EMSC
Well-known member
Went for some High-altitude Mtn Biking while staying at my good friends place in Blue River just outside of Breck. The mtn biking first, but then a few items about Breck toward the end...
A good trip, but not as good as I had hoped. I started off by forgetting my bike shorts #-o So a delay to go buy some $12 shorts meant we started our bike ride at 11am. Too late. We were trying the north fork of the Swan River which is all forest roads (well maintained at first, parking at the Dredge lot) and getting progressively rougher and steeper. I like such rides at altitude because if you ever get tired or a storm comes in you can just turn around and get down in a hurry. This day storms built quicker than normal and thunder was booming by 12:30. Crap! Only ~5 miles and 800' of vert up. Enough for my wife, but not for me. We hightailed it down and went back to my friends house to sit it out.
After a 3 hour delay I went by myself on ride #2 up Spruce Creek road. It's a lollipop route with only ~1.5miles of repeat. It also starts right from my friends house at 10K feet. The way I ride it, I top out about 11,250 and it's fairly relentless in going up even though not excessively steep. The route down is quite steep in sections but a good reward for the work. Even better reward is the hot tub and a brew back at my friends place for getting ready for day #2 of riding :wink:
Day #2 had similar if not quite the same weather. Not a cloud to start, followed by afternoon showers - though less intense and more scattered than they had been on Saturday. Today starting from my friends house again my wife & I did the Pennsylvania Gulch loop. Riding down a bit to get to the Spruce Valley Ranch roads then across an old water ditch on the single track Blue River trail before going up the gulch and over into Indiana gulch. (Normally I then ride up indian gulch, with a hike-the-bike section and come down into the old mining town of Dyersville. But then I'm not usually with my wife on this particular ride). It's a good and reasonably tough ride - especially at altitudes up to ~11,500' and ~2000 verts the way we ride it. About all my wife could do to get up & over the ridge line. I guess I picked the wrong route for the day ( [-X #-o ). Oh well. Eventually going to another friends place for some good BBQ and hanging out with the locals.
Skiing related update (?):
1) The base of Peak 8 is all ripped apart (see pic). Looks like a multi-year 'big' building and assuming they can sell them, I would suspect a number of additional big projects to come. basically all the parking that was up there is toast, putting even more parking pressure on the heart of town. Parking is already a big issue in Breck (#1 in the US for skier visits last year).
2) Even bigger issue for coming years is the beetle kill of trees. The ski area is relatively untouched at this point, but just a mile or two down valley toward Frisco the mtns look terrible. 90% plus of trees are dead & red. It begs the question of how many folks want to ski, buy houses, etc.. with such aesthetics around. If you have the kind of $ to buy at a resort location do you now look elsewhere? I would think a number of high roller types will...
3) Speaking of which, I'm not sure if I've ever seen so many "for sale" signs in one town. Some neighborhoods it looks like every 4th house is up for sale. And, according to the locals, virtually nothing is selling this summer. Although the folks that own the places are generally not in need of immediate cash and so few prices are being dropped. Instead the real estate just sits on the market and sits on the market and...
4) The Central Colo resorts don't need to worry too much about gas prices. The number of people in town and on I-70 might have been literally down, maybe. But you sure couldn't tell it, if that was the case. So, I would suspect that at most the local traffic to the resorts will decline at most a couple %. No huge drop off in sight... (destination tourists, might be another matter)
Just 6 weeks to the start of snowmaking :lol:
A good trip, but not as good as I had hoped. I started off by forgetting my bike shorts #-o So a delay to go buy some $12 shorts meant we started our bike ride at 11am. Too late. We were trying the north fork of the Swan River which is all forest roads (well maintained at first, parking at the Dredge lot) and getting progressively rougher and steeper. I like such rides at altitude because if you ever get tired or a storm comes in you can just turn around and get down in a hurry. This day storms built quicker than normal and thunder was booming by 12:30. Crap! Only ~5 miles and 800' of vert up. Enough for my wife, but not for me. We hightailed it down and went back to my friends house to sit it out.
After a 3 hour delay I went by myself on ride #2 up Spruce Creek road. It's a lollipop route with only ~1.5miles of repeat. It also starts right from my friends house at 10K feet. The way I ride it, I top out about 11,250 and it's fairly relentless in going up even though not excessively steep. The route down is quite steep in sections but a good reward for the work. Even better reward is the hot tub and a brew back at my friends place for getting ready for day #2 of riding :wink:
Day #2 had similar if not quite the same weather. Not a cloud to start, followed by afternoon showers - though less intense and more scattered than they had been on Saturday. Today starting from my friends house again my wife & I did the Pennsylvania Gulch loop. Riding down a bit to get to the Spruce Valley Ranch roads then across an old water ditch on the single track Blue River trail before going up the gulch and over into Indiana gulch. (Normally I then ride up indian gulch, with a hike-the-bike section and come down into the old mining town of Dyersville. But then I'm not usually with my wife on this particular ride). It's a good and reasonably tough ride - especially at altitudes up to ~11,500' and ~2000 verts the way we ride it. About all my wife could do to get up & over the ridge line. I guess I picked the wrong route for the day ( [-X #-o ). Oh well. Eventually going to another friends place for some good BBQ and hanging out with the locals.
Skiing related update (?):
1) The base of Peak 8 is all ripped apart (see pic). Looks like a multi-year 'big' building and assuming they can sell them, I would suspect a number of additional big projects to come. basically all the parking that was up there is toast, putting even more parking pressure on the heart of town. Parking is already a big issue in Breck (#1 in the US for skier visits last year).
2) Even bigger issue for coming years is the beetle kill of trees. The ski area is relatively untouched at this point, but just a mile or two down valley toward Frisco the mtns look terrible. 90% plus of trees are dead & red. It begs the question of how many folks want to ski, buy houses, etc.. with such aesthetics around. If you have the kind of $ to buy at a resort location do you now look elsewhere? I would think a number of high roller types will...
3) Speaking of which, I'm not sure if I've ever seen so many "for sale" signs in one town. Some neighborhoods it looks like every 4th house is up for sale. And, according to the locals, virtually nothing is selling this summer. Although the folks that own the places are generally not in need of immediate cash and so few prices are being dropped. Instead the real estate just sits on the market and sits on the market and...
4) The Central Colo resorts don't need to worry too much about gas prices. The number of people in town and on I-70 might have been literally down, maybe. But you sure couldn't tell it, if that was the case. So, I would suspect that at most the local traffic to the resorts will decline at most a couple %. No huge drop off in sight... (destination tourists, might be another matter)
Just 6 weeks to the start of snowmaking :lol: