Tuesday, June 24, 2014
This day's ride is the first day of full Colorado road riding. After breakfast we broke camp, filled our gas tanks, and headed east on US50. Just before we got to the Blue Mesa Reservoir, we turned what will eventually be north on to SR92, which is part of the West Elk Loop Scenic Byway. About 25 miles long, it twists in an out with views of the reservoir below, which by the way is Colorado's largest body of water and hosts the largest Kokanee salmon fishery in the nation.
There are available places to pass cars and slower motorcycles, which we put to good use. Except for two Harley riders that we came up to. The odd thing here is that these two could ride. I mean they were getting after it! There was no reason to pass them.
This is the first time I've been behind a Harley that was riding fast enough through the corners.
True, some of the really tight ones they had to take a bit slower because they'd be scraping (which they did), but by gum they weren't holding us up. We got to the top of the grade and Bill, who was leading, followed them off to a viewpoint where there was a bunch of other Harley's gathered. We all got off our bikes and went over to shake the hands of two Harley riders who could really ride.
It was a father and son pair and they were as nice as could be. The dad was an Army Lieutenant back in Vietnam and my brother Dave (an ex-Army Captain) really hit it off. We had a great time talking until it was time to head off again.
After that, we stayed on SR92 past Crawford State Park, through Hotchkiss where we turned right on to SR133,
then through Paonia on up to Carbondale where we stopped for lunch at the El Horizonte, a nice and quiet mexican restaurant. After topping up our tanks, we headed south on SR82 so we could head through Aspen and then on up to Independence Pass. Aspen really does look like a great place to ski, but man was it crowded.
Lots of money and tourists. I mean, I know I'm one too at this point, but crowded touristy places are not the type of thing that interests me.
The ride up to the pass, now that's for me! We didn't take a picture of it, but before we got too far up the road there was a sign that said rigs over 35 feet in length were prohibited. That got our curiosity peaked.
Well we found out soon enough when the road, which had already been twisting all over the place narrowed to a little over a lane in width.I was in the lead and didn't come up against any cars, but the other guys did.
This got to be pretty addictive as we kept looking for other passes to ride.
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.
