Colorado, part 2

After the Rockies, we headed further west toward Glenwood Springs. Our friends Taz and Mike live about 13 miles from there in a little town called New Castle. We rode our bikes one day from Glenwood Springs to Carbondale (10 miles one way) to the 37th annual Mountain Fest. We ate food, listened to music, people watched and perused the crafters wares.

One of the crafters did really creative work with wood, where they let the wood check and crack and then filled in the voids with crushed turquoise. Here's an example...

The next day Bob, Taz and Anna rode up to Vail Pass, starting from Vail (we've done this pass from the Frisco side which is the easier side) . The Vail side is about 15 miles one way and just under 3000 vertical foot climb. Whew!

Here's Anna after we got back down to Vail...

Our third day of road biking, Mike Joined Taz and us for a ride up to the Maroon Bells in Aspen. The road has very little traffic. We've been wanting to do this one for awhile, so it was a real treat to see. Here's Anna making her way up. 8 miles and about 2000 feet vertical.

And here's another view from the road. Spectacular.

The four of us at the top!

The Maroon Bells were shrouded in mystery (read: thunderstorms) but we managed to get back to car before we got soaked.

We're saying goodbye for now to our road bikes. They'll be living at Taz's place until we swing back through Colorado on our way home. It was worth bringing them for these classic rides!