We did this trail over a two-day period, Wednesday and Thursday, September 22 and 23, but I’m combining the blog into one entry. We also did part of the Mineral Belt Trail in Leadville, Colorado, on the first day. Though not Hall of Fame Rails to Trails, they are two that Martha and I have been wanting to do for over a year. The COVID-19 pandemic stopped us last fall, but this year we decided to forge ahead and take the trip, since we had all received the virus vaccinations, and Martha and Ed had the RV Camper by which to travel out west and not have to fly. Ron and I felt rather safe flying to Denver and then driving to Salt Lake City from Glenwood Springs, which gave us a chance to check on the house and spend a few days in Salt Lake, the first time he had been there since pre-pandemic in September 2019 when we stopped by there enroute to Atlanta from Boise with Howie. Another nice addition to this trip was Robert and Ginny Harrell joining us. Robert had worked at Clayton with us and they had since moved to Denver and were bike enthusiasts like us, so it was fun. Ed was once again indispensable being the main transporter of people and bikes rather than riding himself.
Though the scenery was wonderful and the bike ride enjoyable, I have to admit that the biggest memory of this trip is of the rental car we used. It had a bad tire, which we noticed about an hour outside of Denver on the way to Glenwood Springs, and had to stop continually to put air in this right front tire. Whenever we stopped for air or a bathroom break, our motivating sentence was “Let’s get back on the road while we have air.” In all, we put air in 4 times between Denver and Glenwood Springs, 5 times while in Glenwood Springs, and 7 times on Friday as we drove from Glenwood Springs to Salt Lake to turn the car in. It was quite an adventure, especially because time and distance between air fill ups was getting shorter and shorter the closer we got to Salt Lake, and crossing the desert in Eastern and Southern Utah offered us few gas stations. In the middle of nowhere, north of Helper, Utah, and south of Springville, Utah, Soldier’s Summit offered us a solitary gas station without a town nearby. It was a Godsend, as we didn’t think we’d make it to the next destination at the bottom of that mountain without more air. Not pleasant excitement, but it was excitement added to the trip. In no uncertain terms the Fox Rentacar office in Salt Lake heard about the experience and how unsafe we thought the car turned out to be.
Early the first morning (leaving Holiday Inn Express at 7:30 a.m.) we followed Martha’s plans for transporting the bikes and people—dropping off our car in Basalt and us riding with Harrells to Aspen to start the trail. Ed and Martha had kindly picked up our rental bikes and drove them to the trail head. It was really nice to be back in the mountains again. About a quarter of a mile into the ride we walked our bikes through the John Denver Sanctuary/Memorial which had the words of some of his songs inscribed on big flat rocks in a wooded area. Martha tuned her phone into one of his songs while we read the words. Neat touch to the ride! This first day of the ride was very scenic and pleasant; the worst part was that we had to cross some mountain roads on the path, which meant stopping to watch for cars approaching the crossing.
Most of the trail was hard packed gravel or limestone, but there were paved parts. There was one steep hill—generally, our elevation was going downhill—that forced us to get off our bikes and walk them up the hill. For the record, though, I’m pleased to say that, using low gear and anticipating the climb, I was able to huff and puff my way totally up the hill without getting off and pushing. Other bikers we encountered mostly prevented the rest of us from pedaling all the way. Almost all of the trail was on the side or near the top of the mountain, so that we had a good view of the valley terrain and the small communities (like Woody Creek) in the valley as we pedaled along, as well as the mountain range we were on and in front of us. We didn’t see any wild animals or many wildflowers, but the weather was nice, and the mountain scenery was worth it. The Astronomy Club of Aspen High School had erected eight signs along the way, each giving interesting details about the eight planets in our solar system. That was a nice touch.
As we approached Basalt, we finally came upon a toilet facility, which was nice, and then a couple of miles farther, we stopped for this part of the ride in the town of Basalt. At that point the signage (whatever little there was) pretty much disappeared, so that we lost the trail once we got into town and had to call Ed to have him come pick us up where we were, near some tire store and not on the trail. The lack of bathroom facilities and scarcity of signs along the trail might be two of the reasons it’s not a Hall of Fame trail. But it’s a good twenty-one mile ride even if it doesn’t help us check off one more Hall of Fame trail.
That afternoon we each drove our respective vehicles over to Leadville via Independence Pass, a scenic highway and a beautiful drive. We stopped along the way at a place called The Grottos, by a creek (but didn’t take the walk to the grottos) to eat our picnic lunch that Ed had picked up while we were still riding. At Leadville, Robert and Ginny went on back to Glenwood Springs, and Ed drove Ron, Martha, and me to a high point on the Mineral Belt Trail because we didn’t have time to ride the entire 11 miles and actually didn’t want to make the elevation climb. So we rode downhill all the way except for a short jaunt uphill to see some colorful Aspen trees, riding through wooded areas. The setting sun made it difficult to see in front of us, and the path was rather curvy, so this part of the ride was a little bit uncomfortable. When we finished, Ed met us and took our bikes, and we each drove back to Glenwood Springs—about 90 minutes—us again worrying still about the air in the tire, having filled it up just before we left Leadville. It was dark not long after we got on our way, which meant that we couldn’t see much on the way home. What we did see was interesting, particularly the abandoned houses on the side of the hill, near nothing, except maybe an old mine site of several years ago.
