The bikes and bruises are worth the beauty

Maybe we were a little ambitious heading up Castle Creek Road toward the ghost town of Ashcroft. Or maybe just up for another adventure. But we definitely did not realize it was going to be such a test to our physical conditioning, or as far as it was.

The bike ride started with energy and smiles. We were headed up a gradual but bearable incline, among beautiful trees, streams, and mountain views. But our positivity faded at the mile 4 marker when our legs had not gotten any relief yet. And then the 70 year old Lance Armstrong look-alikes zoomed passed us with their professional bikes and gear. "Good to see you out here, ladies" one said without a loss of breath as he passed me on the left. "It is the perfect ski training!" I guess we have some more work to do...

It was a supposed 11 miles of straight up on a heavy mountain bike until we would reach Ashcroft. Thank goodness it was beautiful. Otherwise, I would have been legitimately miserable.  The scenery distracted me from the bruises developing on my butt (time to buy padded shorts), the burning in my thighs, and the strain on my neck from leaning so far forward and looking up at where I was going. It was the steepest longest ride of my life. When we took breaks, all we wanted to do was collapse. So we did. On gravel.

Colorado getting the best of us...

But we are still smiling!

 

 

 

 

 

Hours into our venture, I wondered where the hell Ashcroft was. We kept seeing the men who past us speed down the hill on the other side of the road. They all gave us thumbs up. How encouraging. Apparently it is a real ghost town because we blew right through it without even realizing it. We continued far past our intended destination and ended up being in a Jeep commercial where the road ended.

Ok not really, but we did see the mud artwork on the "off-roading" vehicles and chatted with the crew, who also had no idea where Ashcroft was. I guess the tavern on the side of the road that we past miles before is considered "town." So, our planned 11 mile uphill ride turned into 15. At least the great thing about uphill rides is its down hill all the way home. The glorious 30 minutes of speeding down the hill filled us with angst to walk in our front doors.

I am not a biker, nor a cyclist. I am also not completely acclimated to 8,000 feet elevation yet either. But I did set a new personal record, and it feels great. It was worth all the pain, even if it means a day in bed to recover.