I could show you a bunch more pictures, but you get the idea. It was 12:40pm and we still had a few more dirt sections in front of us. We got going again with the idea to just go straight to Steamboat Springs and recover a bit. It wasn't long before we got back on to Road 129 which is now paved and we talked about our options. We weren't willing to get into the mud again so when we missed the next turn off to go around Steamboat Lake we didn't sweat it much. But as often happens, we calm down and wonder if we're being too hasty to give up. So we decide to get back to the normal route, but also figured we were quite a ways past the turn to the lake so we just skipped it. Our next turn was on road 56 which just goes out into the country. It was a nice little road and no mud which eventually led us back to the highway and finally Steamboat Springs. We stopped for lunch at the Johnny Be Good diner which was a great meal. Before leaving town Tim stopped at NAPA to better fix his kickstand switch, then it was off to Section Five.
This next section has us riding past the Stagecoach Reservoir, but due to construction or something else, the road was closed except on weekends. So we had to backtrack and ran over to SR 131 which took us through Oak Creek by about 5:30pm. Because of the hard day and the fact that it was going to be below freezing, we opted for a motel in town. Dave found a nice little spot where we had two beds and had to do rock-paper-scissors for who ended up on the floor. Dave lost this little contest, but with good grace. We ran over to a store to get some goodies and had nice showers, even watched some TV. The day's mileage was about 138 miles.
Tuesday, September 21, 2021
A good night's sleep can make everything look better in the morning! We slept in till 7:15am, had a leisurely breakfast and got on the road by about 9:30am. The skies were clear and the dirt roads dry. We passed by Stagecoach Reservoir that we missed yesterday, but realize we didn't really miss that much. It was pretty but not that long. The road we were on was traveling through a valley as we headed south and was in pretty good condition, so we were making good time.
At about 10:45am we found the Rock Creek Stage Station, our first real historic stop for the COBDR.
Originally built by James and Katherine Gates in the 1880s, the Rock Creek Stage Stop served as a family home, hotel, post office, and stage stop. It was a halfway station on the first Wells Fargo mail route into Yampa Valley and as a service center for settlers until the railroad line took over in 1887. Travelers going between Steamboat Springs and Kremmling stopped here before continuing their journey. It's listed on the Routt County Historic Places and has been the subject of preservation work.
It's pretty big for a building of its day. You can see where they had an upper deck at one time.
Fifteen minutes later and literally just around the corner was Rock Creek and our first water crossing. It was similar in size to our crossing of Long Creek in Idaho, but much smoother. Dave was leading today, so he went first, then me, then Tim. No worries for any of us.
Tom Clark
I'm a Senior Software Engineer at Intellitect, living in Spokane, Washington. I also do a little development work on the side. And I love riding motorcycles all over the country with my friends.
