Riding the CO9 - US6 Loop

Father's Day dawned cool and sunny here in Colorado.  After a sumptuous breakfast and Father's Day greetings from my sons, I left the house set for a daylong ride, my now traditional Father's Day present along with a couple of cool books I'll bring up in later articles.

Note: This posting is also located on examiner.com. So what's the difference? I get paid per # of hits on that site, so if you feel like helping my fuel budget, read the article there instead: LINK, Thanks! 

I rode out of the Denver Metro area on US285 and stayed on this fast moving two lane highway (for the most part) until I left the city's traffic behind and enjoyed the cool ride out to Kenosha Pass (10,000 ft).  Cruising right past the sign at the pass, I was soon plunging down to the valley below (Colorado Basin) where the towns of Jefferson, South Park and Fairplay reside.  The winds really picked up at this point and had to go into my "dances with the winds" mode to stay on the road!  I climbed out of the valley through Red Hill Pass (9,993 ft) and I was glad to see the turnoff for Colorado State Rd 9 or CO9 at Fairplay, which I took north towards Breckenridge which was 23 miles away.

Climbing steadily from Fairplay I arrived at the small town of Alma (highest incorporated town in US) where I stopped to don my jacket liner and heavier gloves, I soon had to stop for this shot just shy of Hoosier Pass:

Just to the south of Hoosier Pass

Continuing on, I saw a turnoff for Park County Rd 4 which looked interesting.  I got on this dirt road and slowly rode along until I came to Montgomery Reservoir.  It's a nice little reservoir where I found families fishing and enjoying the view:

At Montgomery Reservoir on Park County Rd 4

The small dam which created Montgomery Reservoir

One last look at the view at Montgomery Reservoir

Getting back on CO9, I transited through Hoosier Pass (11,542 ft), negotiated several tight hairpin turns down to this point where I usually stop to pose the motorcycle I am riding.

I continued on CO9 until reached the town of Breckenridge (9600 ft), one of the several major ski resorts in the state.  The mountainsides looked nice and green, with the ski runs covered in grass.  I wandered through Breckenridge, foregoing the temptation to go down Boreas Pass Rd.  I got to Frisco (9075 ft)  and near the vicinity of the I-70 super slab when I spotted a promising road.  This road is Swan Mountain Road and it takes one up into the hillsides near Frisco and Dillon (9111 ft).

This very nice mountain road takes you around Dillon Reservoir and soon you come upon a magnificent sight of cliff-side houses overlooking Dillon Bay:

Pretty nice bay huh?  Specially since it's at above 9000 ft above sea level!

Dillon Bay

I took Swan Road until it junctions with US6, the plan at this point to go see Loveland Pass (11,90 ft) on the way home.  As I left the Dillon area, the sight of these mountain peaks caused me to pause and try and capture the majestic peaks I saw:

Continuing on US6, I soon came upon another of Colorado's major ski resorts, this one was Arapahoe Basin(13,050 ft) which is located close by to Keystone Ski Resort  (9173 ft) and the town thereof.

Continuing to climb on US6, I stopped once again for this last show of A-Basin, the nickname for Arapahoe Basin Ski Resort.

Eastbound US6 is a nicely climbing, gently curving road with mountain scenery aplenty.  However, it's got no guard rails so it pays to keep a close eye on the road as you catch glimpses of the nearby mountain peaks.

Some of the majestic mountain peaks visible from US6

Near the summit of Loveland Pass on US6

I finally got to the summit of Loveland Pass, there was open space near the Forest Service sign and so I stopped Brigitta nearby and got this shot.

Loveland Pass

I rode down a bit from the summit and turned Brigitta around and parked her at the same spot (more or less) where I had parked Natasha the last time I was up at Loveland Pass this past winter:

January 20, looking towards Loveland Pass

June 20, looking towards Loveland Pass

Views from just below the summit of Loveland Pass, a couple of minutes before one gets to the treeline

I made my way down from Loveland Pass, and endured the usual frenzied Sunday afternoon rush from the mountains until I got to Georgetown where I exited to get fuel.  From Georgetown, I managed to stay on frontage roads past Idaho Springs

I stayed on US40 which is a winding two lane road all the way to Genesee Park where I once again jumped on the I-70 slab for a couple of miles till I could get on the turnoff/death merge exit for US6/US40.  From this point on I basically had the two lane road all to myself until I got back to the Denver Metro area's vicinity.

I used CO93 to cut south towards the town of Morrison and from there it was Morrison Rd to Kipling Blvd to US285 once again.  Traffic in the city was not bad for a Sunday afternoon and soon I was taking the I-25 exit south to I-225 and from there, Parker Rd to my home neighborhoods.

