Weekender: Gaining Elevation in the Heat of the Summer

escaping the desert summer for the mountains of crested butte and surrounding regions

While living in southern California with an extremely flexible job that allowed my to take months off work each year, I would often find myself heading out in my truck for anywhere from three weeks to three months each summer. Because 2020 left me (and everyone else) with no real plans, I decided to make my way back to southwest Colorado and escape COVID-19 and some of the city hassles that came with it. 

Note: My time spent traveling in the summer of 2020 was ONLY to places that had opened for visitors. It wasn't until places like Silverton and Crested Butte, CO had publicly announced that they were open for tourists to come. I spent the entiretly of the lockdown working in an ‘essential business’ and I was not going to let my time spent being smart about the precautions go to waste by getting sick while traveling. However, even though restaurants, bars and the like were all open in these places, I made the conscious effort to avoid any and all people who were not in my immediate circle during my time exploring. 

While spending nearly two months of the summer in Telluride, CO, living with Sami, who I am lucky enough to now call my girlfriend, we decided to take a few night trip out to the mountains surrounding Crested Butte. I spent nearly two weeks in these mountains last year during my month in Colorado while traveling 7000 miles through six states. 

We began with a quick overnighter in the mountains outside Ridgeway after getting a bit of a late start to the day. The next morning we headed straight into the higher elevation zones of the Gunnison National Forest. We set up camp at 9550' and after hiking down into a hidden waterfall and swimming hole we made way to ride mountain bikes along the Slate River. 

After the beautifully scenic and sweeping trail that is the "Lower Loop" that evening, we made our way back to camp for a gourmet meal of Annie's mac & cheese right off the pocket rocket. Nothing beats a cheap and rather unhealthy bowl of mac right out of the dirty camp pot. Shortly thereafter we were both fast asleep in the tent.

The Weekender State of Mind

I've been on a handful of longer, month+, trips. Yes they are fun and I wish I could constantly be on trips like that, but so is life. That being said, weekenders can be just as much fun and you really don’t need a whole lot. Hell, you don't need much to camp for months either.

There is also something to be said about really exploring one zone vs trying to cover the ground of multiple states, national parks, etc. If you get out of the car and walk, or roll, down a trail you will feel and experience more on that stretch of dirt than you would crossing 3 states from behind the wheel of that car.

“In the first place you can’t see anything from a car; you’ve got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk, better yet crawl, on hands and knees, over the sandstone and through the thorn bush and cactus. When traces of blood begin to mark your trail you’ll begin to see something, maybe. Probably not.” — Ed Abbey

Lilly Lake Trail

Wasting no time the following morning, we headed out in search of another trail to ride. We pulled up to the trailhead along Kebler Pass Road, the same road Anthony Renna and I traversed in its entirety on our way out of Crested Butte in the summer of 2019. Thankfully this portion of the forest road was no where near as muddy as it was the year prior. 

We suited up and got the bikes ready with a fresh coating of Tri-Flow on our chains and a bit of air to fill the slow leaks in each of our tires. 

The loop begins with a steep climb for nearly a mile and a half of two-track. You pass a set of abandoned and collapsed mine shacks that have seen their share of abuse as the winters in this area can be quite harsh. It is hard to imagine people spent their lives up here with none of the amenities found in today's herd of weekend warriors in their $100,000+ 'overland' rigs, who given the opportunity would most likely consider themselves to be of the most rugged outdoorsmen. 

Anyways….we rode on and were soon met with the large meadow that fills the bed of Lilly Lake, which was completely dry on our pass during the final week of August. This trail is far from anything technical, but still a great, fun ride to do at a mellow enough pace to stop and take photos. However, were soon faced with a sight that would shift our attention.

After pulling off the trail to take a snack break and soak in a beautiful view, we noticed the early stage of a small brush fire on the next hillside across the valley. Soon we noticed another rider was sitting right by us watching the fire from afar, just as we were and after talking with this guy we learned he was watching to see if it was just going to go out on its own because the tree burning was a bit isolated from any others around it. But after the three of us decided it would be best to just alert someone, the guy called in the fire and by the time we made it to the bottom there was already a row of fire trucks headed up. In that convoy was the coolest fire rig I'd ever seen.

As we finished up our ride and filled our empty stomachs with some PB&J tortillas - smashed bread sucks, when your camping bring tortillas instead - we watched the row of fire trucks head up to work on the fire we had first eyes on. 

We then made the executive decision to bail on Crested Butte due to the masses of summer crowds heading into the backcountry to camp during this Labor Day weekend.  Pointed south, we made way down the mountain and into Gunnison.  

Hartman Rocks

I've been to Gunnison a handful of times and it really is an amazing spot to pull off for the night. We got into town around 3:30 that afternoon and drove right through to the Hartman Rocks Recreation Area. There we were again met with the crowds, but we found a spot to call home for the night and even managed to squeeze in a few laps through the region's large network of trails. 

With the sun setting late, I sampled a lot of the area, but still did not come close to riding everything. My favorite part about this area, and the only reason I put up with camping among so many people is the fact that you can ride an endless amount of miles right from your camp, even lapping back for a snack or water when needed.

The following morning we unfortunately rose from the tent to be met with a layer of smoke filling the sky. Rather than spending the day huffing the poor air while riding bikes, we packed up early and made way back to Telluride where it was forecasted to snow that day.

I'll always welcome a random snow in September. The year before, in 2019, I got a day of snow while rolling through Missoula, MT in September as well. 

The Galloping Goose

By the next morning the snow had melted and after breakfast at our favoritre morning spot, the Butcher and the Baker, we were off to head out on a favorite local trail, the Galloping Goose. With easy access right from our front door, we headed down the box canyon and got onto the singletrack. 

This trail is a perfect balance between effort and fun for an in town lap. We'll often lap the three mile section of the Galloping Goose on the west side right out of town before making our way back up and crossing the 145. From there we ride up Remine Creek and Aldasoro, making for a fun decent back down to the valley floor where we then ride the singletrack back to our doorstep. 

For a weekend trip we got to experience a lot. A couple hours drive each way, but the rest of our time was spent out of the seat and exploring what the area has to offer, whether that be on foot or on two wheels.  This weekend we will be making our way back to the mountains of Colorado, and while we won't be out camping, it will be a welcome weekend enjoying and exploring the fresh mountain air.