COLORADO TRIP - 2001

8/23/01 (Thursday) - "Wild Elk Scenic Loop"

Today we left the trailer at the Hideout Campground in Glenwood Springs and left at 8 am to take the Scenic and Historic Byway called the "Wild Elk Loop".  Total mileage for this loop for us was 315 miles and it took exactly 11 hours to complete it.

 
South of Carbondale is the small town of Redstone. We saw dozens and dozens of charcoal kilns lined up along the roadside. These were used over 100 years ago to make coke to be used for making iron in the mills further south.

Here is one of the old brick kilns built into a small hillside.

The view of the rocky mountains from Redstone was quite nice.

The scenic part of the route started in Carbondale and went south to Somerset.  Somerset is a coal-mining town dating back to 1886.  The conveyer systems for moving the coal set up around the town were interesting and picturesque.  The miner's homes were all small but well maintained.  It was a nice looking community. Unfortunately, I did not take any photos here.

It was from Somerset that the actual "loop" part of the route began.  It circled the Gunnison National Forest and mountain range.  We passed through such towns as Paonia and Crawford.  In that area there were a lot of fruit orchards (peaches, nectarines and pears.)

Just past Crawford there was a cutoff to the north rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. We took about an hour and a half to take this route and to look at the canyon.  8 years ago we visited the south rim in temperatures of over 110 degrees F.  Today it was a very nice 72 degrees.

 
Yoshiko is looking into the Black Canyon of the Gunnison from the north rim.

Click Here for more photos of
Black Canyon of the Gunnison

We later followed the Gunnison River (and Canyon) to the dam upstream at Sapinero.

   
Here is the reservoir on the Gunnison River. The dam controls the flow of water through the canyon.

Near there we had a nice (late) lunch at a restaurant on a marina by the reservoir.  From there we went on, via US-50, to the town of Gunnison from which we headed back north to the resort town of Crested Butte.  Crested Butte is at the end of the highway and is a restored old mining town with a lot of quaint shops and a lot of restaurants and B&Bs. (Sorry, no photos here.)

From Crested Butte we took a secondary road (mostly hard packed gravel) for 30 miles over Kebler Pass at 10000 feet.  The scenery was spectacular and we drove through a 7-mile section of Aspen trees that were spectacular.  We have never before seen such a large and magnificent stand of Aspen trees.

 
While driving over Kebler Pass we drove over 30 minutes through a dense forest of Aspen threes. I have never seen so many Apen trees together before. Some were quite large and old. Aspen trees have a life cycle of some 100+ years and then they die out naturally. The trees propagate as a rhizome, that is, their roots spread underground and send up new shoots.

   
Here are some other view of the Rockies as seen from the Kebler Pass road.

The road took us back to Somerset from which we returned back to the trailer (60 miles).

Tomorrow we move on to Breckenridge to stay 3 nights at the Tiger Run RV Park. At $50/night it should be pretty nice.  We'll let you know.

Also we will attend the Alpenglo Chamber Music Festival in Silverthorne.

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