41843 - June update

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Dag,
   Iris (Chromo, 41843 miles)

41843 - The Great Divide

There were three reasons to take a bike with me:

1. As a Dutchie, you simply never travel without one.


2. The White Rim, with 30 cars and numerous supported bikers passing by every day, I opt out.


3. The Great Divide Mountain Bike Route.

Hikers have the Appalachian and Pacific Crest trails, we trekking bikers have the GDMBR, with 2465 miles from Canada to Mexico the longest off-pavement cycling route in the world. The route parallels the Continental Divide, the line where rain falling on the west side ends up in the Pacific Ocean and rain falling on the east side in the Gulf of Mexico. Having read about it years ago in a Dutch outdoor magazine, it has occupied my thoughts ever since. The most scenic part is the 320 mile stretch in Colorado, from Platoro to Silverthorn. The route here hovers between 2100 and 3600 meter and thats breath taking in several ways. Thats what I am going to ride.

I drive to Platoro, which turned out to be an isolated little village high up in the mountains with no paved access. There is another Dutch biking coupe and together we drink coffee and eat cookies. I feel so Dutch.

The next morning its time to pack my stuff, dig out my panniers, mount my front rack on the bike, change pedals, boil the last eggs, drink the last milk and at 10:00 hit the road. The first challenge is also immediately the biggest one. Indiana pass with 3630 meter the high point of my trip. The route climbs through a natural contaminated area, with all the water carrying toxic metals and abandoned mines all over. I have to ration my water intake, but still run out of it after a while.

Whoosh! What was that. Another biker with hardly any gear comes down the road. There is no time to stop, an hellooo is all I get. I have heard that the Self supporting GDMBR race is on the way and in the area. Would this be one of them? My thought are going to my left rear pannier. This morning when I finished all the food in my cooler there was one item I decided to just take. A water melon. So here I am encountering these light weight bikers, and me, I carry a heavy water melon over the highest pass on the route. I should have listen to W, who shove me a light weight backpacking know-how book under my nose last week.

At the top of the climb there is no sign but the views are immense. The whole day feels more like hiking than biking, this high up in the mountains.

On the downhill I find an amazing camping spot. Out of sight, a stone fire ring with wood, a grassy field for my tent and a magnificent view. Oh damm, I have no water. I am so used that Oto carries everything I need, that I hadn't give it a second thought. So I mount my bike again and descent more. Two more bikers with hardly any gear are coming up the road. They have time to stop and tell me that indeed they are doing the GDMBR as a race. They are talking about 100 to 160 mile days, hardly any gear and around 20 days for the whole route. They are insane! The guy I passed this morning is from French and is riding a single speed. Hmmm, insane or just fucking cool.

I continue my descend and in the early evening finally find some surface water to filter. The camp spot I choose is covered with fire ants, the views are non. My only light point in the evening, the water melon tastes very good.

The next day I do some shoppings in Del Norte before riding a trail through a barren landscape. The Rocky Mountains are still part of the Colorado Plateau and rainfall can also here be very low.

Also today I have to climb a pass, Carnero Pass with 3100 meter of altitude another hard day. This time however I take water just after the high point and can camp when ever I feel for it. It only takes me a while to hang my bags high up in a tree, for the rest its a perfect spot.

When the sun comes up, I wake up and after some coffee and pancake breakfast another long day is waiting for me. This time Cochetopa pass, 3050 meter, is on route. With more racers and more irissen around, I never feel alone and love the ride and have no worries.

Its late in the evening and again I am looking for water. The map indicates a river crossing, but when I arrive I know when cows are not my best friends.

Its goes up and down again and the road is filled with the so hated washboard.

Finally I arrive in Doyleville, 3 houses and a haystack. I knock on the most organized house and X opens. Yes, I can get some water and yes I can pitch my tent in the garden. A couple minutes later we head instead to the Taylor river for some whitewater kayaking for X and shuttling the car for me.

On the way home X gets a phone call, if we wanne catch some bluegrass music in Crested Butte. My legs are sore, I am longing for a bed, but bluegrass, sure. At the entrance of the bar I ask which band is playing. Something Turtle. My favorite bluegrass band Blue Turtle Seduction has recently stopped. This was the first bluegrass band my friend H took me, and also the last day in the Bay Area we went together to see them. Something Turtle?

I order a beer and scan the posters above the bar. Trampled by Turtles, Monday June 28. What what, this is the band V introduced me to in Alaska, and has been a favorite while driving through this country for the last year. Is it really Monday today. It is, and sore legs or not, with some beer and good music I can dance until 2 o'clock in the morning.

Well the next day I do feel it. And Marshall pass with 3300 meters in altitude is far, high and lots of suffering. From the top however its all downhill to Salida.

