10-17th June 2019
The mountains of Colorado were a’calling and, as an antidote to the free-wheeling of the first two weeks of the trip, we booked a whole week’s stay in the town of Ouray. Plucked from reasonable obscurity by my chief travel planner, Ouray (pronounced ‘You-ray’ by the locals, but always ‘Hoo-ray’ by my internal dialogue) turned out to be an amazing little town. Known as the Switzerland of America and with a permanent population of about 4,500 it is situated at about 7,800ft elevation at the southern end of a valley, surrounded by three 13,000ft snow-capped peaks. The only road out to the south being the reasonably scary Red Mountain Pass, also known as the ‘Million Dollar Highway’. This is infamous in these parts, being very tortuous and having significant sections where the steep drop-offs have no guard rails. (I wonder if that is where it got its name, having only a one million dollar budget that didn’t stretch to essential safety features?) We arrived by the less stressful northern route but all week were impressed/amazed/astounded to see what type and size of vehicles were tackling the pass.
We took a lesser travelled route from Moab to Ouray, using a smaller road to cut across into Colorado. There were a few climbs and descents but nothing too dramatic, and the scenery subtly changed from the desert canyons and expansive plateaus of Utah to the more intimate forests, hills and snow capped peaks of Colorado.
As the landscape changes with a state border crossing, so do the laws, culture and politics. Colorado is much more liberal and less religious; where Utah has strict alcohol legislation and even state-controlled liquor stores, Colorado has full legalisation of recreational cannabis. These big differences between states is one of the things that makes travelling through America so interesting. It also makes it more of a miracle that the states are united at all. It is like a very big blended family with a lot of large and clashing personalities. No wonder politics are so complicated here.
Anyway, back to Ouray.
Our camp was on the river, about half a mile from town. The river in question was in full angry, snow-melt, torrent mode but was not tipped to break its banks, which was reassuring. It was very loud too so we were glad to have opted for a slightly cheaper site a few rows back from the premium riverside ones. The whole area was ringed by majestic pine-tree clad cliffs, with snow-capped peaks not too far away.
Camp was connected to town by a riverside walk and had its own small but respected cafe that did breakfasts, and steak dinners at the weekends. Ouray itself boasts a fantastic, newly renovated, sulpur-free hot-spring pool complex. This has a variety of hot-pools fed by the spring, and also an outdoor heated 8 lane 25m lap pool filled with municipal water. The hot-pools were always fairly busy, but the lap pool strangely empty. During our week here we had a couple of visits to the pools, knocking off 1km each time in our private lap pool, followed by some time soaking up some mountain sunshine on loungers. The pools create a bit of a beachy vibe in the town and it was not unusual, but a bit bizarre nonetheless, to see people wandering up the main stream in swim wear, wrapped in towels.
Another of the Ouray’s assets was a loop hiking trail that circumnavigated the town, following the contours of the hills that surrounded it with several connections back to civilisation along the way. It was only about 7 miles long, but the terrain was steep and tricky for a lot of the way so it took us four hours. Because the town is visible for the majority of the hike it somehow felt less challenging that it actually was, and the rolling thunder and light rain in the past hour gave less cause for concern too.
The chief outdoor activity of locals and tourist alike in this area is bashing around on off-road trails in an ATV or Jeep. Many of the higher trails and passes were still shut due to snow, even though it was now the middle of June. There was a lot of snow this past winter, between 200 and 600% above average, depending on whom you spoke to. There still seemed to be a thriving industry in ATV and Jeep tours and rentals, and we were not immune! We decided to rent something fun for a day and do some exploring.
Big Dave could have managed the trail that we did, but it would have been so uncomfortable. His suspension is geared to carrying the 2.5 ton weight of Tin Can, with 8 massive leaf springs. On uneven terrain, without Tin Can, Big D is a bone-rattler of epic proportions and he is not particularly manoeuvrable. We took possession of our basically brand new Jeep Wrangler one evening, ready for an early start the next morning. Our route the next day took us along a route called Last Dollar Rd. It is a proper county road rather than a true off-road trail, but you wouldn’t know it to drive it. It had only opened the day previously due to the snow, and was challenging enough for us to be fun without being too scary. We didn’t want to break the Jeep or ourselves. It was about 20 miles long and cut off a big corner of the road that went into the swanky mountain town of Telluride.
This was place that Nick has always wanted to visit ever since he read an article in 2013 about a bar that was serving a Bloody Mary garnished with a chicken slider on a stick. It was called the ‘Smack Mary’ That sounded just about his idea of cocktail heaven. Unfortunately the bar has since shut and the intoxicating possibility of a boozy drink married so closely with a delicious snack had disappeared. But the dream of visiting Telluride never died. So we bashed across what felt like the the top of the world in our jolly green jeep, far away from any other humans, happy as pigs in the proverbial.
We had overestimated our journey time somewhat, and arrived in Telluride by 10.15am. Perchance our picnic sandwiches would not be needed. This is a very well-healed little town with some seriously priced real estate and a collection of celebrity residents; Tom Cruise, Oprah and Kevin Costner are amongst those who have homes here. The liberal side of this part of Colorado was plainly visible in the rainbow flags lining the main street in support of Gay Pride month. A gondola from town takes you up a small mountain and a modest ski-field. This is used by tourists, hikers and mountain bikers in summer and is free at this time of year. We went up, and came down again, had a coffee, mooched up and down the main street and the shops, had a lovely lunch, then drove home via the road. Once back in Ouray we had some time left before we had to return the Jeep so we set off south to see what all the fuss was about regarding the mountain pass road. After about 5 miles of driving up into the pass Nick was a blithering mess as his vertigo had kicked in with a vengeance. It really was quite scary. Your sensible head says “You will not randomly and without explanation suddenly steer to the right and drive off this cliff to a fiery death of twisted metal”, but the possibility of that happening is only 3 feet away. So whether your brain plays games with you or not, whether you freak out or not, it is rare to do something in life where the dangers are so obviously apparent. We turned around in a lay-by and headed back, comforted slightly by now being on the inside track of the road. We returned the car in one piece and walked home.
That evening Ouray hosted a free ‘music in the park’ event, right in town. A weekly event in June. There were a couple of bands, a beer tent, numerous food trucks and it was really well attended with hundreds of people turning up . Every one brought chairs or picnic rugs and there were masses of dogs too. It was a great evening, although when the sun went behind the hill it got very cold. The warmest folk were either the ones dancing, or the ones who had been sensible and brought warm blankets. We were deploying neither strategy to stave off hypothermia, and headed home after a few pints and having shared a brisket sandwich and the most delightful punnet of barbecued prime rib chunks smothered in warm blue cheese sauce, topped with blue cheese sprinkles. MMMMMmmmmm.
All in all, we loved our stay here and it was a place we could have stayed much longer. It had a small town feel, but felt that it was part of something bigger. It was beautiful, buzzing without feeling busy and full of people who loved to call it home. I wonder how much the real estate is here…..?