Hell Week 2014- recap of Day 2 (Telluride to Lake City) Telluride is one of our favorite towns in Colorado so it’s always tough to leave. Day 2 began with a climb over Ophir Pass and then a small portion of Section 2 from the COBDR. Our goal for today was to conquer Poughkeepsie Gulch. Some of you may know PG and think of it as a dirt bike trail...you would be correct. PG is no joke. It’s 4 miles of hell. There were two major obstacles that stood in our way. The first is affectionately called the, “Step.” There are two ways down for a GS rider. The first route is down a slab of rock that requires a precise line. A mistake 6” to the right or left spells doom. Jason Houle was the first to attempt this route and he aced it. In fact he made it look so easy I decided to try it. My attempt didn’t go as well. Three-quarters of the way down my front tire got off line and I ended up rolling to the right. It wasn’t pretty but surprisingly I wasn’t hurt and the bike ended up with only a few broken plastic pieces. Needless to say, the morale of the group was obviously affected by my fall as no one else attempted this route. I can’t say that I blame them. Route 2 was a steep rocky slot that allowed the rider to use their feet to guide them down along with the help of fellow riders on either side of the bike. Everyone made it down this route unscathed except for Kyle Moore. Kyle’s front tire hit a rock and bounced him off the bike. His F800 was ok but his landing proved to be “hands-on” shall we say. Kyle absorbed the impact with his hands and ended up breaking his left pinkie finger and severely bruising his right. Kyle pushed on and finished the ride under his own power. The second major obstacle was a 1/2 mile loose rock section that thankfully went downhill. After we all made it down we all unanimously agreed that it would be impossible for a GS to make it up the same section....at least with the bike intact! One of the interesting points about this loose rock section was the fact that there was water running under the rocks. This running water created a lava-flow effect. You would feel your front tire sink into the rocks if you slowed down too much, which of course made it extremely difficult to ride. Most of us slugged it out on this section by riding a little, paddling a little and crawling a little. A constant drizzle of rain didn’t help matters either. A few notes about Poughkeepsie Gulch- DO NOT ATTEMPT this trail alone. It is an expert level GS trail. Most 4x4 off-roaders traverse this trail from North to South which means you travel in an uphill direction. We did NOT try this direction. We went from South to North which meant that we were traveling mostly downhill. An uphill attempt on a GS would be futile. You could do it but you wouldn’t have much of a bike left after the fact. Also, after we descended the “step” and made it another several hundred yards we came to a fork in the road with a sign that indicated a bypass was available for people who did NOT want to try the “step.” Obviously, since we were NOT traveling in the normal north to south direction this sign didn’t mean much to us...oh well. The last trail of the day was Engineer Pass which was our means to get to Lake City. Engineer is a classic. The rain continued at a drizzle but it didn’t dampen our spirits too much. We stopped at our favorite Lake City restaurant, Southern Vittles, for a late lunch and called it a day. Happy Trails, Mick
Posted on: Wed, 17 Sep 2014 16:57:15 +0000
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