Colorado Trail

July 2017

After finishing school for the year, I rallied out to Colorado for a huge trip - mountain biking from Denver to Durango via the Colorado Trail, a 486 mile trail (536 for bikers who have to take wilderness detours) with over 72,500 feet of climbing. I set an ambitious timeline of 13 days, and rolled out with a long time friend of mine, Daniel. Before starting, we stopped at Harleys: a Hotdog Revolution to get fueled up for the trip -- the owner was a rad dude who noted our next two weeks might get "a little hairy and scary." Hairy and scary they were, but that's what made for such a rad ride.

Prepared as we were, the long, arduous, and rain-storm filled first day got the better of Daniel. He was feeling pretty sick by nightfall, and not much better the next morning. As a result, we rode into the town of Bailey around mile 40, and Daniel hitched back to the car in Denver. I was now faced with the task of completing the trail alone. Fortunately, Daniel would link up with me a couple times here and there throughout the trip, giving me a much needed morale boost.

The terrain was incredible and the riding was top notch: gnarly single track with a good mix of chunky rock gardens and wide open, lightning fast sections. Though with 20+ pounds on my back and an extra 15 pounds of gear hanging off my bike (I did not yet know the wonders of ultralight travel), I was slower than usual. I passed many thru-hikers and section-hikers along the way, rode with some other cyclists, and met some overall sick folks along the trail.

After Daniel took off, there weren't anymore huge surprises, though the trip didn't go completely without a hitch. Thunderstorms are notorious for rolling in unexpectedly almost daily on the trail in the early afternoons. I was fortunate enough to only see rain for four days of the trip.

When heavy storms rolled in, I would seek refuge under trees. Normally, the strategy seemed to work, though when the storm persisted for more than an hour all my gear would be soaked, and I would get quite cold. To remedy this, I would get back on the bike and ride to warm up.

Other than the slight discomfort of precipitation, the only other hangups were two crashes resulting in some minor injuries (which I threw some water on and called good), as well as a (somewhat) blown out shock on my bike. The blown out shock could have been much worse -- but it held air for a few hours at a time so I'd carry a shock pump in my pocket and give it a pump every so often.

The riding and the views progressively got more breathtaking as I made my way towards the end of the trail. I met a dude named Carlos somewhere in the San Juans. We rode together for a day and he gave me a lift into Silverton for a resupply. The San Juans are notoriously beautiful yet brutal for mountain bikers. I navigated them with relative success and was rewarded with beautiful wild flowers all the way til the end of the trail.

12 days later (1 day ahead of schedule), I found myself in Durango, at the end of the Colorado trail. The photo below was actually about a mile from the "real" ending of the Colorado Trail. A local rider smugly mentioned this to me after taking my photo, so I biked down to the end and then climbed back up to my car in order to properly finish the entire trail.