. I like it here! We ate out on the patin, and here’s the view:

That’s river you see shining past the railing. Don’t worry, we were not the only ones there, I purposely shot to avoid catching anyone.

After breakfast (second breakfast, that is), we walked around a bit, and saw some folks kayaking:

In funny little river yaks:

More views of town:

And when we returned, here’s what the two places look like, bike shop on the left, restaurant on the right:

When we returned, the bikes were ready, and Ryan showed us the artwork that came out of two of the tires:

Looks like rubber coral, but it’s what I call “Tire boogers”. It’s the dried-up sealant that you put inside bicycle tires when you run them tubeless (it’s liquid when you put it in). On a DVD case for scale. I’m surprised we didn’t hear those massive clumps bumping around in there while we rode!

Anyway, after that we went looking for trailheads, one of which is here:

This is Little Rainbow, and it’s rated “easiest”, so this is what we’ll ride tomorrow. Yes, today is YET ANOTHER rest day, I suppose. Well, we’re walking, at least, so getting some exercise. While going a bit into the trail, ran into this:

Not sure how it happened, but there it is.

Ok, so after that, on the way home, stopped by O’Reilly Auto Parts to get a small air tank. NOW I have what we need to install tubeless tires. Whew! Well, it was worth it to have the bike shop do it, they found some small issues with my bike, but took care of EVERYTHING, and for a VERY reasonable price. Well, ok, we DID buy a lot of stuff the other day (dropped several hundred bucks on tires and rails to transport the road bikes) but I’m not sure that had so much to do with it, I think these guys want to help you out if you’re visiting and really need something done. If you’re in Salida, they seem to be by far the largest bike shop, tell ’em Bill and Barri sent you!

Today is work on bikes day! Off to town to get things we need, then we’ll return to do the work.

Walking through town, we saw this:

The cool part is it seems to be fully functional!

We were looking for breweries, and the distillery, found them, and then decided to get some lunch, as it had been a while since breakfast. Saw a lot of places, but the desire to try a Moonlight Pizza overcame us, so we returned. We ordered the T-Guns – Special red sauce, tomatoes, spinach, pepperoni, cream cheese and jalapeños. Wow! We have a NEW winner! THIS is the best pizza I’ve EVER had, never mind the tour. The crust is what makes it. It’s a thin crust, but airy, yet it still tastes like the bread ones I’ve always liked. Look:

And here’s a close-up of a slice:

Heaven on a plate! We’ll be back to try some of the others, I guarantee. Since it was before happy hour (half-price pints), we had soft drinks. First round was a root beer for The Bear, and a ginger beer for me:

Mmmmmm … GOOD! A little bite to the ginger beer. All made with Salida water and cane sugar, no high-fructose corn syrup. For a second, I had the Vanilla Cream:

Yeah, I know, looks like it’s just water, but trust me, it did not taste like just water! On the way out, we picked up a growler of Smoked Stout for the road – 64oz of wonderful stout for $9! Ok, it was an extra $4 for the growler itself, but after that, refills are just $9! For a half-gallon of beer! Woohoo!

Ok, time for something stronger to drink, so off we go to find Elevation Beer Co. It’s on the way home, so we whip in and have a couple of brews, I have the Lil Mo’ Porter, and The Bear has a Señorita, also a porter – the weird part is that while it is smaller, as you might expect  (considering the name), it is stronger (alcohol-wise). Go figure. Here they are:

Good stuff! After that we head home to work on the bikes.

We start with The Bear’s bike, front tire change-out, but soon realize that our floor pump, even though it’s a high-volume one, does not seat the bead on the tubeless tire. AHA! But I have a compressor! True – but what I don’t have is a Schrader-to-Presta adapter. Damn!

Off to Walmart it is, where we find our adapter and a lot of candy to soothe our pains. We return only to find yet another setback. Yes, I have a compressor, but it still cannot put out enough volume of air to seat the beads. Double damn! I guess it’s off to the bike shop tomorrow.

We hiked yesterday. It had been a while. My legs HURT! My calves and shins are killing me! Ok, so no riding OR hiking today. Good day to GSD. We go into town and pick up a few more things. We know we’re heading into cold country, so a quilt is in order, and I pick up some sandals, because I’ve discovered sandals. The Bear bought me some Tevas a few weeks ago, the first sandals I’ve ever worn that were comfortable, so I wear them A LOT. I find some Dr. Scholl’s that are INCREDIBLY comfortable, and buy two pair, open and closed. I’m set! We get some kitchen stuff, and head back to camp to wrap up the camp – tomorrow we head to Salida, CO.

No riding today – hiking instead! We’re going to go check out the Colorado Trail in Durango. It starts just outside of town, so just a short drive. We’re hiking it because we may ride it. Pretty nice trail, except in parts it drops off VERY steeply, and goes down a long way – easily over a hundred feet, and the only thing to stop you would be the creek at the bottom. I don’t like that. Plus, the trail angles to the outside (as it should, so water can run off the trail when it rains, instead of along it to cut it deeper. The only issue I have with that is that where the trail has got itself dusty, it could be very easy to slid off into oblivion. I know, that most likely would never happen, but irrational fears are just that – irrational. The scenery is spectacular! I hate to take photos of things like this, because they never do it justice, but here goes anyway:

Yes, storm clouds were looming, but we braved it anyway.

See the creek way down there?

See how steep? And this is one of the less steep sections …

This was a really cool bridge a couple of miles in.

One of the steeper sections, but at least there is shrubbery to slow you down, so this did not bother me.