That night we went to Arby’s again for a take-out dinner of steak and cheese sandwiches to eat back in the room. When we filled up the tire’s air at the 7-11 nearby (where we had discovered $2.00 air the night before), we actually saw the tear in the tire and marked it with a Sharpie we borrowed from the Arby’s staff. Even though it didn’t solve the problem, it made us feel like maybe we could get it fixed. Ron seriously considered not riding the next day at all, instead, taking care of the tire problem. Then when we thought about the itinerary, we realized that we and the Harrells could actually go in the same car, that Martha had listed us going in separate cars for COVID-19 precautions. So we decided to text Robert and Ginny to see if we could possibly ride with them on Thursday’s trip. About 10:30 that night, we all made the final decision to meet them at their car at 5 a.m. the next morning. (We had taken reserve breakfast goodies from Wednesday morning’s breakfast because we were leaving Thursday before breakfast opened up at the Holiday Inn. We set the alarm for 4 a.m. and made it!)
Ed and Martha were leaving from their campground with the bikes to meet us at Maroon Bells Scenic Area, about 40 minutes south of Glenwood Springs on the road to Aspen. Obviously riding in the dark, we couldn’t see much, but it was pleasant conversation with Robert and Ginny. When we finally arrived, Ed was waiting for us in the parking lot with his flashlight to guide us to where Martha, Mary, Jim, and all the rest of the photographers were lined up along a path beside a lake which was in the glacial valley of Maroon Bells, a scenic mountain range. As the sun gradually lightened the sky, the mountains around us were true to their name—scenic—and we all got some great shots of the mountain slowly changing colors as the sun rose higher in the sky. To compare with our early morning excursion at Key West to see the sun come up, it was very different because we never did see the sun rise as we had at the Florida Keys. It was pretty, though, and worth the hassle of getting up so early for this once in a lifetime experience. After it was fully lighted and people were packing up their camera paraphernalia, we all took a little hike in the area—more like a one-mile scenic loop walk. It was refreshing and scenic, and we did see a fox fairly close up by the parking lot. Our only wild animal that I can recall! Then we all drove to Basalt to the parking lot we had used yesterday, only this time we were heading north on the trail to ride the next 21 miles to Glenwood Springs.
Just south of Carbondale we encountered the goats eating the grass alongside the trail—a planned event by the trail manager. He hires the goats once or twice a year to do this and spent a little time talking to us about the trail and the goats. Interesting. We did use the opportunity to tell him about the poor signage in Basalt and the lack of restrooms on both days of trail riding. In Carbondale, a nice little town, we picked up the lunches Martha had ordered for us at the Granetta Panini (she also bravely went inside to pick up the sandwiches in spite of her concern about the pandemic) and then rode on out of town a couple of miles looking for the picnic table that Martha said she could see on her trail map. We finally found it, and though it didn’t overlook the Roaring Fork River like we thought it did, it was a good spot for lunch and an opportunity to shed some of the layers of clothing we still had on from this morning’s cold trip to Maroon Bells. Refreshed, we continued the trail mostly along the river and enjoyed the scenery, this time being in the valley instead of on the mountainside, and with fewer stops for road crossings. Still not any wildlife on the trail and few wild flowers, but we were in the mountains, and that felt good. Most of today’s ride was paved, which made it seem faster. Probably was faster.
In Glenwood Springs, Ed met us at Two Rivers Park, put Martha’s bike on their truck, and drove Robert back to Basalt to pick up his car. Ron, I, Martha, and Ginny walked our bikes back to the Holiday Inn and to the Blue Sky Adventures & Canyon Bikes store where we turned in our bikes. We started to walk to the nearby ice cream store but realized there was no sidewalk to get across this busy intersection and decided to not get ice cream. Ed came for Martha, and we all went into our rooms to rest up before dinner. We rode with Robert and Ginny to dinner, where Ron and I decided to treat everyone for all they had done for us to make trip enjoyable. The only reason I mention this is because of the lesson I learned that night about tipping—I gave the waiter sizable 25% tip and when I eventually looked at the bill I saw that he had already added in a 20% gratuity, so he received a nice $50 tip from us that night!
Before we left for Salt Lake the next morning, we met Ginny and Robert for breakfast and then Ron took the car to a tire store for their opinion. They decided the tire was so bad that it couldn’t be repaired, so we left for the rest of our adventure into Salt Lake City, as noted at the beginning of this blog.
It was a good bike ride and an interesting experience!
For the “rest of the story” (as Paul Harvey) used to tell, back in Georgia we used our meticulous notes of where we added air to the tire and sent a certified letter to the vice-president of Fox Rent-a-car detailing our experience and asked them not to rent that car to anyone else until after the tire had been replaced. Three weeks later, a credit for the rental showed up on our credit card. No explanatory letter, just the credit, but at least they responded in a positive way. Most likely, they clearly could hear the tone in Ron’s words that the car was probably illegal to be rented in the condition it was in.
Georgia Pedal Pushers 