Part 5: Riding Through Autumn Splendor in the Rocky Mountains—Leadville, Independence Pass at 12,100 feet

By Frosty Wooldridge

Part 5:  Tennessee Pass, Leadville mining town, Unsinkable Molly Brown

What’s it like sleeping at 11,000 feet on the edge of a cliff?  Answer: slept like a rock!  As the sun rose over the eastern mountains, the light show effervesced from the high summits to the valley below us.  From dark shadows to golden aspen leaves fluttering to the ground.

(Frosty, Robert Case and Robert Montgomery standing by the sign for Tennessee Pass) Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

It’s an amazing sight to watch the sun rise over the mountains. It slips over the Continental Divide.  Once over the peaks, it sprays light downward into the deep canyons.  To watch it, you enjoy a spectacular light show from many different angles.  As you look into the sun, it backlights the changing leaves to make them resemble golden light bulbs.  As you watch the sun hit them to the west, the leaves reflect the sun to blazing gold—to give a different, deeper hue.

As I sat on the cliff watching the magic and eating my oatmeal, I felt a certain “awe” transform my spirit.  Every cell in my body felt alive and energized.  Call it “high vibrational frequency” or communing with the universe: it dances in my mind, heart and spirit.   I bet Robert and Robert both enjoyed their own feelings as to the tranquility and splendor of our moment on that cliff.

We pushed the bikes up the hill to reach Route 24 again.  After a spectacular four miles of high-speed descent, I stopped to take a shot of my mates cycling over the huge arced green bridge across the Eagle River and the town of Red Cliff.

“Wow, what a beautiful bridge,” said Robert Case.

“Yes, it reminds me of a European-style from Roman times,” said Robert Montgomery.

“I’ll take a good video of you guys riding over it,” I said as I set up the camera and tripod.

(Shot of a lake in the high country with the sun coming up.)  Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

They swept down and over the bridge in perfect poetry of bicycle motion.  Quickly, the road leveled out along the Eagle River with aspen groves glowing on the high mountain ramparts above.  From our lofty perch, we dropped into the valley to find ourselves deep in aspen groves now seeing the trees glowing gold 60 feet above us along the highway.

We passed beaver dams along the way.  Several herons jumped up and flew away.

We stopped at Camp Hale that trained 10^th Mountain Division WWII soldiers to fight in the snowbound Italian Alps.  Over 6,000 men once lived and worked along the valley. Today, only cement bunkers remain.

From Camp Hale, we spent 1.5 hours climbing to the top of Tennessee Pass at 10,424 feet.  We reached it at 1:00 p.m.. We snapped a few pictures and talked with other cyclists.  We coasted back down to 10,000 feet and pedaled across a ten-mile strip of flat valley.

On our right, Mt. Elbert jutted into the sky at 14,455 feet, the tallest mountain in Colorado and among the 54 14ers in the state.  We rolled along the entire chain of mountains until we reached the highest city in America: Leadville at 10,152 feet. 

Its 1880 brick buildings lined Main Street.  They housed hotels, saloons, bordellos, shops, liveries, barbershops and the Tabor Opera House.  The legendary actress “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” made her name in this old mining town. 

(Robert and Robert about to enjoy breakfast on the outdoor patio before the climb to Independence Pass.)  Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

Miners drilled, shoveled and extracted millions of dollars of ore out of the area mines.  Today, hardy people remain, but most folks don’t care to live at the freezing levels experienced at 10,000 feet. Bitter cold and snowy winters remain for tough mountain people.  In the summers in order to generate money and business, Leadville features the “Leadville 100” bicycle and running race.  I’ve participated four times in the bicycle race of 4—12,000 foot passes and 1—13,000 foot pass on single track for 100 miles. It’s 12 hours of mind-bending pedaling up hills, gasping for oxygen and pounding your body into mush.  When you cross the finish line, it feels like you conquered the world.

After eating lunch, we rolled along the Arkansas River to Route 82 cut-off to Aspen.  We found a spot near Twin Lakes to camp. As the sun dropped in the sky, it lit up the 100 acre-sized aspen groves on the mountain flanks on the opposite side of the lake.

“Can you guys believe the beauty across the lake?” I asked.

“Man, it’s blazing like a wildfire,” said Robert Case.

“Sure makes me hungry,” said Robert Montgomery.

Next morning, a bright sun rolled across the lake and into the high country.  We packed our gear and headed into Twin Lakes Village where we enjoyed oatmeal breakfast garnished with bananas, raisins and apples.  As we sat at the outdoor table, fifty college cyclists raced by us on their way up Independence Pass at 12,100 feet.  Some of them stopped to marvel at all our gear.

“Let’s get ourselves up that pass,” said Robert Montgomery.

We mounted the bikes with golden leaves lining the roadway.  At that moment, we pedaled up the valley near the river.  With each passing mile, we continued our climb out of the woods and into mountain tundra.  Soon, the aspen gave way to the lodge pole pines.  We passed a few beaver ponds on the meandering stream alongside the road. 

(Golden aspen turning the mountains to colorful landscapes.)  Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

Ahead, one “mother of a climb” with steep grades.  But as we climbed, the beauty became more dramatic.  The valley dropped away and we soared to ever-greater altitude. 

Along the way, I snapped tons of photos and videotape of the ride.  Two hours later, I reached the top to a big surprise. 

Sixty college kids jumped, screamed and cheered my last moments of the climb. They formed a “victory” tunnel with invitations for me to ride through it.  I looked behind me to check if they were cheering for one of their comrades.  None seen!  I pedaled toward the tunnel amidst cheers and screaming.  I got “high fived” as I pedaled through the tunnel.   At the end, I turned back into the parking lot where two co-eds offered me a beer.

“Gees, this is the most amazing moment I have ever experienced on a mountain pass,” I said to them.

“We’ll cheer your buddies, too,” they said.

Sure enough, ten minutes later, my mates made their way through the “victory” tunnel to the cheers of all the college kids.

(Robert Montgomery riding into the “victory tunnel” created by the cheering college kids at the top of Independence Pass at 12,100 feet.) Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

“Did you organize this?” Robert Montgomery said.

“Not me,” I said. “They did the same thing for me. Pretty cool!”

We took pictures, strolled around and pulled on more layers to keep warm in the cool wind at the top of Independence Pass at 12,100 feet.

Ahead of us, 18 miles of coasting through paradise.

(Frosty, Robert and Robert at the top of 12,100 foot Independence Pass.)  Photography by Frosty Wooldridge 

###

(Condor about ready to coast down from Independence Pass for 18 miles into Aspen, Colorado.) Photography by Frosty Wooldridge

##