Day Twenty, Saturday, May 19, 2007

Montrose, CO to Kayenta, AZ

The trip from Montrose, to Ouray, to Silverton, to Durango, to Mesa Verde National Park, through Four Corners, to Kayenta, AZ was stunning. I took my time today: over 12 hours to cover only 271 miles. I’m confident that I can’t do justice to today’s trip with words, so I’ll mostly resort to a few of the 100+ photos.

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Road to Ouray

Ouray

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Vista 02

Below you can see two historical mines, the Genessee on the left and the Vanderbilt on the right:

Genessee and Vanderbilt Mines

Silverton, CO

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Vista 03

Vista 04

I mentioned in an earlier blog our family vacation back to the east coast. One of the things we wanted to do on that trip was tour the Biltmore Estate. However, when we arrived at the front gate, it was raining and rather than just see the inside of the house, we decided to come back another time so we could take the full tour. I still haven’t seen Biltmore.

So, when I arrived at the turn off to Mesa Verde National Park (MVNP) with the lighting flashing and the thunder rolling, I never hesitated.

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MesaVerdeNP01

MesaVerdeNP02

Waiting out the rain in the park cafe, I met three guys from Oregon that had trucked their bikes in for a weekend ride. Now that’s dedication. They were completely outfitted with GPS, CB’s, radar detectors, and even satellite radio. Apparently, they do several trips a year and had just finished Death Valley in March. I’m inspired! It was still raining hard when this picture was taken. Keep the rubber side down guys — and stay in touch.

New Friends

After the rain lightened up, I investigated the Spruce Tree House:

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Inside a Kiva

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Leaving MVNP, I received the biggest surprise of the day. Riding in the desert at sunset, following on the heels of a thunderstorm was one of the highlights of the trip. The air was clean, the clouds were breaking up, it was about 75 degrees, and the moon and Venus were visible for the entire ride. This shot of the sunset just doesn’t do it justice.

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Sunset

My soul and my spirit are full right now.

My recommendation? Put the Silverton to Durango trip on your “must do” list.

Today’s Route:

montrosetokayenta

  • TheDonPuccio

    Damn I wish I was still riding with you. I’ve been most of the places you are hitting now. I’ve been to Durango and rode the Silverton Railroad thru the mountains. I’ve seen the desert Sunset many times in college at ASU. I used to love to ride out in the desert on my Honda 250 street/dirt bike and watch the sunset. I’ve been thru the badlands. Those thunderstorms are really amazing aren’t they? We never have anything like them up here in Seattle. Hope you don’t see a Desert Sand Storm. That would be bad on a bike. You just drive into a wall of dirt thousands of feet high, like in the movie Hidalgo.

    Where next? Grand Canyon? You can’t miss the Grand Canyon. Go to the Blue Angel Trail. Hike down a little bit, at least enough to see that those red lines on the wall you see from the rim that look an “inch wide” are really 60-70 feet. From the rim it looks amazing but even then your eyes are deceiving you. Our minds cannot conceive of this depth, a mile straight down. I once hiked down to the river and there was snow at the rim and we were lying in the sun at the bottom in 100+ heat. It’s amazing. Arizona is wonderful.

    Didn’t go around Mt. Ranier … raining and cold here.

  • Bill

    Thanks for the recommendation Pete – I plan to do the Grand Canyon on the second leg of the trip. Want to fly in and rent a Harley for the weekend?