sfarson
New member
A severe winter in South Park this year. South Park is a high 10,000ft. meadow about 900 square miles in size. Middle of Colorado. Three mountain ranges and passes guard its borders with Pikes Peak anchoring the southeast.
I tried to scoot over Kenosha Pass to the Park a few weeks ago, but weather and road conditions had me turning around. Noted here:
http://forums.bmwmoa.org/showthread.php?t=24617
First pause today was the last pause at the link above. SW side of Kenosha Pass...
Here's the map of today's ride, with locations of images below noted:
The very small town of Jefferson is at the bottom of Kenosha Pass. In 1937 there was only one option for motorized access to the area...
Still a small town, but today a device with fewer wheels can take me to the Park...
BTW, several years ago recorded a GS ride vid to the Jefferson Lake noted on the sign above. If you like to fish for big trout make plans to spend a day at this scenic and quiet place...
To a High Alpine Lake - Streaming Video
Down the road I ride through the lumpy remants of winter...
...pausing and turning before a 13,500ft. spur of the Mosquito Range. That's 13,684ft. Bald Mtn. on the left...
Paying homage to 13,822ft. Mt. Silverheels. Rightfully so. In the early 1860's a smallpox epidemic decimated the nearby mining camps. A bar maid stayed behind to nurse the men, comforting and helping many, but also contracting the disease herself and dying from it. In honor of her love and care the men named the nearby skyscraping peak after her, knowing her only as the lady who wore silver heels. It is said her ghost can be seen tending the graves at the nearby Buckskin Joe miner's cemetery...
The K-Bike finds South Park a fine place to stretch the legs. That's 14,286ft. Mt. Lincoln on the right peering over Red Hill Pass in the foreground...
Looking back. The Tarryall Range and Lost Creek Wilderness is in the distance...
Fairplay is my county seat. Population 610. If you hunt out county courthouses the old one still stands here, and I think the big tree near the courthouse is the one where "death by hanging" judgments were quickly executed.
Nearby is the little league baseball diamond called "Two Mile High Stadium". Spent some frigid times there during "spring" little league games.
With corruption, cheating, and riff raff a rule versus exception in the mining camps 140 years ago, the community declared you can work and live here, and we'll "play fair".
That's 14,172ft. Mt. Bross standing as a sentinel to the west in the pic below. This is one of the highest incorporated towns in the U.S. About ten miles down this road here is the second highest town... Alma. About eight years ago Alma and Leadville (The highest in the U.S.) played a game of one upmanship, annexing cemeterys, mines, and stray roads up on nearby hills so they could be higher than the other. Alma waved the white flag of surrender after a couple of years. Fairplay today...
Heading south on Hwy 9. The small stream here feeds into the Middle Fork of the South Platte, feeding into the South Platte, joining the North Platte to form The Platte, merging with the Missouri, joining the Mississippi, and flowing through New Orleans to the Gulf. Had this stream been on the other side of the Continental Divide seen on the horizon here, towards the Pacific its water would go...
Turning around, the Buffalo Peaks Wilderness area in the distance. Never a man made intervention to happen...
Continuing on south I pass, then turnaround and park to salute fine beaver craftsmanship...
OK, I take a two mile spur off Hwy 9 to visit Guffey, a small cabin town in the southern part of my county. If in the area, just stop by to see things not often seen...
BTW, that is an AMF Harley-Davidson golf cart...
Can do all your Christmas shopping here...
Now here's hoot, if not a creepy hoot. Some guy wired up some real skeletons...
And that's flesh and fur on the bones. Should have seen how it looked last year...
So I'm taking lonely roads back and make a stop to observe the not oft seen southern slopes of 14,110ft. Pikes Peak...
I tried to scoot over Kenosha Pass to the Park a few weeks ago, but weather and road conditions had me turning around. Noted here:
http://forums.bmwmoa.org/showthread.php?t=24617
First pause today was the last pause at the link above. SW side of Kenosha Pass...
Here's the map of today's ride, with locations of images below noted:
The very small town of Jefferson is at the bottom of Kenosha Pass. In 1937 there was only one option for motorized access to the area...
Still a small town, but today a device with fewer wheels can take me to the Park...
BTW, several years ago recorded a GS ride vid to the Jefferson Lake noted on the sign above. If you like to fish for big trout make plans to spend a day at this scenic and quiet place...
To a High Alpine Lake - Streaming Video
Down the road I ride through the lumpy remants of winter...
...pausing and turning before a 13,500ft. spur of the Mosquito Range. That's 13,684ft. Bald Mtn. on the left...
Paying homage to 13,822ft. Mt. Silverheels. Rightfully so. In the early 1860's a smallpox epidemic decimated the nearby mining camps. A bar maid stayed behind to nurse the men, comforting and helping many, but also contracting the disease herself and dying from it. In honor of her love and care the men named the nearby skyscraping peak after her, knowing her only as the lady who wore silver heels. It is said her ghost can be seen tending the graves at the nearby Buckskin Joe miner's cemetery...
The K-Bike finds South Park a fine place to stretch the legs. That's 14,286ft. Mt. Lincoln on the right peering over Red Hill Pass in the foreground...
Looking back. The Tarryall Range and Lost Creek Wilderness is in the distance...
Fairplay is my county seat. Population 610. If you hunt out county courthouses the old one still stands here, and I think the big tree near the courthouse is the one where "death by hanging" judgments were quickly executed.
Nearby is the little league baseball diamond called "Two Mile High Stadium". Spent some frigid times there during "spring" little league games.
With corruption, cheating, and riff raff a rule versus exception in the mining camps 140 years ago, the community declared you can work and live here, and we'll "play fair".
That's 14,172ft. Mt. Bross standing as a sentinel to the west in the pic below. This is one of the highest incorporated towns in the U.S. About ten miles down this road here is the second highest town... Alma. About eight years ago Alma and Leadville (The highest in the U.S.) played a game of one upmanship, annexing cemeterys, mines, and stray roads up on nearby hills so they could be higher than the other. Alma waved the white flag of surrender after a couple of years. Fairplay today...
Heading south on Hwy 9. The small stream here feeds into the Middle Fork of the South Platte, feeding into the South Platte, joining the North Platte to form The Platte, merging with the Missouri, joining the Mississippi, and flowing through New Orleans to the Gulf. Had this stream been on the other side of the Continental Divide seen on the horizon here, towards the Pacific its water would go...
Turning around, the Buffalo Peaks Wilderness area in the distance. Never a man made intervention to happen...
Continuing on south I pass, then turnaround and park to salute fine beaver craftsmanship...
OK, I take a two mile spur off Hwy 9 to visit Guffey, a small cabin town in the southern part of my county. If in the area, just stop by to see things not often seen...
BTW, that is an AMF Harley-Davidson golf cart...
Can do all your Christmas shopping here...
Now here's hoot, if not a creepy hoot. Some guy wired up some real skeletons...
And that's flesh and fur on the bones. Should have seen how it looked last year...
So I'm taking lonely roads back and make a stop to observe the not oft seen southern slopes of 14,110ft. Pikes Peak...