Crested Butte Day 3: 401 hours of fun

Our spectacular Crested Butte vacation was having less than spectacular weather.  I had wanted to save the 401 trail for a blue-bird sunny day, since this trail is renowned for breathtaking scenery and calendar-worthy photos, but the forecast was shutting down that probability, so we just decided to go for it on day 3. 

To do this as a loop ride, we started out at the old mining town site of Gothic and settled in for the long gravel/mud road ride to Schofield pass.

On the road to Schofield pass.

Emerald Lake was more of a turquoise color on this day.

At the pass we caught the trail and then climbed and hiked some more.  The trails were very muddy and dark clouds threatened again.

The top of the ride on the 401 trail above Schofield Pass.

Mount Bellview, and is that a glacial moraine in the foreground? I never noticed it until I looked at this picture.  I was too concerned that day about getting down off the high country.

 After a moderately serious shower, the sun decided to pop out now and then to prove the grandeur of the 401.

That's Gothic Mountain to the right and smiley Drew to the left.

 The trail was mostly intermediate-skill singletrack. There were a few more technical sections, and some parts that we had to "negotiate".

This part of the trail was marked on the map as "impassable to horses". It was damn near impassable to mountain bikers too.

Not many wildflowers in bloom this time of year, but the fall colors were nice nonetheless. The relatively easy trail allowed us opportunity to marvel at the scenery.

Those are some seriously nasty trail conditions.

 We had been rained on, we were tired and thirsty, and the map showed a way back to the main road over a creek crossing near Rustler Gulch trailhead so we checked it out. 

Not a happy place to ford.

 Creek crossing no kidding!  We watched a pickup truck drive through up to its floorboards. We decided we would rather ride another 3.3 miles of trail than swim that one.

I'm a wimp for not riding this, but it was slippery!

Obligatory smiling selfie complete with amazing scenery and goofy bike attire.

We managed to avoid a major deluge and see the grand vistas.

 The last three miles made the warm dry clothes waiting back at the van all that much nicer.

Happy Dewey awaits at the end of the trail.

Mount Crested Butte.

The route back to the van passed directly through the town of Crested Butte, so what else were we to do besides partake in the funky atmosphere and free WiFi of Secret Stash pizzeria before retiring to our Onemile campsite to rest for tomorrow's big ride.

The day's stats: 3 hrs 1 min ride time.  13.2 miles. 2402 feet of climbing.

Crested Butte Day 2: Doctor's Park is what the doctor ordered

Rewind to camping

In my last post I forgot to mention the camping situation.  By the time Drew's schedule for September was finalized, it was much too late to make campground reservations for Labor Day weekend.  Instead, I managed to reserve Sunday night at Onemile Campground, a U.S. Forest Service campground up the Taylor Creek drainage. Friday night, as you saw, we pulled in late to a campground outside of Gunnison. Saturday, our first order of business (after espresso and breakfast, duh) was to find a camp spot for Saturday night.  I was apprehensive that Onemile campground would have any available spots, but it was worth a shot before we forged on up toward Crested Butte and higher elevation, undeveloped camping*.  We were in luck! Site number 9, which just happened to be the best site at Onemile campground, had just opened up as we pulled in, so we snagged it and set up camp.

*Undeveloped means no electrical hookups.  There was a time in my camping career that I would have preferred to be unplugged.  Spending the chilly nights in a cozy van that has an electric heater and electric hot water have changed me. 

Site 9 at Onemile Campground on Taylor Creek.  Excellent flat parking, water hydrant close enough to hook a hose to the van when needed, lots of trees for privacy and well spaced sites, clean restrooms, friendly hosts, quite neighbors; can't do better than that.

 

Enough about the camping. What about the riding?

For day 2 we chose Doctor Park and did it as a loop from our campground.

Most people shuttle Doctor Park. We chose to ride up the 10 miles of mostly gravel road. We like to earn our beer.

   

A pit stop to break up the road ride. Drew is fascinated by the rocks.

 The fun begins at the Spring Creek crossing. 

Since we did not have a high clearance four wheel drive vehicle like those pansies on the other side, we had to take our two-footed two-wheeled vehicle though the icy cold creek.

 Actually, the fun had not yet begun.  We had to climb up to where the fun starts, and while we were doing that, it rained.

Note the very muddy road.

 It rained a lot. It rained so much that a car that was following us on the road slid off the track. It rained so much we had to push our bikes. It rained so much that when we tried to start riding again, this happened:

Drew trying to un-stick a rock that had wedged itself in his bottom pivot. Meanwhile, I spent a good 20 minutes de-mudding my bike to the point where the wheels would turn again.

 But just like a good summer thunderstorm, that one passed and by the time we reached the tippy top of the trail at almost 11,000 feet elevation, we had sunshine and 90% tacky (10% muddy) singletrack on which to giggle down the mountain.

Doctor Park trail zigs and zags toward the trees. There were miles of this stuff. Happy face.

 Not all the trail was skinny buff bliss, a good chunk was technical rock gardens, just to keep things interesting.

Rock garden on Doctor Park

The last couple of miles of trail lose a lot of elevation, fast.  This is how they do it:

Steeply descending trail using anchored cinder block to armor the trail against wash outs.  Very effective. Very fun to ride.

After hours of trails, we finally popped out at the campground next to the one we were staying at. A mile of pavement back to up our camp took us to frosty cold beers, warm water for washing the mud off, and an evening of cooking and eating the best Pad Thai in the universe.

Modesty while showering from the flexible handheld shower head attached to the kitchen sink is a luxury we can afford in our van.

Nature's kitchen.

The day's stats: 3 hrs 43 min ride time.  22.5 miles. 3470 feet of climbing.

So after that, we elevated the trip to epic status.