I covered 259 miles today, including 4 mountain passes, in about 8 hrs of saddle time, a pretty good day's worth of riding.  I managed to beat the incoming weather home and Brigitta performed great.  What more could I ask from a Father's Day ride?

Columns and other sights near Buckley AFB

An overcast day today for us here in the Denver Metro area, but with temperatures in the low 40s, it was Brigitta's turn for a little ride near Buckley Air Force Base.

Brigitta felt a little weird when I first rode out of my neighborhood.  She felt like I was riding on a flat rear tire to tell the truth!  I stopped at a nearby side street, got out my small air pressure gauge and the tire pressure was at 34 P.S.I. just as I had checked it minutes before during my pre-ride safety checks.  Weird.

I headed on back home, used the pressure gauge on my air compressor and again, it was 34 P.S.I!  I pushed down on her tail end and she seemed a bit "spongy".  I asked my wife to take a look as I sat on Brigitta and she also thought she was a bit "springy".  A few minutes examining the shock and the motorcycle in general rendered nothing untoward.  Writing it off as not enough riding on her, I rode off again in search of sights.

I headed north on Gun Club Rd from Quincy Rd, thinking to take pictures of some carved wooden animals near the Aurora Gun Club.  Once I got there though, a fence line prevented near enough positioning of Brigitta with the said animals in the background so I bagged on the idea.

Continuing north on Gun Club Rd however, I spotted the high overpass ramp that is part of the E-470 Tollway arcing over the I-70 Super Slab.  Thinking it would make for a nice "artsy" background, I headed in that direction, found a frontage road which gave me this angle on the overpass:

 

I like to picture objects which "lead" the eye, there's probably a name for such an effect but I don't know it

Continuing on along the frontage road, I saw off in a field an oversized small letter h next to a housing development sign for horizonuptown.com.  I made to get closer to the oversized letter to use it as a background.  The trail leading in its general direction was packed dirt and I had good traction.  Things changed quite a lot when I got off the trail and was on the field itself.  It was that squishy, slick Colorado clay/mud combination which I'd found before to my dismay!  

I gave up on trying to get closer to the h, instead slowly and unsteadily made my way via a wide u-turn back to the dirt trail and firmer traction.  I could feel the rear wheel wanting to fishtail on me, not good.  Fortunately, I made it with minimal dog paddling back to the trail without dropping Brigitta

 

 Here's Brigitta back on the dirt trail and as close as I was going to get today to that letter h!

 

 Colorado has some amazingly slick and glue-like mud that is mostly clay, nasty stuff

 Now to the title of the posting, the sights above are to the east and north of nearby Buckley Air Force Base.  The base's several large golf ball shaped housings for satellite downlink dishes are visible for miles around and are a local landmark of sorts.

I wandered near the golf balls and spotted what looked like the Air Force's newest transport plane, the C-17, parked real close to the border of the base, near where Gun Club Rd becomes Sixth Avenue.  It was quite the imposing sight and I maneuvered Brigitta onto the San Simeon Catholic Cemetery's parking lanes for this shot:

 

 The view from San Simeon Catholic Cemetery

The grayness of the skies played a bit of havoc with the light meter on my camera and so all of the above pictures were tweaked somewhat using the tools at picnik.com.  As I played with said tools on the last picture, I realized a bit of cropping and some extreme tweaking of color saturation, temperature and light exposure and contrast could render a photo that evoked perhaps a bit of mystery, perhaps the atmosphere of the airplane's presence at some exotic location with weird shaped buildings nearby.....what do you think?

The forecasted snow probabilities for the next two days have gone from 20-30% to 30-40%, we shall see how much snow we get.  Glad I got Brigitta out today, she ran fine after that initial weirdness, which I am sure now is because I am not riding her often enough during the winter!

Riding through 2010's first full week

Note: This posting is also located on examiner.com. So what's the difference?  I get paid per # of hits on that site, so if you feel like helping my fuel budget, read the article there instead:  LINK  Thanks!

It's Friday of this new year's first full week. I thought I'd show you the local riding conditions and how they changed as we got the latest "artic blast" from our neighbors to the North.

Here's Tuesday afternoon's riding conditions, highs in the low 40s and it had been over a week since Brigitta, my 1987 R80, had gotten to go out and play. So I took her out on the county roads to the east of my home neighborhoods for some exercise. This is important to work all the mechanisms and "burn off" any water condensate that might have built up within the gearbox. You have to go, according to my indie mechanic, at least 50 miles to heat up the engine enough to boil off the water within the gearbox.

A lonely county road somewhere on the Eastern Plains

Then there was some snow starting that Tuesday night and into Wednesday, we really only got perhaps 2 inches of the stuff so no big deal.

Thursday, I had lunch with a guy I used to work with about three contracts ago, had a good time and he gave me the scoop on two locations where my resume is being considered.

