Lake City, CO and Cimarron Pass (What a trip.)

I'm back at the Gunnison Public Library to use the internet. We will be leaving Gunnison Saturday returning to Monument, CO where my phone card will work again.

Tuesday May 29th Bev and I went on another adventure. It wasn't just touring around but a real adventure.

We decided to take a scenic trip from Gunnison to Lake City, CO. It was a very nice ride and the scenery was outstanding as usual in this part of Colorado. The trip didn't end there though. From Lake City we decided drive to Silverton, CO via the Cimarron Pass which is over 14,000 feet.

On the way before we started our climb up the mountain I pulled off the dirt road to get out of the way of a truck and there it was, a memorial sign of a young police officer killed in action. The unique thing was his name is Larry McMaster and it was just luck that we saw his memorial. You never know it could be one of Bev's relatives.

Starting up the mountain we left the smooth dirt road through a gate (it gets closed when the road is impassable) and the road sign said "4 wheel drive vehicles, ATVs, snow mobiles, or horses only". Well, our Honda CRV is 4 wheel drive so we decided to tackle the road.

When they said 4 wheel drive they really meant it, the road was awful. Our little car climbed and climbed over the roughest terrain which was more of a dirt trail than road. There were large rocks and washed out areas and we could only go 2 to 5 mph most of the time with a max speed of 10 mph. The scenery was awesome but the road was on the edge of a high cliff with no guard rails.

We passed a tepee.

Some mountain goats.

We almost made it to the top of Cimarron Pass (we were so close). On a near vertical section just before the top as our car tried to climb over a couple of boulders we got a fright. Our front right wheel and our left rear wheel  were off the ground at the same time and the car teetered as we looked down over the cliff.

Well that was all I needed, the hell with Silverton! I slowly backed down quite a ways to an area where I could turn around. Remember, we were very close to the edge a the cliff with no guard rails.

We were sure glad to start our trek back down the mountain. After that section of road the trip down didn't seem so bad.

Other than the car covered with dust we safely made it down and headed back to Gunnison. By the time we got to Gunnison we were starved so we stopped at a Chinese Restaurant which was highly recommended to us. The food was great and we will surely go back again.

Another great day but again we were glad to get back home and relax.

As I mentioned we are leaving here Saturday returning to Monument, CO so I won't post any more blogs until I get internet at the camper again.

Tom & Bev Livin and Lovin the RV lifestyle with a few exciting moments.