Spirit Of The
Rockies LC Gathering - Kremmling, CO. July 12-16 2004
I rode
up from Longmont on Monday with Tim & Patty, Vic, Jaycoe & Robin, Dave
& Lynn. Tim & Jaycoe and their gals stayed overnight in Longmont Sunday
night. Tim was having some carb problems on the way in Sunday, but a rejet in
the Super 8 parking lot took care of it. He also lost a bar-end nut so I gave
him a spare and good to go!
Arrived
at Kremmling around 1pm Monday. Ride in was good...weather was HOT! Several
folk were there when we got in, spread out between Bob's, Cliffside,
campgrounds, etc. Spent a pretty miserable night trying to sleep at Bob's...no
air, HOT, noisy (next to Hwy 40), mosquitoes that attack in droves each
evening. But hey, we came here to ride not be comfortable! LOL
Tuesday
morn we headed for TrailRidge & Estes Park. Weather was perfect! Ton of
bikes (35-45?) in our group with Orc leading the pack. Awesome scenery,light
traffic, lots of pictures ya'll will see later. Got to Estes around 1pm...town
is packed with tourists. Had trouble finding parking for the bikes, so grab'd
the RV area in a public lot. Walked across street to find food. Dave Bishop
came in and told us our bikes were being ticketed! Bunch of us left lunch to go
see. By that time the officers were gone, and yep!, each bike had a ticket on
it. Musta caused some carpal tunnel for some unlucky public servant. lol One of
our gang had talked with the law and they said as long as we were gone by the
time they finished their meeting that we could tear up the tickets. So we took
all the tickets and put them on Crow's LC!! Hahahaha! Shoulda seen his face
when he came back! Got pictures for later.
We
debated going back over TrailRidge around 3pm but the clouds looked ugly there
so took the backway outta Estes down towards Central City. Our group kinda
broke up along the way, but we hooked up in Nederland. Once we found parking in
CC I had to head on back to Kremmling as Tess had arrived there with the car
and was "rather perturbed" that I wasn't back yet. Got back around
7:30pm.
Wed
morn we headed out on the poker run. Perfect weather once again. Best part was
Independence Pass (12,096') tho' gravel/oil road construction on the way up was
a BITCH! And when we finally got up there, no toilets...no trees either and
lots of people. Thought Tess was gonna pop. Took lots of pix up there, then she
& I hi-tailed it down to find a roadside or a gas station. Was riding with
the Orc/Mufasa/Crow contingent on the way up but due to our "emergency"
we got separated. Hitched up with BanglaDave, Ross, Nimbrag and their gals in
Leadville for lunch. Hit the rest of the poker stops, then seperated out to
return up I70 back to Kremmling. Played tag with the rain clouds on Hwy 9 until
about 10mi outta town, where we hit high winds and a huge downpour...drops the
size of silver dollars. Thought it was gonna hail for sure! Had to pull over
and hustle on the rain gear but we got soaked. Could barely see the next couple
miles..doing 30mph tops. Storm let off just as we got into town...figures. Tess
was all bitchy about it but we survived. At least the rain cooled things down
for sleeping. That and get'n the motel staff to turn OFF the pilot on our room
heater (sheesh!).
Had
the poker run drawings around 8pm. Orc did a fantastic job of having this all
organized this year and there were some great gifts. Jim Lanning won the high
hand and Crow won the low on a 60/40 split. Most everyone won some kind of
doorprize (I got an OCC pin and Tess got some pin holders). Was really funny
when Jackie won a set of chaps...she had just finally bought a pair in Estes
day before! So they went back into the drawing pot. Almost as funny as when
Helges won a "purse"...looked damn good around his neck too! But
doesn't really go well with his "Intrudian" so he may've bartered it
away.
Thurs
we decided to skip the Mt. Evans ride...had enough hi twisties for the week. So
we rode over to Grand Lake and did the tourist thing downtown. Rode about 100mi
cruising the area there & back. Again, weather was great but some
heavy-looking clouds rolling in as I write this (about 2:30pm). No one got back
from Mt. Evans until after 4pm. Tess was SO glad she didn't go! It was one
SCAREY ride from all reports (altitude, weather, road) and she can't handle
those. I'll let others fill ya'll in on it but it sounded
"interesting". Had a wonderful cookout/feed in the town park at
5:30PM. Group shot by Ponz of most all the bikes and owners (Ponz doing the
photog spiderman routine on a building across the street). Music provided by
JimJc, Orc, Dave West...songs of mountains and friendship. Great time!!
Friday
(today) a bunch of us rode over to Steamboat Springs to do shopping and see the
town...about 100mi round-trip. One UGLY looking stormfront moving in as we left
that hurried us back to Kremmling. Ponz was still stuck in the parking lot at
Bob's with battery problems, so I gave him my old battery (glad I brought that
along!), then hi-tailed it outta there with storm-hell chase'n me towards
Winter Park. Hit the rain there and had to wait 20 minutes. Put on the
rain-gear then headed into MORE clouds sit'n on Berthoud Pass. Rode up/over the
pass thru a surreal foggy/cloudy landscape but only light rain. At least until
I hit the town of Empire near I70. Rain, rain, and MORE rain ALLLLL the way
home...100 mile of RAIN and traffic! SUCKED! But made it home safe with no
problems other than the pucker-factor.
That's
a quick summary from my viewpoint, but LOTS left out to be filled-in by others.
All in all it was a BLAST and if you didn't go, you SHOULD be kick'n yerself
heavily by now...with both boots! Don't miss the next one!! -- Mamba