Near Arapahoe Road, looking west to the mountains

Finally, there's today, Friday. I went out on Natasha for some errands down in the Denver Tech Center area and on the way back home detoured through the Cherry Creek Reservoir Park for pictures of the snow.

Whale Tail Row at the Cherry Creek Reservoir Park

The view from the Model Airplane Field at the Cherry Creek Reservoir

One of several picnic/overlook areas at the reservoir

Cherry Creek Dam's Control Tower, I slipped and fell on my butt while moving around the rear of Natasha, no injuries since I was ATGATT but a good reminder to me of how slippery the snow was, in spite of how sure-footed Natasha was riding

I saw some car/truck tire tracks off one parking lot, followed them, looks like they were made by park service vehicles as they maintained the facilities in the area. Still, it allowed me this shot of Natasha amongst the trees of a picnic area.

Got home around 12:30 PM, had some lunch and spent the rest of the afternoon helping my youngest son build a snow fort. Great fun and not too hard on my back. I even got calls from a recruiter for a possible interview with Comcast. Wish me luck on these three leads....

Update: Fort pictures added:

Riding under overcast skies

Although temperatures were in the 40s most of the day, I spent the morning, while it was sunny, doing work. I was done by 1:00 PM and headed out west under now overcast skies on Belleview avenue out of the Denver Tech Center towards Cornerstone Park. It's just west of the intersection of Broadway and Belleview. The sign says Progress Park but the actual entrance sign says Cornerstone Park, weird.

You head in on a dirt parking lot towards the western edge of the park where you can see the Front Range mountains in the distance:

Looking west from Cornerstone Park's parking lot

The parking lot surface was muddy with a few icy spots that were melting. No real problem navigating that stuff.

I headed back towards the Denver Tech Center and posed Brigitta at another favorite spot for pictures. The entrace to Westlands Park:

The archway entrance to Westlands Park

I headed out of the Tech Center by way of the Cherry Creek Dam Road. Today the traffic was very light and no one was behind me so I was able to stop midway along the top of the dam and back Brigitta onto the service entrance to the control tower.

It's a narrow little roadway which leads to a concrete tower in which I imagine the Army Corps of Engineers houses the mechanisms to control the water level in the reservoir. The skies made it all feel very gray today, so I thought I'd post this in B&W, following the recent lead of fellow bloggers:

Yeah, that's a thin layer of ice on top of the water in the reservoir, it'll be gone soon

One thing that had also changed was the wind conditions. The winds had been really strong in the morning as I headed towards the work site. I tested out the tip from Ken Bingenheimer to deal with strong winds. You force yourself you take the pressure exerted by the hand away from the wind. In other words, if the wind is hitting you from the right, relax the pressure on the left hand grip or even hover your hand above the grip. I had my doubts but after trying it, it really helps!

Of course, if the wind is hitting you strongly from the left, you relax or hover the right hand over the right grip.

Pretty sedate riding I must admit. I believe the weather forecast is calling for temperatures in the 40s and 50s this week so Brigitta will be my steed. Not to mention, I am waiting on a replacement clutch lever perch since I need the Italian one, not the Russian one to go with my new clutch cable. It should be here on Wednesday.

On a repair note. My kudos go out once again to my riding mentor John, aka Sanoke. His "temporary" welding job not only did the job but has lasted way past the point I think either one of us expected it to. Thanks again John! I removed it this afternoon from Natasha in preparation for welding by professionals tomorrow.

The Vintage Aero Flying Museum

I've read somewhere on the Net, how motorcycling is as close someone get to flying without actually leaving the ground. Today, I visited a museum where vintage flying machines are repaired and flown as they are at the same time preserved for future generations.

Sure, I rode today but only to Andrey's house since the snow covered streets both at my neighborhood and Andrey's caused me to wimp out and instead ride with him in his car to go see the Vintage Aero Flying Museum. Andrey was going there to look over some airframes that the museum needs him to re-cover with fabric to make them flyable again.

A little food porn for the yearrounders who frequent this blog, made by my loving wife

Not exactly great riding conditions for two wheels but doable if you go slow

Conditions at Andrey's neighborhood were similar to the above. So my inner voice told me to leave Brigitta, my 1987 R80 Airhead at Andrey's house and ride in his Mini Cooper to the airfield. Yeah, I know, me in a car.....who knew? I didn't want to ride Natasha, though she was rideable, due to the "cobbled together" way her new clutch cable is installed. The new clutch lever assembly will be here Wednesday I am told.

Turns out, my trepidations were unfounded for the most part. It was dry and clear roads almost all the way to the air park near Hudson, CO. About an hour's ride away from Andrey's house. I kept kicking myself as we approached since road conditions were so good. As we got near the airport, the roads turned to dirt with snow on them but still, they were doable!


