Colorado Cruiser: 2013 Summer Ride - Day 3 - Long Detour

I awoke at 6:00. Rather than get up and wake Kyle and Nan, I just lay in bed checking emails, facebook, and playing a few hands of Freecell solitaire. As I lay there, I heard 3 electronic beeps from somewhere outside the room. Then a few minutes later I heard them again. Then I heard beeps like someone programming a microwave oven. Then the 3 again. I was trying to figure out what or who was making that noise when I remembered that Eric has been waking up at 4:00 every morning, unable to go back to sleep. Our rooms all have microwaves in them and I wondered if Eric was next door fiddling with his microwave. If so, I was gonna kill him.

When the noises continued for well over 30 minutes I realized that I was hearing people at the Continental Breakfast. The 3 loud beeps turned out to be the Belgian waffle maker.

Finally I decided to get up and shower and have some breakfast myself. I made a waffle for myself, some eggs, sausage, and orange juice, then took them outside to a picnic table. The temp was about 55 and felt wonderful. About 10 minutes later Angela, then John joined me. Angela quickly went to their room for a light jacket, but John and I thought it was great. Kyle joined us after a while. Kyle commented that if Angela thought this was cold, then we Coloradans were allowed to think that 90 was hot.

While we sat there, a couple of fire trucks headed East out of town on the same road we would be taking. I wondered aloud whether there might be a while fire nearby, but John said he'd seen an ambulance headed the same way a half hour ago, so we figured it was an accident. I commented that if the accident closed the road, we'd have a pretty long detour down through the San Luis valley.

When I got back to the room Nan was already up and showering, so I started packing things and taking it out to the car. We were packed and ready to go by 8:30.

Heading East out of town, we hadn't gone 1 mile when we say a flashing highway sign saying that Monarch pass was closed due to an accident. But it had been over an hour since we'd seen the fire trucks roll by, so we kept going. 9 miles out of town we passed the road that would be a detour if we needed it. There were sporadic cars passing us the other way, and I commented on the CB that I hoped they were cars that had crossed the pass, and not cars that had turned around.

25 miles later we pulled up to a road block. The police man said that the road would be closed until at least 2:00pm. We'd gambled and lost.

We turned around and rode to a gas station just a few hundred yards back, gassed up and discussed options. There really were none. There was a 20 mile gravel road we could take around the accident, or a 120 mile paved detour. We headed back the 25 miles to the detour road we'd passed.

We turned South and began to wind our way through the mountains toward the San Luis valley. The road turned out to be a great road. Scenic and twisty. I'm sure that if it wasn't being used as a detour, it would also have very little traffic on it. It didn't have much as it was, but we kept running into slow moving RVs that we had to pass.

40 some miles later, we finally emerged into a small town that I recognized. Kyle Kadi and I had ridden through it a month ago on our Memorial Day ride. We turned left and headed toward Poncha Pass.

By the time we reached Poncha Springs and highway 50 again, the detour had cost us nearly 170 miles and 2.5 hours. It was a very tough morning.

We decided to continue North on 285 toward Buena Vista rather than detour 10 miles to Salida for lunch. Once we reached Buena Vista (pronounced with a long U sound) we stopped at a restaurant I'd been to before. I just picked it rather than asking everyone's opinion and spending another 30 minutes looking around and trying to make everyone happy.

The took a bit to seat us (7 people after all). The menu really only had 1 thing on it. A Burger, with several options for topping it, or you could replace the burger with a chicken breast. So we all had burgers.

We gassed up after lunch and turned back South for a mile to re join highway 285.

This 20 miles of highway 285 is the only East/West corridor through the mountains until you reach I-70. So it's very heavy with traffic, 1 lane each way, and very twisty. I've often had idiots pass me around blind corners, on the outside, and just plane drive up my lane forcing me off onto the shoulder as they pass. We didn't have any trouble like that today though, just heavy traffic.

Once we cross East through the mountains, 285 turns North towards the town of Fairplay. It crosses some wide open grass lands which has a different kind of beauty from all the canyons and trees we've been in lately.

John and Eric have informed me that my notions of flat, strait, and boring roads is very warped. I've been jaded by all the super twisty roads I ride on in the mountains. Many of the roads that I've been calling boring, have to them, been great roads. And thinking back, they're right. They are great roads and I really shouldn't complain about them. It's nothing like driving the grid - straight roads in the Phoenix area. But I digress.

We reached Fairplay and stopped to stretch our legs again. Today was supposed to be a short 5 hour ride. We've now ridden 5 hours and thanks to the detour, we still have over 2 hours more riding to go. At least it's cool today.

From Fairplay we headed North on highway 9 toward Hoosier pass. I've only been over Hoosier pass once, and that was in a car to go skiing at Breckenridge, and I wasn't even driving. This is another gem of a road. Twisting and winding up a river valley with trees all around and towering peaks on both sides.

Just over the top of the pass, the truck in front of me slammed on his brakes and stopped. I looked over to the side to see what he might be looking at and saw a black shape near the trees. It was a bear. I pulled up behind the truck, about 20 feet from the bear. It looked pretty young and confused. It kept coming out and going back a ways. Suddenly I was very aware that I had a young confused bear only 20 feet from me and wondered if the truck was just going to sit there, but he pulled away and I continued on. No thoughts of trying to get a picture.

Angela did get a picture, but only the bear's head is visible on the left side.