In the end, we hiked five miles, which doesn’t seem like a lot, but we did climb (and descended!) a bit over 1,000 feet, so the legs were a mite tired when we got done. A good day!

Ok, late posting this because of flaky internet.

Today was FS day! Find Stuff Day. Looking for trailheads. The Bear wants to try and let her hand heal, so we’re going to take it easy today, maybe tomorrow also.

We head out and look for the Hermosa Creek Trailhead – here it is:

We went ahead and hiked a little bit of it, and it is beautiful out there!

After that, we drove out to places we were in 20 years ago – Old Lime Creek Road and Molass Pass. Here is the view from Molass Pass:

Here is the sign that tells you how high up you are:

And here is a map of the Colorado Trail, From Durango to Molass Pass:

This is one place we STARTED a ride from all those years ago. Ah, to be young again! To be able to BREATHE again!

Then we went looking for Old Lime Creek Road. This is a ride several of us did 20 years ago, not all of us did the same ride. The Bear and I have a bad habit of always riding with folks younger than us, and we get our butts kicked repeatedly by doing so. You think we’d learn. Anyway, OLCR starts (the way we did it back when) at about 8,900 feet, winds its way up and down, then ends up about 11 or 12 miles later at 9,800 feet. The rest of the crowd did it as an out and back, but we were not sure we could handle another 11 or 12 miles back (we did not realize it was going to be mostly down hill), so we opted instead to take the highway. I remember we got rained on, and hailed on, but I did not remember it being that bad. Well, driving it this time, I have a whole new appreciation for what we did! Our return started at 9,800 feet, of course, and went over Coal Bank Pass. It was three miles to the pass, climbing to 10,600. Yes, we climbed 800 feet in three miles. Not too bad. It’s like taking a 20-foot board, and raising the far end one foot – not bad! Well, yes, but do that for THREE MILES. It’s kind of steep after a while. Then, we dropped from 10,600 to 8,900 in five miles. We were doing about 40-45 mph on the way down, using very little brakes. Not one car kept up with us, I do remember that! Fun times!

Saturday – ride day! We’ll go check out the Animas River Trail. It’s about a seven mile concrete or asphalt (or rarely, gravel) trail that parallels the Animas River. Clever name, huh? We started in the middle and headed in towards town, about 3.5 miles total to the current end of it on the North end, then we rode back to where we started. The South end did not hold any allure for us, so we skipped that – besides, we need to go to ACE Hardware to get a 7MM wrench so we can bleed The Bear’s brakes, and maybe stop at City Market for some vittles.

Ok, got the wrench, got the vittles, head home for some lunch!

After lunch, we got the itch to go back to that brewery that we couldn’t get into last Thursday, the Ska Brewery, so off it is! This time, there’s plenty of parking, so no issues with that, and we head in to the restaurant at the rear (The Container – so called because it’s made of shipping containers!). On the way in, we see some interesting things:

Bike racks! Really cool ones, that hold the bike vertically. i like it! So, we went on inside, tried some of their stouts, and also looked at the food menu. Hmmm … Kimchi Burger. I happen to like Kimchi, so this sounds like a most-have! Here it is, $8 by itself, or $10 with a pint:

The Kimchi was pretty good, though it could have been hotter, but I’d still have this on a return trip. On the way out, we saw a different type of bike rack, much more creative:

And that was it for today! Tomorrow? Not sure. Some killer trail, I’m sure, where we’ll never be able to catch our breath, but that’s why we’re here!

Ah, Friday! So many plans, but, what are plans for? Why, to change, of course! Were gonna ride the concrete trail, but decided this was a good GSD day – Get Stuff Done. Gonna stick with “Stuff”. And so we did. Little niggling things that were bugging us about living in the trailer, but it’s all sorted out now.

Tomorrow we’ll get back on the bikes.

Did see a couple of cool things today while out and about, though. The first one was cool, I should say, and will interest many DORBA folks:

Maybe a little expensive at $70.00, but some folks would probably spend it. The second thing was … weird. No other word for it. I’d never seen this:

Bad photo, I know, but it was a quick grab at the grocery store, and before anyone maligns the poor unfortunate woman standing there, she was NOT with the … other person … in the photo. I had never before seen high-heeled hiking boots. And it’s not like he was THAT short, either. Go figure …

Fine day for a great ride, and we are off! We want to return to North Horse Gulch, a set of trails we rode last year, so we head out, kinda late, though. This is the trail where we saw Mo Monaghan last year, and it was a fun one. Well, when last we were here, the city was working on the parking area, so parking was difficult, though not impossible. THIS year, they’re STILL working on it, and there is NO parking! Well, almost a year, so … quite the improvement … NOT!

Ok, that’s out, but there are a LOT of trails here, so we go to SOUTH Horse Gulch instead. We DO find parking there, so off to ride we go! Here’s the trailhead:

A bit into the trail, I see this:

Cute! I have no unearthly idea what it is, but it’s cute! From the trail we see this:

And later on this:

Not terrific vistas, but pretty cool.

For later, there’s a plan, so we head home to shower and change. There’s a brewery (well, a lot of them, but we want a particular one) that has specials and BBQ on Thursdays, so off we go, across town. Very close to where we rode, as a matter of fact. Well, the place is so packed, there’s no place to park literally for over a block, and it’s all illegal parking anyway (on the street, on No Parking areas) and I won’t do that, so we head home for dinner. Oh, well.

On our return, I get photos of our campsite. I like it – lots of trees, megashade. Here’s the rear of it:

Here’s the left side:

And the right:

Best campsite EVER!

Tomorrow? Maybe some concrete trails, to let the legs rest a bit.