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Colorado 2000 In June of 2000 my father and I went on both of our first off-roading trips. This being the entire reason why we bought the jeep I was really excited about this trip. My friends and I had always stayed around the San Antonio area and were frequent visitors of one of San Antonio's only but illegal off-roading areas called devils den. This trip was actually going to encompass trails that would take you over ten minutes to complete and some can take days. Not knowing what to expect we loaded up the jeep after only haven driven it maybe 10 miles and started on our 24 hour trek to Ouray, Colorado. That morning we stopped just north of Boerne, Texas (only 40 miles from the house) to grab a bite to eat and then hit the road again. We only made it about 5 miles down the road when a car pulled up beside us to let us know that we had a FLAT! (1 & 2) After changing the tire and heading on we went through west Texas, not much to say about that) and then headed north through New Mexico. Once up in the are we met up with Hal Heintz with son Luke and Dick Brakke with his son Shane. While in the camp area we met a couple with there newborn who ended up wheeling with us for the rest of the week. The camp sites that we stay at are at the KOA park just outside Ouray about seven miles. The facilities there are as good as any hotel and cost much less. The only catch is you must like the outdoors (camping) or have a R.V. to stay in. All of these trails were originally built to provide a means of transportation for the gold mines that were built during the late 1800's and early 1900's. Once in the town of Durango the only way to get to Silverton and then on to Ouray is Highway 550 or as it was nicknamed the Million Dollar Highway because of the gold that was transported out of the mines, onto this highway and to the cities to be shipped off. The Jeeps Hal Heintz and Luke rode in Hal's 1993 jeep Cherokee that had a 2 in lift and oversized tires. I believe he had a true-trac locker in the front to. Dick and his son Shane rode in dicks 1984 highly modified CJ-7. Here's his list of mods: Howell fuel injection system on the stock 304 v-8, AMC-20 rear, Dana 30 front, both with detroits, rear rack, custom interior, Warn 8000i, on board shovel, gas tank, and highlift jack, 35x12.50R15 Goodyear MT/R's with the 589 rim, and steering box stabilizer. Greg and his Wife had purchased a new Jeep Cherokee that was bone stock, they really had not planned to do any serious wheeling while up in the area. Day 1 Trail 1: Last dollar This trail connects the town of Ridgeway with Telluride. Although this trail has no major obstacles and is passable in two-wheel drive, it offers a great chance to relieve the stress caused by the drive through west Texas and New Mexico. It is also a great chance to get acquainted with the scenery and what is to be expected of the trip ahead. One side note that everyone should be aware of is that this is passable by a two-wheel drive vehicle when its dry but is nearly impossible to pass with any rig once a considerable amount of rain has dropped. Telluride: Telluride is an absolutely beautiful city surrounded by mountains on three sides and one paved highway coming in from the north. From the south of Telluride comes Black Bear Pass which is probably one of the most un-nerving experience someone can have. I plan on conquering this trail next summer. The town itself is relatively small but has many amenities of a larger city. We stopped mainly to shop around and have lunch. Here are some pictures. Trail 2: Alta Lakes Alta Lakes is actually a series of lakes that are just outside Telluride off of highway 145. This trail is much like the Last Dollar as far as difficulty but does entail a little more climbs and cliff faces. Alta Lake sits at nearly 11,500 ft. which for us Texans isn't something commonly found. The pictures will have to do the rest of the explaining. This was an interesting trail run because while spending lunchtime in Telluride a storm had blown in and created an interesting situation up on the mountain. In pictures 3 & 4 those are beaver dams that are passed on the trail on the way to the lake. Trail 3: Ophir Pass Ophir pass is just south of Alta Lakes on 145 is a pass that loops back around to the Million Dollar Highway. Ophir pass is a long trail that took us about 4-1/2 hours to complete and then at that there is still another thirty or so minutes back to Ouray on 550. While heading up a steep climb of about 3 miles we encountered what most 4-wheelers hate to see, TRAIL STUPIDITY! A man had taken his family in their Chevrolet Astrovan (he claimed since it had all wheel drive that he could make the trails, idiot) gotten to the top of the pass and realized he could go no further. The only problem with this situation is that the trail is just wide enough for a jeep to fit through and we now had to pass two vehicles on a cliff face. I don't have any pictures of this event but trust me I hope I'm never in this situation again. Here are some pictures of the trail and us at the top. Day 2 Trail 1: Engineer Pass (Alpine Loop) The Alpine Loop is acutually made up of several trails that connect Ouray with Silverton and Lake City. This is where the extent of the trails are located in the Ouray area. Most of the time you start out on Engineer Pass because of the proximaty of the trailhead to Ouray, which is what we did. After heading up twords Engineer we took a left before the pass and made our way over to Animas Forks and then into Silverton for lunch. Pic 1 Pic 2 Trailhead 4x4 Only Silverton Silverton is a small little town in between Ouray and Durango that is sometimes not accessable during the winter months due to the amount of snow on Highway 550. We had lunch in town and shopped around for a while. Silverton is famous for having one of the last narrow gauge railroads in the U.S. This railroad runs along the Animas River and down into Durango. If time permits i would recomend taking a ride on this old steam locomotive train but make sure and book your tickets in advance. Sorry i dont have any pictures availiable. Trail 2: Cinnomen Pass (Alpine Loop) Out of Silverton we took the Alpine Loop back up to the ghostown of Animas Forks and from there we headed over twords Lake City via Cinnomen Pass. This trail is a long one so be prepaired, make sure that when you leave your vehicle is fuel up and that you are to. From Cinnomen Pass we headed into Lake City. We only stopped in Lake City just long enough to re-fuel and grab a Big Boy ice-cream bar for our mid-afternoon snack. If you like fly fishing or just fishing in general, make sure to bring your rod with you because on the way to Lake City there is plenty of rivers to catch rainbow trout in and once in Lake City the lake is full of good fishing. Trail 3: The road home After spending close to 6 hours on the trail to Lake City it was now time to head back twords Ouray. Again we hit up the Alpine loop on the other end of town and started twords Capitol City and Engineer Pass. Capitol City is another mining ghost town that is a wonderfull spot to take pictures and a break from the trail. After leaving Capitol City we went up Engineer Pass and then headed down to Highway 550. This day of trail riding was fun but very long. We were on the trail for a little over 11 hours and cover i think somewhere around 125 miles of rough trails. This trip could actually have been divided up into an overnight trail, this might have to be done in the future. Day 3 Trail 1: Tomboy Basin For the third day of trail riding we decided to take it easy. A friend of mine had come up and met us there with his 1958 Jeep Willys except the altitude had something different in mind. After messing around with the engine for the entire morning we decided that it wasn't gonna happen so he ended up renting a jeep. True Jeepers dont rent their jeeps they own them :-). We ended up going up to Tomboy Basin which is just outside of Ouray. On the way to the valley you pass some pretty cool sites. One of these which is an old mining camp called Sneffels mine town has a complete board with its history written on it. Antoher pretty cool thing is how the trail runs under a rock ledge, at this spot there is also fresh water running down the face and makes for an interesting ride in an open topped jeep. Once up at Tomboy you could have a relaxing lunch, or just do some exploring which is what we did. This was a great end to an awsome trip. I really, really dont want to head back to San Antonio. Rock Sneffels Pic 1 Pic 2 Pic 3
Here's a Couple of extra Pictures
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