I drop by the bike store and H invites me to take a shower at her house. From one comes the other and I spend a rest day riding on a cruiser bike around town. Salida, is one of these secret little gems with wonderful people and lots of outdoor activities. H is an hardcore single speed mountainbiker and I like her a lot. Until late at night we talk and it feels like friends from way back then.

The road climbs steep out of Salida onto a high plain. Here and there are some second homes, but most of the area is empty, with hardly any other traffic.

The views to the west are immense. And several 4000 meter peaks are dotted along the Continental Divide.

This is when you forget the numb hands, the sore bud, the pinched nerve in your shoulder. This is why you do it for. The feel to live on top of the world.

The night I spend in the wide open. No hiding possible, but I make it another time save through the night.

The last day I continue in the wide open plains before arriving in Como.

Almost every day I had rain, hail and thunder in the early afternoon and sometimes I had to pitch up my tent again to wait out the worst. This time I drink coffee in the post office lobby with B, who is also biking around and of course knows W and H. This Colorado outdoor world is so small. When the sun is back one more last pass is waiting for me. Boreas pass, 3500 meters, but with a gradual climb not bad at all.

The other side of the pass drops me into Breckenridge, with the 4th of July weekend a place not to be. I continue on a busy bike path along a busy highway to Frisco and the same is true here. I hide myself in the woods for the night, the last 10 miles to Silverthorn are not for me.

The next day is a day I have been dragging a bit. So first I go to the local bakery for a croissant and some bread. Now I am ready to try my luck. Hitch hiking back to Oto with the bike. 5 minutes and ride one is ready to be loading my bike in the pick up truck. For the next 5 hrs, I have 4 more rides until Del Norte. And there I am sitting. Its only 30 miles, but with dirt roads and Indiana pass between me and Oto, not an option for biking. I am waiting only 30 minutes and get anxious already. Probably the effect of being a blond woman, and wiating so for for only 10 min max. Why did I start in Platoro, oh jeh right, because its at the bottom of my map. But it would have been so much wiser to start in a normal reachable village. Then M stops and has time to bring me all the way for a big fat hamburger lunch. It takes us 2 more hrs, but there he is. Oto is still waiting for me as ever and its good to be together again.

My bike and me however, thats even a better combination. Just not in this country, here Oto is favorite. But GDMBR, that was another wonderful trip. As always, life is so good.

Dag,
   Iris (Platoro, 41843 miles)

41562 - National Parks in Colorado

I have some time in between adventures and head for 2 more national parks.

Back Canyon of the Gunnison NP
The first one is the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. Is the U-shaped valley of Yosemite carved by a glacier, the Black Canyon is a real V-shaped river carved valley. Is the Grand Canyon carved by a slow moving Colorado river through soft rock and 6 million years of erosion, the Black Canyon is cut by a fast moving Gunnison river through a hard rock uplift with hardly any erosion.

Combined a deep, narrow, with sheer cliffs, black canyon cuts through the landscape.


Great Sand Dunes NP
The second National Park is the Great Sand Dunes. Streams, creeks, melting snow and flash floods brought bits of rocks out of the San Juan Mountains to the San Luis valley floor. Southwestern winds blew the grains towards the low curves of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains at the other side of the valley and there they started to pile up.

High dune with 198 meter of height is one of the tallest dunes and a good burley 1 step forward ½ a step slide down hike up. The sun is hot, the sand even hotter.

When I run back down the slopes, sand is piling up in my shoes and burning my feet. Stopping is no option, while now I am sinking to my ankles in the hot sand. Did it take me an hr to hike up, 20 minutes is all it takes to bring me back to the Oto.

Dag,
   Iris (Salida, 41562 miles)

41249 - Paradise

This is how it goes. I meet A in a coffee shop in Moab and she sends and text message to E. E has a beer with W and gives my contact info. W thereupon drops me an email and invites me to Ophir, Colorado. And thats where I wanne be, when escaping the heat of Utah, high up in the Rocky Mountains.

Ophir sits in the middle of the San Juan mountains and is in one word; paradise. Its all I want for now. A beautiful setting, a nice house, very healthy food, a relax atmosphere, he is amazing.

We dance at the Telluride bluegrass festival, drink beer, cook, read, talk, bike and hike.

W is a professional outdoor photographer, so why words when pictures can describe all you want to say.

Dag,
   Iris (Ophir, 41249 miles)

40948 - Tour de Colorado Plateau

One of the most geologically intriguing features of the Colorado Plateau is its remarkable stability. Relatively little rock deformation such as faulting and folding has affected this 337.000 km^2 plateau when it was uplifted 3 km into the air, 75 to 15 millions years ago.

