Thursday, August 30, 2012

120 miles driven, 3+ miles walked

Bob has been dying for a chocolate beignet from the French patisserie a few blocks down Main Street so after we did the usual (and I got my coffee from next door at 6:30), we headed out in gorgeous partly-cloudy and brisk (high-50s) air down the street.  Bob got his beignet and I had a little coconut cookie (just toasty shredded coconut held together with most likely gobs of butter…. yum!).  We also got a fresh baguette because we decided to make dinner in the room tonight given that we won’t be able to see the 49ers on t.v. we may as well stay in.

We also decided to go take a hike around Clinton Reservoir (above) that we were intrigued with two years ago when we drove from Breckenridge to Aspen and passed by.  We left Breckenridge about 9:30 after getting gas and headed Leadville on Hwy 91 from I-70 West. First time in the car since Sunday!  We had the top down, the windscreen up and the music on.  Mostly sunny and 64*.

Driving by Copper Mountain I had memory flash from about 20 years ago when Betsy and Manny lived in Denver BK (before kids) and Betsy and I went skiing at Copper.  It was a crystal clear bright blue day, 0* at the base and about -25* at the top.  It was so freakin’ cold.  We would spend 45 minutes going up and skiing down and at least that long inside trying to warm up.

We got to Clinton Reservoir and started the hike around it (2.12 miles of shoreline according to the sign) about 10:15. We hiked to the end of the reservoir when the rumbling thunder convinced us to turn around.  The skies changed really fast!  The trail was fantastic — really spongey and nice on knees, etc. and at 11,113 feet challenging enough to make it worthwhile! I was afraid of meeting bears after last year’s encounter so was trying to walk loud….. we saw nothing but squirrels thank goodness.  It started raining big fat drops about 15 minutes before we made it back to the car and continued pretty steadily on the way into Leadville – about 20 more miles.  Really beautiful drive.

We rode bikes around Leadville on our first road trip to Colorado in the fall of 2002? 2003? when we stayed at the Hyatt Beaver Creek.  We have been through it since then but never spent much time there.  And now, we have to plan a whole day there in the future!  We had lunch at High Mountain Pies per the recommendation of a nice girl in the sporting goods store.   She said they had really good salads and sandwiches as well as pizza.  Bob ordered a BLTA (avocado) on a fresh, warm french roll that was HUGE and I had a salad with roast chicken (warm! shredded roast chicken) that I inhaled.   Bob ate a little more than half of his sandwich.

While we were waiting, we were reading this little give-away about Leadville and realized there is even more history to it than we knew.  The list of influential, famous people who started in or went through Leadville is incredible.   The surrounding outskirts of the town is pretty rundown and depressing — as so many small towns are.  But the main street is still quite vibrant, naturally depending a great deal on tourists.  We walked around for about an hour, enough to determine that we need to come back.

We drove out of Leadville and took a different route back to Breck, Hwy 24 via Minturn to I-70 east.  This route is even more beautiful!  We spent a good deal of time at the 10th Mountain Division Monument at Camp Hale.   This is dedicated to the WWII mountain men who trained on skis and climbing mountains in this area and went on to great success in the American effort in the war.  There were 14,000 men, 900 of whom died.   This is how the valley looks now:

It really started raining hard off and on as we continued on Hwy 24 ….  we took a little detour to Red Cliff, an old mining town that is perched, literally, on the side of a mountain.

It really started pouring as we went over Vail Pass and all we could see was black sky around us.  Loved it.  Stopped at the farmer’s market stand in Frisco for tomatoes (the same guy who was at the market on Sunday).  God, are we spoiled with the choice and quality of produce we get at home…..

Our next stop was City Market for bison sirloin and asparagus.  It was raining hard and steady and at 4:30 it was dark!  Got to the Hyatt just before 5p and we were happy we were staying in!  We spent an hour or two on our computers and trying to find football games….. watched South Carolina and Vanderbilt while we made dinner with a bottle of Chardonnay and had a glass of Jacuzzi Pinot with dinner.   Went to bed without finding out 49ers score…..