June 19, 2018 - North to Vail

It was going to start out a cool morning but warm up into the 70’s by 10.  We were going to the Great Sand Dunes National Park then with a late checkout we would go back to the hotel to change into our riding gear.  We only covered 35 miles and had few people out.  The road in route went through pretty barren countryside.  We could see them off in the distance and they grew and grew, huge sand dunes.

The ranger suggested that we do our walk quickly because the sand heats up to 150 degrees by noon. We walked maybe 1/2 a mile and turned around to head back.  We made it half way there but with late checkout we had to get packed.  We also were tired from walking in the deep sand.  Could easily spend 3 hours there.

Bike loaded and we were headed to Buena Vista an old mining town.   The road was a 2 lane easy ride with some gusting winds.  We stopped every 60 miles to keep up with water due to the dry air and heat arriving around 2:00.we wandered the streets of the old town, very cute and ate dinner in a local restaurant.  Once again my lovely wife pointed out that I was the oldest person in town.  The wind had been very tiring so it was off to bed early but before that I had to do laundry.  In order to keep the packing down due to limited space, I carried 4 days of cloths and enough pods to do 8 loads.  Most motels have laundromats so it’s easy

In the morning we were off to Vail via Leadville and Rt 24, the Top of the Rockies Byway.