Day 12 - Steamboat Springs to Denver, CO

Today was our last day in the mountains. The morning started out cool with the temps in the low 30s (there was significant frost on the bike cover). Today was a short mileage day at only around 220 miles so we slept in a bit and rolled out of the parking lot around 10am. We headed south out of Steamboat Springs on scenic CO131 until we reached I70.

In addition to the great scenery, we also saw a rancher corralling his sheep into his trailer.

And a scantily clad mannequin near Yampa, CO (oh my!).

We traveled east on I70 into the Vail were we had lunch at Westside Café. The temps had risen to the 60s so we shed most of our heated gear.

After lunch, we continued east on I70, the snow-capped mountains grew closer.

We rode over the Vail pass which tops out at an elevation of 10,603 feet. The temperatures had dropped 15 degrees to 45F from where we had lunch in Vail.

We now had mountains in front of us and behind us! Being surrounded by mountains is a very good thing.

During lunch we checked the temps and road conditions on the Loveland pass. Reports indicated dry roads with temps in the mid-40s so we elected to detour off of I70 onto US6 and ride through the Loveland pass.

US6 first took us over Dillon Dam. The town of Dillon sits on the “downstream” side of the dam several hundred feet down while the Dillon Reservoir sits on the other side. There is a dramatic drop from the bridge dam into the town.

We then started our ascent of Loveland pass. The scenery quickly turned more winter-like.

During our ascent, we saw two mountain sheep standing on the edge of the road. As we approached, they were visibly afraid of us and backed away from the road down the mountain slope. We were lucky to catch a photo of them as they are very elusive.

The Loveland pass is part of the continental divide and tops out at 11,990 making it the highest point of our travels this trip. You know you are really high in elevation when you can see across the mountain peaks instead of up them!

There was plenty of snow that had fallen from the storms 2 days ago and there were several locations where the road was wet from melting snow...one of the reasons we wanted to make sure the surface temps were above freezing…icy roads and motorcycles are a bad combination.

We arrived in the Denver area around 3:30pm and after getting checked into our room, Michele contacted her "sister" friend, Lynn, and they made plans on meeting up for dinner. We had a great dinner with Lynn at Steuben’s in downtown Denver. Michele and Lynn caught up on their lives and talked a little shop. It’s always great spending time with Lynn as she has such wonderfully positive energy.

Tomorrow we leave the beautiful scenery of Colorado and begin our journey back east to home.