San Juan Trip Sept 1-6 (1 Viewer)

PWCO70crusier · Aug 1, 2018

The San Juan trip is fast approaching, so its time to start planning.

Meeting place: Shell station on CO HWY 115 in Penrose, 9:00 AM (or meet down there if you are traveling on your own).

Camping: Golden Horn dispersed camping area. Turn off is 2 miles north of Silverton on FSR 585. Its down a couple miles on the left. Camping area does have a bathroom (bring TP though). I like to camp in the far right corner down along the river. Its free! Campers and RVs can camp down there.

Trails: up for debate! There are lots of them there, and we don't all have to do the same trails. I'd like to do Cunningham Gulch up Stony Pass to Bear Town, I've never done that one and could be interesting. The Alpine Loop (Engineer and Cinnamon Pass) is a favorite. Ophir/Black Bear Pass and Imogene is another. Sydney and Governor Basin's would be possibilities. If there is a trail you'd like to run, post up!

Really this will be a come down and participate in as many days as you want. If you have questions, post up here and I'll do my best to answer them.

PWCO70crusier · Aug 27, 2018

bump...ok...so who is going???

twbland · Aug 27, 2018

Sorry, can't make it this year. :-(

PWCO70crusier · Aug 27, 2018

Bummer!! Maybe next year. Anybody else thinking about it? One week away!

PWCO70crusier · Aug 31, 2018

We are a day away from leaving. I have myself, Tony (my brother in law's brother in law from MO), and Tracy coming down later in the week. Is there anybody else planning on going?

EricG · Aug 31, 2018

Wish I could, but I've already taken off a ton of time this summer.

SAS · Sep 6, 2018

I drove down to Silverton on Monday and met Kyle and his friend, Tony, from Missouri. Kyle had been there a few days already, and Tony had been there since Saturday.

Tuesday morning, Tony decided to head home a day earlier than planned, so it was just Kyle and I. We drove Ophir Pass into Telluride, then Imogene Pass into Ouray. The early half of the day was partly cloudy and mild. We made it over Ophir, and headed up Imogene. We met some people on the trail, and everyone had to inspect Kyle's FJ40. "Wow, that's a nice Land Cruiser!"

We picked up a couple from Kansas, who had visited the San Juans before but this was their first time in their Jeep JK Sport. They were staying in a motel/inn at Ridgeway, where they were told "oh yeah, go run Imogene Pass, it's easy."

The rain and hail started once we got to the Social Tunnel (2.5 miles into the trail), and was sporadic for the remainder of the day, sometimes intense for short durations. We stopped at the Tomboy Mine, and of course we stopped at the pass summit. Things got interesting going downhill in the rain and hail, but no problems.

We bid our Kansas friends farewell after completing the trail, then Kyle and I returned over Red Mountain Pass/Hwy 550 to camp near Silverton. To our amazement, camp was bone dry. We cooked some dinner then I made a dutch oven blueberry cobbler while we sat around the campfire talking.

I had to return home on Wednesday but figured I would ride a trail in the morning with Kyle who was planning to stay until Thursday. Overnight, Kyle decided to head home also. We considered running Stony Pass from Silverton to Creede, which is +/- 60 miles and several hours, but would put us on US 160 at South Fork in good shape to get home before midnight. We broke camp and went into Silverton for fuel, and then considered the impending weather.

Turns out it was a good choice to drop the idea of Stony Pass, and just get going on pavement. We hit torrential rain in Montrose, which became almost unbearable when approaching Blue Mesa Reservoir. I mean it was harsh!!!

Once we got to Sargents, and over Monarch Pass, it wasn't bad. In fact, Salida east was dry with only sporadic light showers.

Pictures from Ophir Pass: