CO monkeys: Alpine Loop mid-October?
- Thread starter Toshi
- Start date
It's gonna be 70* in Fruita you wuss. 
it would be a long drive....but....monument valley utah...
I like this Maroon Bells idea. I like it even more after reading that driving on the weekend is only possible October 5-closing (and it isn't closed yet). Some hiking + busting out the camera shall be in order, and I don't even have to drive anywhere on Friday night this way. Early morning Saturday departure and hopefully open I-70 tunnels...
Same goes for Moab, Canyonlands, and even the grand staircase. Nice sights, but a hell of a lot of plain desert on the way there.
Hopefully it won't be like our experience last weekend trying to go to the Maroon Bells. The traffic was backed up into town from the shuttle parking at Highlands and the parking there was full. As was the Bells lot proper. We never got that far... we went up Castle Valley. Nobody up there.
If you're gonna do Maroon Bells, is Independence pass still open?
*edit: CDOT says open and dry. DO IT!
*edit 2: Weekend leaf peepers in Aspen. Eff that. Go to Fuita and take your bike ya knob.
*edit: CDOT says open and dry. DO IT!
*edit 2: Weekend leaf peepers in Aspen. Eff that. Go to Fuita and take your bike ya knob.
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From my visit to the Maroon Bells in early October last year. Best to camp out or get there early, we were there mid-week and it was almost shoulder to shoulder at sunrise.
Independence pass before sunrise? 
Plus the scenery is half the reason to do it.
Plus the scenery is half the reason to do it.
Sounds like the pass was quite the adventure in JBP's youth:
http://cozine.com/2002-august/love-and-hate-on-independence-pass/
Getting there for sunrise would be the win, and would allow me to potentially continue to other trails later in the day...
http://cozine.com/2002-august/love-and-hate-on-independence-pass/
Getting there for sunrise would be the win, and would allow me to potentially continue to other trails later in the day...
So I found this very useful site, and now am convinced that Engineer, etc. will be impassable:
http://www.bushducks.com/tripreps/passopen.htm
After all, Mosquito Pass is now snow-bound as of last week.
http://www.bushducks.com/tripreps/passopen.htm
After all, Mosquito Pass is now snow-bound as of last week.
Several generations of Men-folk from my family are CO natives. I am given to the impression that road conditions are almost unbelievably more favorable than they were just a couple decades ago. The old man traveled single lane dirt roads in his youth that are now multi-lane commercial high ways.
Take Hwy 50 back to 285 instead of going up to I-70.
Edit: I'd agree with SS, if your pace was more casual or you had more time. FWIW, that stretch of interstate has to be the most amazing section of freeway ever laid down, but it is still interstate.
I'm with SStupid.
Montrose tho.....
Ya should have gone earlier
If you wanted a wrangler you could have borrowed mine. 
I missed the squiggly bit through the GM (on my phone couldn't tell) - that may indeed be a worthy route. But you've already drive all that I-70 bit. 50/285 is a nice (and pretty fast) route.You don't think the squiggly bit through Grand Mesa would be worth the slog on 70? By that time I'm going to be bleary-eyed...
