Crested Butte

I think Crested Butte is my new favorite town in Colorado! It's a fun town, with lots to do! We should have planned more than one day here.

Dad and I decided to my van to give Mom more time to get ready. It was about a 30 minute drive up there and we parked at the visitor center and went in and got maps and talked to the guy about hikes and bike rides.

We found a quick walk right outside of town, the Woods Walk. It was 1.5 miles and would give us a good taste of the area and let us see windflowers. Crested Butte is the wildflower Capitol of Colorado and the Wildflower Festival starts on Tuesday so it was the season for wildflower. The main flower we saw were Columbine, but we saw a lot of them! We also got great views of the mountains all around us!

When we returned to town, Mom had arrived and it was time for lunch. We went to Pitas in Paradise! I had falafel and it was so good! Then we went to check out Third Bowl Ice Cream. Their flavors were more creative and it wasn't my favorite ice cream.

Next we decided to drive out the Slate River Road to the Oh Be Joyful recreation area where there was a trail that looked interesting. We got to the recreation area and we couldn't find the trail. We suspect it was on the other side of the river and we would have had to take our shoes off to get across the river or drive and Dad thought it was a bit too swift and deep for the jeep. So, we headed up Slate River Road toward Paradise Pass

We ended up driving almost all the way to the pass, but in order to make a loop we had to take the road down before we got to the pass. The whole loop was really neat! Lots of big mountains and windflowers.

 

When we got back to Crested Butte we had about two hours before we were meeting Brian and Heather for dinner, so we decided we'd ride our bikes on the paved rec path. But, 1st I got to learn how to fix a flat tire on my bike. Ugh. Luckily Dad had taken a class and knew how to do it and it was the front tire so it was easier. It took a few tries because the patch didn't hold and the pump wouldn't work. Finally, after having gotten a trial run of the steps by trying to patch the inner tube, I used my new inner tube and fixed it up.

The rec path was really nice! It was paved and had great views. It was also very hilly! There was a long steep hill then at the top there was a sign that said "bikes 7% grade". I wasn't sure I wanted to ride down it because I was going to have to ride back up it, but we were almost to the end of the trail so I rode down it. On the way back the 7% spot wasn't so bad and said how I thought the hill coming up was harder and soon we passed a sign warning bikers that it was an 8% grade! Ha! I was right the hill coming up was steeper that 7%! It was also long.

After our bike ride we got ready and headed over to Secret Stash to meet Brian and Heather. I loved getting together with them two years ago and really enjoyed seeing them this evening as well! They (and their yellow lab!) had hiked over from Aspen! It's an 11 mile hike over the pass! They'd then gotten a shuttle into Crested Butte and had a hotel room for the night and would hike back over tomorrow morning! How cool is that?

 

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