Kyle came over the CB saying "Where's his mom?" and that set off a whole different set of fears, but we were already moving past, so someone else could worry about angering a mother bear by gawking at her cub.

We continued down off of Hoosier pass through the switchbacks and eventually reached the bottom. Soon we were cruising through down town Breckenridge. It's a very VERY touristy town. There were people everywhere along the street going in and out of shops and restaurants. It seems to have grown a bit since I was here last a few years ago. I've never seen it so busy.

At least traffic didn't stop and we moved along at a good 25 mph, stopping occasionally as someone crossed the road.

After Breckenridge we approached Frisco. I was leading and saw the sign saying to turn left for I-70. I pulled into the left lane and announced it on the CB, but Nan couldn't get over for all the traffic. John said that his GPS was saying to go straight and I remembered, that yes, going straight was actually a quicker way so we told Nan just to go on. We were split up yet again.

Our route took us through the touristy section of Frisco. Not quite as built up or busy as Breck had been, but they had stop signs and stop lights everywhere. I'm sure the I-70 sign was meant exactly to get people to drive through this area.

We eventually reached I-70 and turned East. I couldn't get Nan on the CB, so I called her cell. She was already on the freeway and about 2 miles ahead of us. So we twisted the throttle and boogied on down the road to catch her.

The freeway climbs toward the Eisenhower tunnel. We had allot of traffic all around us here and I was going at a pretty leisurely 75. Soon I heard the gentle rumble of John's bike coming up to pass me, then the LOUD rumble as he accelerated through a gap of cars and he was gone. Eric and Kyle soon followed him and I kept to my gentle meanderings. I'd forgotten just how log the Eisenhower tunnel is. It seemed to go on for a very long time with traffic still moving at about 75.

Eventually I caught up with Nan near George Town. Everyone else had passed her a few minutes ago. We decided to gather up in Idaho Springs. John came over the radio to tell us to get off at the first exit, just after Nan and I passed it, so we took the 2nd exit instead. Then started a whole nother game of "where are you?". Eventually we met up at the East end of town. We got back on the freeway for a couple miles. We were going to take the exit to Central City. Nan said she thought the exit was to the left, so John switched over just as the exit came up on the right. The rest of us exited and John said he'd turn around and come back.

Split up again.

Nan stayed to wait for John and the rest of us headed up over the highway. This road has always intrigued me. It's a big wide 4 lane road that I almost never see anyone drive on. I'm sure the casinos nearby paid to have it built. But it was nice to ride the 8 miles over the surrounding hillsides on the smooth wide road with beautiful views all around.

As we pulled into Central City, I spotted a free parking lot and pulled in to wait for Nan. After a few minutes I called her and she said that she hadn't seen John yet. I know that the next 3 or so exits all lead into this area, so I told her to come on over because John probably followed the signs rather than turning around.

I tried the CB and the cell, but couldn't get ahold of John. Eventually I texted map coordinates to John. Nan and Eric had wanted to stop to play slotts for a bit, so I told them to go ahead, and I'd stay outside waiting for John. After another 15 minutes I heard the gentle rumble of John's engine and saw him go past an intersection. I called on the CB. John turned and came over to our parking lot.

We hung out for another 30 minutes relaxing while Nan and Eric played slots. At one point Nan put some money in the machine Kyle was sitting by, and a few spins latter it paid off $24. Kyle kept 10 of it.

Eventually Nan ran out of money and Eric stopped while he as $30 ahead.

John led us out of the winding mass of one way streets over to the highway and we started the last hour of our ride.

I've always wanted to ride highway 119 from Central City up to Estes Park but I've never had the time or circumstances. Other rides have told me how nice a ride it is and I wasn't disappointed. We had more beautiful vistas, mountain peaks, lakes, canyons, hairpin turns. All the good stuff you want on a motorcycle ride.

Partway up the road we hit another traffic slow down. Just off the road was a huge Elk with his antlers still in velvet, quietly eating the grass in someone's front yard. We got pictures but it's very hard to see.

We continued North on 119, occasionally passing cars and trucks that were moving slow. But eventually we came up behind another group of motorcycles who themselves were behind a couple of big trucks. We rode this way for the last 10 miles of the road because it was too twisty to pass.

When we reached town we were still following the other motorcycles but John's GPS had us turn off the highway into an industrial section. We went over a hill and then right back onto the highway, just behind the same motorcycles. I guess the GPS just wanted to give us a tour.

We got split up by a stoplight and John called over the CB that it was only point three miles farther to the Hotel. As I turned the corner, I just saw the tail end of a bike turning into a parking lot so I followed. It turned out to be the other bikes we'd been following. So I flipped around and continued up the road. Eventually we found them after a couple more U turns.

For dinner we drove through Estes Park till we spotted a nice restaurant. Like previous nights, we ate, laughed and talked until the jokes got worse and we got louder. You'd think we were drinking, but it was just water and being very tired.

On the way back to the hotel, Nan and Kyle stopped at Safeway to buy stuff for breakfast and lunch tomorrow.

The hotel is a bit dated, but it's really comfortable. Big rooms with sliding glass doors for entrance doors, and a pond with a fountain just outside the rooms. There was no air conditioning, but they had a big box fan that we set in the doorway to blow in the cool night air until we went to sleep.

Getting ready to ride. My lens is blurry because the sprinklers kicked on and got me