Continental Divide....Chapter 2

Continental Divide….Chapter 2
After wimping out on Monday due to freezing temperatures and intimidating streams I mounted up Tuesday better prepared. Thermal underwear top to bottom….socks, long johns, light and expedition upper, head hood, and glove liners! I also brought my fishing hip waders for the occasional stream.
The plan was to head south from Buena Vista (BV), west up to old mining town St. Elmo, over Tin Cup pass (Continental Divide-CD) to old mining town Tin Cup, north on Timberline Trail to Cottonwood Pass Rd, then back over CD to BV. Round trip was 87 miles and over the CD twice. It took 7 hours.

Chalk Creek Canyon to St. Elmo. Gateway to Fun!


St. Elmo, 1880 Gold and Silver mining town.


Tin Cup Pass East Aspens


Tin Cup Pass Beaver Ponds


Tin Cup Pass Tree Line


And Finally……..Tin Cup Pass


Lunch on the Conintenal Divide. View while humming the Jimmy Buffett song “I wish lunch could last forever”, then “Incommunicado”.


Going Down……..lots of streams that follow the trail for a while. Fortunately not big ones………yet!


Mirror Lake. Dang, I knew I forgot something…….my fly rod!


And finally, Tin Cup. Originally settled by the Ute Indians, later in the 1850’s by prospectors searching for gold. Tin Cup got its name from a prospector who used to carry his gold dust out in a tin cup.


Tin Cup building…


Tin Cup Cemetery. I usually don’t envy the dead but this spirit has quite a plot!


Timberline Trail. There were many boulder fields. It was all I could do to not conk out, not fall over, and not get stuck but I did conk out, fall over, and get stuck many times. The pictures don’t do justice for the difficulty.


Timberline Trail Aspens, a little after the peak color change.


Timberline Trail, note the slope left to right, don’t get off the trail!


And then the anticipated stream crossing. Actually his stream followed the trail for about 50 feet and was a little over a foot deep. Here I’m suited up for the crossing!


The End! Cheated death again!
Ps: this is a recruiting effort, hoping I can suck a few of my friends into buying a dirt bike going along!
Have Fun!
Jerry
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Good pics Jerry, id love to ride those trails, the rocky stuff looks good(but not all day long though !!)

Good report, Jerry. That's a trip I have dreamed about many times. Wanna do it again next year with a partner? Seriously.

That is truly a beautiful area to ride. Thanks for the pics and report Jerry. Wish I wasn't so far away.

Wade in NW Florida

Jerry - Sweet ride and pictures. You uncovered some very nice trails beyond Tin Cup that we didn't get to. I do know of the slopes, rocks and difficulties up on those trails not to mention the O2 starving altitude. You're a brave solo soul to tackle this terrain as shown. I love this stuff. Thanks for taking the time to stop and bring back pictures with a ride report. I'm curious about the Timberline trail. Need to investigate.

Muniac,
Glad you liked it! There is a lifetime worth of trails in this area!
If you have a map, Timberline trail (414)is North off Tin Cup Pass Road close to Mirror Lake. It goes north to 209 (Cottonwood Pass Rd) and even continues on to Texas Lakes and Texas Creek Rd. (Thats another story.....where I got soaked crossing Texas Creek and lost my waders.....flew out of the milk carton....not enough bungies!). I actually took Mirror lake Rd. to Tin Cup, then Cumberland pass Rd. to Sanford Creek Rd. to Timberline Trail. Timberline Trail is hiking and motorcycle only, to narrow and rough for ATV or Jeep. National Geographic sells great "Trails Illustrated" maps with all the designations. If I didn't have that, you would be hearing about me on the search and rescue news!
Have Fun!
Jerry

Montana Tracy,
I would totally be up for doing that trip again or some variation. I'll keep you posted.
Jerry

WOW! Hard to believe that was 9 years ago, need to get back there!

Woot! More trip pics please - helps pass these dark Winter nights!

Beautiful! I'm marking this ride down as a must do when I get to Co! I imagine this trail is covered in snow at the moment, any idea how long it would take for everything to melt and it be rideable?

There is a lot of snow in the San Juans. We've switched to back country skiing until the trails open up. Probably July/August time frame. Snow pack is pretty good now and we'll get a few BIG storms before Spring fully arrives. The limits then become bloated/dangerous stream/creek crossings. Water will be high for about a month.


An abandoned ski hut at 12k feet east of Red Mountain Pass. Photo taken 3/8/2017.

We're putting together a local group of riders now to explore some of the more remote areas come Summer and Fall. My one friend just bought a new WR-450F and is making modifications to it for trail riding. He and I did a number of rides last season on the XTs. He really liked the terrain. My other friend just bought the WR-250F for trail riding. They are moving here from NC and will arrive in a couple of days. All are psyched to ride. This should be a good riding season.

Tin Cup is inaccessible right now. I recall the pass to be around 12.8k feet elevation. Been a few years since I was up there. There is a website HERE that chronicles Jeep runs. Very well done and useful for seeing many of the trails here in CO.

http://www.accuweather.com/en/videos/moo...tgvg0sogh9ais5h

Was this you?

Alexd

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKftsW67zU0

...And, what's the problem with riding in the snow anyway?!

Alexd

I've seen that one before.

I think it's Grand Junction area, after a snowfall.

Alexd

I’m glad these pictures are still available, I though they were sent to the “bit bucket” when the host asked for $$$

Those photos are hosted by flickr which didn't go the route of Photobucket. Photobucket did finally restore photos but with watermarks. We rode Tin Cup on the XTs and other mountain trails in the Buena Vista area some years back. Might go back to 2005 if memories are correct. The Collegiate Peaks have a lot of trails/roads accessible from Buena Vista. Glad the photos endured. Ride safely.

Fun to go back and see these photos again. Glad they weren't hosted on Photobucket..

WOW, that was 16 years ago! I just got back to BV for the summer and will get my ‘07 Serow out of storage!
Can’t wait to get back out in these beautiful mountains (carefully)!