Today we rode from informal campground 8km before the top of Canero Pass, Colorado, US to a cabin at the base of the climb to Indiana Pass, Colorado, US. Sunny weather with little clouds. Road conditions included paved roads, gravel roads, and jeep tracks. Highlights of the day include climbing Canero Pass, the jeep tracks after La Garita, and the cabin were we will stay for the night.

Riding statistics: on Thursday, September 1, 2022, day 32 on the route, it took 11:17h (06:27h moving time), between 07:23 and 18:40, to cover 95 km (59 miles), including 991 m (3251 ft) elevation gain, with an average speed of 15 km/h (9 mph), while reaching a maximum speed of 47 km/h (29 mph). During this ride the average temperature was 27 °C (81 °F) with a minimum of 3 °C (37 °F) and a maximum of 49 °C (120 °F).

Totals: So far, it took 9 days, 9 hours, 13 minutes, and 15 seconds of cycling time to cover 3313 km (2059 miles), including 38708 m (127001 ft) elevation gain, with an average speed of 14.9 km/h (9.3 mph).

Another morning with the alarms set to 6am. It was not needed; I was awake way before the alarm. Somehow, I did not sleep well. I woke up a couple of times, and from 4am it started to get colder. At 6am it was still cold. The sun was already shining, but mountains blocked it for us. During the night, there has been some rain, so our tents are wet again. We got everything packed quickly so we could start moving. The guy from the RV was also outside, and after a short chat we moved on. He told us there would be a high chance that we would see bears at the top.

We continued with the remaining 8km (5 miles) to the top of Carneo Pass. At this early hour we already saw different persons, all seem to be preparing for the start of the hunting season. The winding road brought us into sunlight every now-and-then, which we could appreciate. ‘Unfortunately’, we had no bear sightings on Carneo Pass either. At the other side of the pass, we could enjoy a long downhill through a beautiful scenery: meadows, forests, canyons, etc.

Once we completed the downhill, we went onto paved, and back onto gravel. We had the option to go to La Garita, which was slightly off course, but had a convenience store annex restaurant. No doubts, we went for it to get ourselves a second breakfast. In the convenience store section, we bought ice-creams and another gallon of water. After enjoying our meal, we continued our ride towards Del Norte.

While we were making good progress, I checked my bike computer at a certain moment and realized that we had missed a turn. Around 1.5km (1 mile) back we should have taken a side road. We turned around to get back on track. The surface of the side road contained much more loose sand. It quickly became apparent that it would take more time compared to the main gravel road we were on before the turnoff. The loose sand turned into jeep tracks, and we had amazing fun riding it. It was a winding road, and sometimes with very deep tracks. So deep, that it were more-or-less two deep single-tracks next to each other. It was a flowy and winding downhill for a large part. Each of us got on one of the tracks and we flew through the scenery, it was an incredible ride. This fun lasted about 6km (3.5 miles), until we arrived at Del Norte’s airport, which we had to ride around to get into town.

When we arrived at the town of Del Norte we first checked for a bike shop. I would have liked to replace my back tire. It was not bad, but for my state of mind replacing it would feel better. Yesterday we’d already seen that one bike shop had closed its location in Del Norte. But here was another one according to Google maps. Unfortunately, when arriving at the location it wasn’t there anymore. Someone told us that it also had closed a couple of months back. Well, no new tire for me.

Next stop was the supermarket. We bought food for the next days. Although it was not a small supermarket, it was still difficult to find some proper food. After doing groceries we rode through town and stopped at a big gas station with store. We bought drinks and snacks and sat down to decide how to proceed. At first, we had the idea to continue cycling to an informal campground halfway the climb of Indiana Pass. It turned out that was still quite a distance with a lot of elevation gain. On our map we also saw an option for renting a cabin, at the base of the climb to Indiana Pass. Anna called to check for availability and pricing, and got Eric the owner, on the phone. The cabin was available, and it costed $30 for the both of us. He provided us with directions, and we could put the money on the table when we left. Sounds good, now we only needed to bike 16km to the cabin. Now we had some time to spare and decided to stay a bit longer at the gas station. There was air-conditioning, drinks & snacks, and we were sitting comfortably.

Eventually we could put ourselves to get back in the saddle and start our ride to the cabin. The cabin would be 400 meters (1312 ft) after the pavement ends. We had to look around a bit, and a kind neighbor told us that it was the next driveway. When entering the property, we saw all kind of arts, made from recycled objects. When continuing towards the cabins (there were two) it got even more crazy. Not only the art, but everything seemed to be made from recycled objects. The person who created this (Kevin Off), must be an absolute creative mind. The cabin was full of sporting equipment (skiing, sledging, climbing, hiking), guns, games, a football table, heads and skulls of animals, and a thousand more things. Everything in and around the cabin was made by the man himself.

We both picked a place in the cabin to sleep, Anna in a room upstairs, I in a kind of closed patio / garden room at the ground floor with an incredible view outside. At one hand we were very comfortable, at the other hand, it did feel a bit strange.

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