In 2006 I performed and taught for two weeks at the Aspen Music Festival. After the final concert, our plan for that summer’s adventure was to ride a big clockwise loop starting in Aspen, through Buena Vista, Durango, a bunch of other towns whose names I still haven’t memorized... Anyway while I was at Aspen I got a text from a friend with whom I’d traveled to Costa Rica a couple months earlier and it turned out we’d both picked up a gross insect-borne flesh-eating disease called leishmaniasis. Instead of doing our bike trip, Bill and I did a quick out-and-back up Independence Pass (leaving our camping gear in Aspen), then flew back to DC where my friend and I got treatment at the National Institutes of Health. This was an interesting adventure in itself but our bike tour remained unridden.
This year I was fortunate enough to return to the Festival and Bill and I decided to give the ride another try. Here are the pics we took, 12 years apart, atop Independence Pass.
Today
Twelve years ago. I had to sift through a whole lot of leish photos to find this one.
This year wasn’t without drama either. I’d been at 8000 feet for two weeks, and also spent three weeks in July in Jackson Hole (around 6200) but Bill only arrived a few days ago. We generally are inadequately prepared for our trips and expect to take it easy on Day One but this is the first time Day One involved riding over a 12,000 foot pass. We took frequent stops to catch our breath, have a snack, watch climbers on rock walls or teens doing somersaults off a cliff into a (one hopes) deep swimming hole.
Climber... I didn’t get any decent pics of the rock jumpers. One kid did a spectacular belly flop and we were uncomfortable watching it.
Bill wasn’t feeling great from the start and eventually he puked ... which made him feel better enough to continue a few miles but it seemed prudent to stop early and camp rather than pushing up another 7 miles/1500 feet. We’ve got several extra days built into our itinerary and there’s a lot more climbing in the coming days. Better to play a free card now than risk his getting really sick.
We pulled into Lost Man’s Campground in the early afternoon and set up the tent and hammock, made some salty noodle broth, then lay around for about 18 hours.
Somehow I had no problem killing hours here, doing more or less nothing.
View of feet. Sometimes I looked up and saw trees waving in the wind. It was nice. I also ate a nice candy I picked up at “Best Day Ever” in Aspen and listened to 2 episodes of This American Life while hammocking.
There were some fun conversations to have at the campground. One guy in the biggest pickup I’ve ever seen, asking me “how’s this campground?” I’m not even sure what that means, take a look around. For a touring cyclist, what makes a great campground is generally its appearance when you’re tired. The first thing we look for is bear boxes. This one didn’t have them so we stashed our food in the bear-proof garbage bin. In the past we’ve used outhouses but this one didn’t have bear-proof doors. We do have rope to hang food, but we’re lazy.
Anyway these were definitely not the priorities of a guy in a giant pick-up. He told me he’d been camping at Maroon Bells — that six months ago he went on line and reserved the maximum 5 day stay, and then his “little girlfriend” (the guy was at least 65 years old) grabbed the following 5 days so they could stay ten in total. These are highly prized campsites so I was definitely judging. He was driving the pass alone today because the other day they had gotten about halfway up and she got nervous about driving down in the dark. He rolled his eyes, said something about how she wasn’t really into this whole outdoors thing.
There was also a delightful group of senior hikers coming off the Lost Man Trail... they had little “100” pins and told me that either the combined age, or the combine IQ, of you and your spouse must be 100 to join. They didn’t camp, just hung out for a picnic before driving back to Glenwood Springs. I was about ready to move to Glenwood Springs to join this group. We definitely qualify.
And a young man camping with his gorgeous wolf-like dog (a pure-bred something, we overheard him telling someone else). He came over while we were eating and offered us a couple beers since he didn’t have a cooler and couldn’t drink them all. He’d been climbing at Maroon Bells (unable to camp because of people like Pickup Man and Little Girlfriend hogging the spots)... he said he hikes with he dog and then stashes her somewhere comfortable in the shade and does his climb. We laughed. “We can’t even walk from room to room without our dog panicking and following us.”
In addition to the one human casualty (i.e. Bill) we already have two equipment fails. Bill’s brand new ExPed air mattress didn’t hold air last night, and one of our foldable cups sprang a giant leak.
Formerly cup, now eyeless puppet.
By the morning Bill was feeling much better. He’s down at the river filtering water.
We woke up around 6:45 and didn’t push off until around 9:45. I’m sure we could trim quite a bit off this but I don’t get these people who break down camp in 15 minutes. The remaining miles up to the pass were very pleasant; despite some rain in the night the morning was clear and traffic was very light. It’s really not that hard a pass other than the altitude — gentle grades, lots of cyclists, considerate drivers, mostly reasonable shoulders, lots of pull-outs.
This was my fourth time up the pass but my first down the other side. Weeeee time to go downhill into new territory.
I made Bill wait atop a switchback to get this pic of me.
We had met some other cyclists at the top who told us that tomorrow’s segment, Cottonwood Pass (steeper and higher than Independence as well as unpaved on the descent) is closed, so we’re going to have to go 20 miles further to go over Monarch Pass instead. It’s a little worrying to have these hiccups so early in a trip but there are various bailout options if we get too far behind schedule.
Early in the afternoon I was thinking maybe we should make up some miles today but the weather was looking ominous and there was a brewery in Buena Vista with Wi-Fi, and that was the end of us. We got beer and pizza, and found an AirBnB here in town.
It’s raining. I’m really glad I thought to ask Bill to bring my rain pants, which I hadn’t packed. It’s gonna be practically winter by the time we finish this trip in September.
Nice to look into your rear view mirror and see that sky... ugggghhhh
Bill entering Buena Vista... The sign confirms that Cottonwood is closed and our detour will be happening.
In Bill’s route notes he has cities, distances, breweries, and coffee shops. He’s a good planner.
Airbnb came with a cute rescue pit bull!
Our cute rescue pit bull is in good hands back home with her dog-sitter (and her parents).
Look below for link to next installment!