At the staircase edges of the plateau and where rivers have cut in deep, the 2000 million years of deposit layers are exposed and the greatest concentration of national parks in the USA are established to see them all.

When floating down the Green river a couple weeks ago, I cut down through about 25 of the upper layers, deposited between 100 and 300 million years ago. 40 of the lower layers, deposited between 200 and 2000 million years ago, I saw when descending into the Grand Canyon last year. Now, by touring around the Colorado Plateau in my own Tour de Colorado Plateau, I focus on almost each layer individual. The question is just how to avoid all the other tourists. A couple emails help out.

Bryce NP (18 layers, 60-175 Mya)
Known for its giant natural amphitheater filled with hoodoos, formed by wind, water and ice erosion of the river and lake bed sedimentary rocks.

When rain combines with carbon dioxide forms a solution of carbonic acid the relatively soft limestone erodes easily away. It is this process of chemical weathering that rounds the edges of hoodoos and gives them their lumpy and bulging profiles. In the winter, melting snow seeps into cracks and joints and freezes at night. Over 200 of these freeze/thaw cycles occur each year in Bryce Canyon. Forming windows and hoodoos.

And thats beautiful from above and from below when I take a hike on the with only 1% of the actual amount but still a lot of tourist filled trails.


The email says: Go to Thundermountain, just outside of the park and ride the trail on your mountainbike.

With no suspension, helmet, gloves, stubby tires or much experience, its hard, scary but very rewarding and deserted.


Cedar Break NM (18 layers, 60-175 Mya)
The nearby Cedar Break is more of the same.


Zion NP (28 layers, 175-250 Mya)
One step down or back in time, depending how you look at it, is the Zion Canyon. Cut away by the North Fork of the Virgin River and very touristy. I take my bike and ride the road to the end. As before, somehow this park doesn’t cut it for me.


The email says: The northern part of the park, the Kolob canyons is more attractive and way less touristy.

I take a nice stroll to a double arch, with only a few other tourists around.


Capitol Reef NP(26 layers, 60-270 Mya)
In Capitol Reef NP the layers folded over each other in an S-shape, instead of the perfect horizontal arrangement I have seen so far. The warp in the earth's crust that is 65 million years old and created the Waterpocker Fold, also created the Rocky Mountains. It has weathered and eroded over millennia to expose layers of rock and fossils.

I take the partly dirt Burr trail, which cuts straight through Long Canyon in the Grand Staircase-Escalante NM, before entering Capitol Reef NP.

When it pops out the views are until far and beyond and makes a very good camping spot.

The email says: Lower Muley Twist, I have heard its good.

I climb over the Waterpocker Fold and descend into the Lower Muley Twist Canyon.
Its hot and I take breaks in the shade.

I don't see another person though and enjoy the canyon walls rising high above me.

To get back to the other side of the Waterpocket Fold I don't have to climb it, but Muley Twist my way trough it.

Its a long hole back to Oto to complete the 15 mile loop. Bugs and heat are my part.

No complains though with a landscape like this around.


Natural Bridges NM (15 layers, 200-286 Mya)
After the Burr trail I cross Lake Powell by ferry and head south. And deeper it goes.

When the long winding curves of the Kachina and Sipapu rivers almost circle back on itself, they can create thin rock walls between the loops. As the river keeps undercutting the thing walls, a natural bridge is born over time. The park features 3 large bridges and I check Sipapu out from the bottom.

The email says: Where all the tourist go left, go right, up stream, there are some ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings.


Valley of the Gods (228-286 Mya)
Valley of the Gods is the next area on the tour. This is the cheap mens Monument Valley, but nothing wrong with.


Hovenweep NM
The next 2 parks I visit are focusing more on the inhabitants then geology.

Between AD 1150 and AD 1200, the Hovenweep inhabitants began building large pueblos around fortress-like towers at the heads of box canyons. The people built check dams and reservoirs and moved their fields into areas where water could be controlled. They also built large stone towers, living quarters and other shelters to safeguard springs and seeps. 6 village are conserved and I visit the most accessible one, Square Tower.


Mesa Verde NP
The Anasazi, ancient Pueblo people, made stone villages and spectacular cliff dwellings their home in the 1200s AD. I visit Balcony House.

Cliff Palace I see from the road.


With the help of the emails, which let me escape the tourists in the more remote part of the parks (thanks), I learned a lot, saw a lot, experienced a lot. But enough with National Parks. Time to be tired, to get a pinched nerve, blisters on my heels, blood on my knuckles. Time to get my bud kicked in the outdoors of the Rocky Mountains.

Dag,
   Iris (Blanding, 40948 miles)