TR: Telluride -> Moab

[freshies]

So, last week of July, me and four good buddies decided to do the Telluride -> Moab bike trip via the San Juan Hut system.
I have to be in Chicago the week before the trip for business and to see family and friends. My buddies are all driving to Telluride that week to spend some time in T-Ride, ride, drink beers, hike and relax. They are hauling my bike and gear out there for me. Me, I am in 8-10 hour meetings every freackin' day. Going to Cubs games and drinking like a fish at night. Eating crap food, getting little sleep, and generally losing all fitness I had accrued up to this point riding in Tahoe and Marin. Thursday night, I outdid myself, by pulling a noon time exit from meetings to attend the Cubs game, where I proceeded to consume alcoholic beverages in every form known to man from first pitch to, oh, about 4am with several HS buddies. I mean, we drank beers at the game, whiskey afterwards, tequila made a guest appearance somewhere around dinner time, and it went downhill from there. I then had to be back at the mother ship for meeting at 9am on Friday. The plan is to fly out of Chicago Fri afternoon to Denver, catch the last flight to T-Ride, and join the boys Friday night for some beers and pre-trip planning and packing and sorting of gear. We are to leave bright and early Sat morning.

Naturally, my flight from Chicago to Denver is delayed because its frickin' hailing in Denver. So I land in Denver @ 11pm Friday night - flight to T-Ride was cancelled anyway. Ok, I will see about an early morning flight. "sorry sir, next available flight is Sat night, possibly Sunday morning if there are no cancellations" Ummm, right, that's not going to work. It's now close to midnight. I am still hung over, tired, pissed and generally not liking the prospect of driving all night to get to T-Ride in time to start pedaling 200+ miles. So I amble up to the Avis counter and say "how much to rent a car one way to T-Ride?" Some negotiating and pleading and flirting later with the 19 yr old Avis girl, and I have a Ford something or other 4WD for $139 vs. the originally quoted $298 for a one way no advance reservation rape-the-idiot-stranded-business traveler rate for the privilege of driving a Ford Taurus. OK, things are looking up.

It's now midnight when I roll out of Denver heading west on 70 with hail and rain coming down and roughly 7 hours of driving time through the mountains in front of me. I have been told that the bus (meaning the riders in my group, my friends) leaves at 9am - no exceptions, as the first days ride to the first hut is a haul. I have the topos and route descriptions with me, and my bike and gear will be left at a friend's house in T-Ride should I not make the 9am departure, and to catch up, yadda yadda......some friends, huh? But I would do the same.

I roll into T-Ride around 8am (with a road side nap under my belt) feeling like a buck fifty. My friends are all properly caffeinated, fed, packed, rested, and ready to roll. "Dude, you look like hell" according to my good, good friend Brad, everyone snickering and cracking jokes about my "training" in Chicago prior to the ride, and how they are gona drop my ass on the first climb, yadda yadda. My friends, tough crowd.

Next up: Day 1:

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

hah! this should be good.

[freshies]

So after shaking off the daze I was in from driving, I loaded up my pack for the next week, grabbed a coffee and a bagel, and we were off. First day was about 22 miles wiht roughly 3200 feet of climbing, mostly on fire roads and ranching roads.
Now, nornally, this woulnd't be that big a deal. But I was beat from the weeks preceeding debauchery, meetings, flights and drive. Add a 25+ pound pack on and starting at altitude (coming for a week in the flat lands)and that climb was hard. But I managed to ang wt the group and we rolled into the first hut about 4 hours later. Man it was beautiful up there, an amazing view below.

View from first hut



The hut:



More scenic stoke from the hut

[p-tex]

Kewl!! I've wanted to do this ride for a couple years now. Recommended?

[shirk]

Your Chicago "training" plan sounds like the one I did in Zimbabwe a few years back. Only replace one week with four months of that. Two days back home and my riding buds mention a new local ride. The ride nearly killed me. I turned funny shades of purple and nearly puked 10 times. I was one hurting unit after that ride. Took several months to get my condition back so I could hang with the group on the trails.

[hev]

this is great. keep it coming.

[freshies]

OK, so after day one and an excellent night's sleep (finally) out under the stars (screw the hut hut when you can sleep under the big beautiful stars of Telluride at 11,000 feet), we awoke for day 2.

day 2 stoke, the group



The start of the day was a screaming downhill of about 2500 feet, and with everyone stoked, the race was on. Stupid....the downhill turned into a rutted double-track. A wiser group of men would have backed off and allowed everyone to pick their line and proceede single-file. But no, everyone was racing, passing people, bunny-hopping between ruts, etc. My buddy Brad came flying down between John and I, and I saw the line he was forced to take, right into a massive rut. We/he was flying at this point, and I saw a blur out of the corner of my eye as his front tire got eaten up in the rut and launched him over the bars at mach speed....he flew into the ground shoulder first (the weight of his pack really driving him into the ground) and threw up a cloud of dust, his bike ghost riding/flipping end over end and almost taking out Wade.

We all stop, go back to him, as he gets up from the ground with his collar bone popping through his jersey in that sickening way (if you have seen/done this, you know what I am talking about). Shit! Fack! He is screwed. We get him comfortable, distribute his belongings from his pack amongst the five of us, and start helping him down the mountain in shifts. Jeff rides ahead to the road that intersects our trail that day, just outside Telluride and calls the paramedics. A few hours later we reach the road w/Brad, and the paramedics coming rolling up. It has been decided that Brad is on his own. He will take the meat-wagon back to Telluride to get his shoulder looked at (Paramedics were super-cool, loaded his bike and gear in the meat-wagon and gave us some left over pizza) and will meet us in Moab in 6 days.

So bummed to lose a man so early, but what are you gonna do? Cancel the ride/trip? Hell no!

After reaching the trail head again froma few miles down the road, we head down some ranching roads w/nice aspens:







We finally reach the second hut that afternoon (about 34 miles and 3000 feet climbing that day). It's a beaut, surrounded by aspens in this gorgeous meadow:

view of surrounding aspens from the hut: