Monarch Crest Adventure

This last Sunday I got the chance to ride the Monarch Crest portion of the Colorado Divide Trail. The Crest is probably one of the top ten mountain bike rides in the US. The day started out rainy and the group I was going to ride with decided to bag it. I realy wanted to ride so I went up to the trailhead and hooked up with another group of people who were gracious enough to let me tag along. the Monarch Crest trail with the addition of the Silver Creek and Rainbow trails is 31 miles long and hits an altitude of almost 13,000 at it's 'crest'. The elevation gain is 3600' and the loss was 4800. The groups shuttle vehicle was parked in Poncha Springs so that added another 7 miles of riding.

The first leg of the climb


Part of the group I tagged along with


Silver Creek where the trail vanished

Where the Rainbow trail meets Poncha Pass, just a bit muddy tired and cold.


A great way to spend a Sunday

Bean

Looks like a great time!

You see any game up there?

Now that's what i call taken a ride!!! Cool!

Joey

Now that looks awesome, what a ride. Thanks for sharing!

Completesportsman,

A couple of times I caught a whiff of that beautiful elk stink. The riding was pretty technical in places and pretty tiring in other places so the focus was on staying upright rather than scouting.

Kind of a funny coincidence: While driving out of Grand Junction I passed a vehicle that had motorbikes and mountain bikes in a trailer along with a Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation decal on the window, they also passed me a couple of times and i thought they would probably be good people because ot eh bikes and decal. They turned out to be part of the group I ended up riding with and gave me a ride back to the top of Monarch Pass to my vehicle.

Bean