Day 17 Chama, NM to Alamosa, CO

Today we entered our fourth state, as we crossed into Colorado. Today’s ride was another challenge. There seem to be a lot of those lately. We needed to cross over the San Juan Mountain Range today and that was the first order of business today, as the first 21 miles were climb miles to get over two different peaks, both in the 10,200 foot range. The climb was very steep at times and I spent most of the time in my lowest granny gear, which means only about 5-6 mph. So, your head starts calculating how many hours it is going to take, just to get to the peaks and then we had another 56 miles after that. I don’t know what my heart rate was beating at, as I can’t count that fast!

The scenery was absolutely breath taking today, especially during the climb. I am including some pics of the valleys we left behind in our climb. The route had an old narrow gauge Cumbres and Toltec Scenic Railroad track alongside for much of the climb miles. It is no longer used, but is being saved for historic purposes. Adam and I also experimented taking some photos of each other while riding. After the climb, It was a very steep decent to the valley below. It was very curvy and the road condition was not the best, so we could not let the bike go as fast as it wanted to. We had to ride the brakes on and off most of the way down. After the steep descent, most of the 56 miles left was slightly downhill and we gained a tail wind for a good part of that section. We had very dark skies behind us at the end of our mountain descent and found out later that riders after us experienced quite a mountain storm with torrential rain and hail. We were glad we kept pushing it to stay ahead of the storm and only had sprinkles. Julie’s SAG station had the rain, but no hail. Adam and I rode together today and we picked up Joel Stehouwer on one of the SAG stops after the mountain descent. We got in camp about 2:15.  

We are staying at a very nice community recreation center, with 3 basketball/volleyball courts, an exercise/weight room and several community rooms. It is very nice.  We are all very tired again tonight.