I left my house in Chula Vista, CA at around 6:00pm to try to catch up with the rest of the group that took off earlier in the day. They were slated to stop and get some rest in Cedar City, UT for the night and I wanted to make it there and get a few hours of sleep before finishing the rest of the trip into Ouray, CO the following day. I arrived at Cedar City at 3:30am
Tuesday (July 15th):
I was up at 6:30am to meet the group, get some breakfast, and hit the road. We headed up the I-15 to the I-70 to the 191 through Moab, UT. From Moab we dropped down though the San Miguel River Basin/Canyon through Ridgeway and into Ouray, CO. We arrived at our campground around 4:00pm. We camped at the KOA campground between Ridgway and Ouray. We pulled in and met my mother and brother-in-law who had driven in from Nebraska to meet us for the Summit. We set up camp, ate some Jack Daniel's burgers, and settled in for the night to be up the following morning to be the first in line for the Summit registration.
We stopped before dropping into San Miguel Valley to check out the view and take a break:
Wednesday (July 16th):
Last year (2007) we joined up with all the sanctioned runs and decided to do our own thing thins year with a smaller group of rigs. It proved to pay off. We were up and running and were nearly the first to register. No runs were scheduled just a meet & greet and the Chile Cook-Off. Frogeye and his brother hung around Summit Central (the Best Western Hotel in Ouray) and my mom, brother-in-law, and I headed out to see some family friends and do some tourist stuff because my brother-in-law had never been in the area before. We were headed into Telluride then to Norwood and eventually into Redvale where my families friend lived. There was a storm a brewing so we stopped at the Dallas Divide to snap some pics and watch the lightening.
Summit Central in Ouray (pic taken from the Amphitheatre)
Dallas Divide:
We took off up the San Miguel River Canyon to Redvale. On the way in we stopped at my aunt's friend's cafe in Norwood and ate some good-ole country food and homeade Pecan Pie. Next door to the cafe were this wagon and steam engine. They have been setting in the same place since I was just a little tyke.
We ate then saw our friend in Redvale. After Redvale we headed back to Telluride to drive down the main drag. On the way to Telluride we saw a bear on the side of the highway. He spooked before we could get a picture. On the way back we decided to take a shortcut and run Last Dollar Road over to the Dallas Divide instead of taking the highway. Last dollar road can be done in a Honda Civic... that is unless it's raining... remember how I mentioned we were taking pictures of the thunderstorm??? Let's just say I'm still picking the seat felt from my sphincter...
We pretty much just slid down the back side of the trail. It was everything I could do to keep it on the trail. We didn't get any pics do to the extreme conditions. We made it back to camp and sat around the fire before hitting the sack and getting some rest before our runs the next day.Thursday (July 17th):
The last sanctioned run for the day left at 9:30am. We decided to set our runs to leave at 10:00am so we might avoid any congestion on the trails. (IT WORKED!!!!) We decided to run Yakee Boy Boy Basin, Ompgene Pass, and Ophir Pass on this day. The rain was hit and miss. Do to time running out we only ended up running Yankee Boy and Imogene...
YANKEE BOY BASIN:
momollie and I on Yankee Boy:
IMOGENE PASS:
We decided to check out a mine (skersfan on his way in):
skerasfan And I discussing whether or not to both come back to Colorado or just start build our new homes here:
Lunch break:
momollie and brother-in-law were lovin' it despite the weather:
The Imogene Summit (we found a 40 at the top!!!):
The old and the new:
Frogeye and his brother (I swear):
Imogene Summit Views:
The ponds you see in the image above are the sediment ponds near Telluride. We hit telluride and took off for Ouray via the highway so we could make it back in time for the nightly barbque at Summit Central. We then crashed for the night to be up early for more fun the next day.
See next post for more of the trip report.