Crested Butte Day 1: Dykes rock

For our first day in Crested Butte (CB for short), we chose the Dyke Trail, west of town up toward Kebler Pass.  The reason for choosing this trail; clouds threatened and I wanted to save blue skies (and epic rides and pictures) for a longer day. 
First stop: Lake Irwin, an impounded lake that is an apparently great fishing spot judging by the number of fisherpeople up at 10,000 ft on an iffy weather day.

Drew at the fancy reservoir outlet.

After about 45 minutes of climbing, singletrack commenced.

It seemed like miles of flow-y singletrack ahead.

However, due to 7 days of rain and what we would come to know as typical CB under-maintained remote trail, we ended up hike-a-biking quite a bit as thunder warned us to keep off the ridge line.

During a previous bike vacation in Sun Valley, we had the unpleasant experience of encountering serious sheep dogs protecting their flocks. Today, we came upon sheep, and heard barking.  We were wary.

But we managed to ring our bells and ride as fast as we could between ridges and thus avoided any canine encounters. We did not, however, manage to avoid rain.  We had showers; the trails, on the other hand, had deluges earlier in the day.  Muddiness. Still, the trails took the rain fairly well and we were able to ride some pretty wild sections.

Maybe we should have headed the “can be muddy when wet” advice on MTBR.com, but it’s all part of the adventure. 

Hiding out in the only shelter around at the end of the singletrack.

The trail proved to have miles of fun, remote singletrack, many streamlet crossings, open landscapes interspersed with beautiful and healthy aspen forests, and very, very few people.  Not a bad choice for day one. 

Post singletrack, we suffered through a long road climb back up and over Kebler Pass. At least there were good views.

The rain had subsided and our map showed a singletrack up and over the top of Kebler Pass that was a more direct and supposedly more off-road route than the road. The heavy equipment at the turn off to the singletrack should have signaled us that the trail was being turned into a road via an interim mud bog.

Back to the pavement and finally down to our happily waiting van.

Hooray for muddy bikes.


And post-ride snacks.


Snacks held us until we could properly re-hydrate at Brick Oven Pizzeria. 30 beers on tap! 

We were so not in Utah anymore. The bartender was friendly and knowledgeable and the pizza was great. Perfect.

Beautiful sunset on Mount Crested Butte and down the valley to our campground.



The day's stats: 3 hrs 2 min ride time.  14.2 miles. 2415 feet of climbing. 

Day 1 in the books. Epic? Not yet, but there is potential.

Crested Butte Day 0: let’s get going

Drew’s vacation lapped over Labor Day weekend in September; a long-term dream of ripping Crested Butte singletrack would be lived!


That picture is cutting to the chase. First we had to get there. 
After much prolonged packing and futzing, we (Drew) drove 7 hours to Lake Fork Campground on Blue Mesa Reservoir of the Gunnison Reservoir, stopping prematurely because it was raining cats and dogs on curvy mountain roads and Drew was tired of driving.  Good decision.

Chillin’ after the drive.

In the morning the world was washed clean, smelling of sage.

Lake campground is designed for fisher-people and RVs.

Time to start the vacation. 

First to fuel up on Gunnison for a burrito and espresso.  Seriously, the worst thing about camping is being far from our espresso machine.  We may have a problem.

Crawford Award

My colleagues and I recently received recognition for work we have been doing in the West Desert. The Crawford award is presented once per year to the authors of an outstanding publication.  Hugh Hurlow is the main author; the rest of us contributed in a significant way.  The award comes with a small cash award - some money to buy that field case I've been wanting.

2015 Crawford Award

The prestigious 2015 Crawford Award was presented to UGS geologists Hugh Hurlow, Stefan Kirby, Lucy Jordan, Paul Inkenbrandt, Janae Wallace, and Mike Lowe in recognition of their combined work on the outstanding geologic publication Hydrogeologic Studies and Groundwater Monitoring in Snake Valley and Adjacent Hydrographic Areas, West-Central Utah and East-Central Nevada (UGS Bulletin 135).
This 294-page book presents hydrogeologic, groundwater-monitoring, and hydrochemical studies in Snake Valley, Tule Valley, and Fish Springs Flat in Millard and Juab Counties, west-central Utah. Collectively, this work delineates groundwater levels, flow, and chemistry in Snake Valley and adjacent basins to a much greater degree than previously possible, and emphasizes the sensitivity of the groundwater system to possible increases in groundwater pumping.
The Crawford Award recognizes outstanding achievement, accomplish­ments, or contributions by a current UGS scientist to the understanding of some aspect of Utah geology or Earth science. The award is named in honor of Arthur L. Crawford, first director of the UGS.



http://geology.utah.gov/2015-crawford-award/

Wicked summer fun

In a June phone conversation, Sister Di mentioned she had four great tickets to the musical Wicked at the Denver Center for Performing Arts on July 1 and they had to find some fun couple to take.  “Pick Me!” I said.  Drew was able to get a July schedule that allowed us a quick overnight trip to play with her and Tod.

We flew in early enough to go for a hike at Red Rocks.

The geologic setting creates spectacular scenery. Red sandstone (Fountain Formation, 290-296 million years old, Pennsylvanian Period) was tilted about 80 million years ago during the last phase of Rocky Mountain uplift (Laramide Orogeny).

I have always wanted to see a concert at the natural amphitheater.

We set out with ambitions of a 7 mile hike but it was hot so we turned around after we felt we had earned our dinner.

Fancy dinner in LoDo before the main event.

 

Down front at the theater.

Our seats were so close we could read the map-curtain, see expressions on the performers faces, and sleuth out that Elphaba’s green hands were pulled off by use of green gloves, not makeup.  The show was thrilling and thoroughly enjoyable!