Once inside the airpark we drove over to the hangars where the museum works on repairing/restoring/building vintage aircraft. The hangar with the white truck outside is where I shot the following pictures. I also met Andy, the owner of the museum, Matt and Stuart who were working on the aircraft. Friendly bunch of guys. I trailed along behind Andrey and Andy as Andy explained to Andrey what he needed form him in terms of work. The work being to re-cover the bare wooden frames below with fabric and paint them. A rare skill apparently, which is why Andrey was asked to be there today.

Even the above snow was highly doable, just go slow

Here's Andrey with one of the aircraft he worked on in terms of the fabric covering of the airframe, he does good work eh?

I believe these are the airframes that Andrey will be covering with fabric over the next few weeks if not months

Another shot of the aircraft Andrey worked on, pretty isn't it?

In an adjacent hangar, I met Mike and DJ who were building an aircraft from manufactured parts. I really liked this Navy aircraft from "back in the day".


Andy then took us in his car below to the hangars which house the display aircraft and all the uniforms and memorabilia associated with these vintage aircraft which flew in World War One.

Aircraft for display and yet flyable. These were in the movie "The Aviator"

If you think the aircraft are beautiful, you must also see the museum's militaria, photos and uniform displays. They were a treasure trove to a history major like me and Andy gave us the dollar tour of the displays. Some incredible stuff there, if you're a fan or student of WWI or WWII Air Combat militaria, this place is a must see! I'll definitely be taking the family here to see this great preservation of aviation history.

Andy, the owner, is carrying on his father's work in maintaining and expanding this vintage aircraft museum. It's non-profit and I believe they depend on donations from visitors and charities such as the Gates foundation. I'll definitely be coming back to this museum, they need all they help they can get in fixing up their aircraft and I might learn some new skills along the way. Andrey agreed to do the work of covering the aircraft and he'll be spending quite a few Saturdays over the next year I think working at the museum.

You can get more information about the Vintage Aero Flying Museum here: LINK Unlike other displays of vintage aircraft, every single aircraft there is flown on occasion. What a cool place, even though its not motorcycling-oriented, it's well worth a visit or three.

Once we got back to Andrey's place. I said my goodbyes and rode out of the mostly cleared up streets to my usual spot for snowy day pictures of Brigitta:


Lots of nice scenery in the vicinity of Hudson, CO. Barr Lake, a state wildlife preserve looks promising for a future ride and I saw some picturesque farm buildings that might yield some nice pictures. All the more reason to go up there again soon.

Paying my respects at Fort Logan

I recently had the sad honor of attending the burial ceremony of Staff Sergeant Brian J. Joiner, US Air Force. He was the son of a friend of mine from when I worked as a contractor at UAL and died last month while on active duty, at Nellis AFB in Nevada.

Today being Veteran's Day, it's become a tradition for me to visit Fort Logan and give my respect to the fields of warriors who lay there after having given their all for our country. It was a bit more poignant for me this time as this time I "knew" one of the residents .

The sun was just beginning to shine its rays into the dull red skies as I made my way to Section 44 of the national cemetery. Brian's grave site is #417 and I found it easily enough in the twilight. I was fortunate enough to be in time to capture this sunrise on this Veteran's Day:

The new arrivals section

click on each picture for a larger version

The sunrise over a nearby small pond

The government being what it is, it takes several weeks I was told to get the marble headstone made which will serve as his permanent grave marker. I was saddened to see how many of these new grave markers there were, awaiting their headstones. I know we're at war and that young men and women die in war; I just wonder if most people will remember these young warriors and the ones that preceded them in wars past.

Brian was flanked on both sides by Army men: To his right lays SP4 William R. Jackson while to his right lays SGT Harold J. Winkler. I believe Brian is in good company with his fellow new residents of Fort Logan.

Section 44 is located on a small hillside overlooking the football field/track of the J.K. Mullen High School which is located on the other side of the cemetery's fence line. The thought came to mind that it was a good location for these young men, both for them to be able to "see" future games and for those playing in that nearby sports field to remember the ones who gave their lives.

Finishing my visit with Brian and his fellow warriors, I left and rode slowly through the cemetery, gazing as always at the seemingly endless rows of grave stones...neatly symmetrical and and laid out with precision. I stopped by the main flagpole, surrounded already by many U.S. Flags in preparation for today's ceremonies.


It was time for me to depart Fort Logan and the company of our country's fallen warriors; but there was time for one more picture at the main gate:


I hope you are flying the National Colors at your home today, be assured they are flying at mine!

My thanks to all Veterans, past and present, for their service.

Note: Here's a link to help you find the gravesite of someone you might know in our nation's military cemeteries. LINK