Over the Continental Divide

At Montrose, we had some McDonald's, went to the library, and stocked up in WalMart, and headed off to Cimarron. We asked a few people in Montrose what kind of services are available in Cimarron, and the vast majority of people didn't know what it was.

So we climbed up one more hill and found our destination. There was a post office and a gas station, and that's about it. The owners of the gas station let us camp by a creek for free.



The next morning, we left Cimarron, and passed by some pretty cool canyons.



After the climbing a hill, we went biking along the perimeter of Blue Mesa Lake. It's a pretty enormous lake (I'd say about 10 miles to bike from one end to the other), with a pretty blue hue during the day.



We eventually made it to Gunnison, which is quite the bike-friendly town. There were three bike shops, and one of them, Rock and Roll Sports, had a neat statue of a biker. We ate at Pizza Hut, where each of us ate 1/2 of a medium pizza (we're burning lots of calories, so I just tell myself that I earned it).



From Gunnison, the ride to Sargent (at the base of Monarch Mountain) was about 30 miles. It seemed like it would never come, but at least we got some nice views as the sun started setting.

We camped at Sargents, got a good night of rest, and prepared to climb over Monarch Pass.

Monarch Pass is a 2,700 foot climb over 10 miles. It wasn't the worst hill that we climbed over, but it felt good to finally reach the Continental Divide. Everything from now on (generally) should be downhill.

We're making good time. For the first four weeks we were climbing to reach the top of the Rockies, now for the next four we'll be going downhill towards home!

At the top of the mountain there was a Porsche car show? They all had numbers from 1 to 900ish, so we assume that they belonged to some exclusive Porsche club. It was quite a sight to see.

After coasting downhill for 30 miles, we made it to the Valley View Hot Springs. It's a great hot springs at the base of the mountains, and the warm water felt great on our sore muscles.

Here's a view of the setting sun near our campsite at Valley View. It's a clothing-optional resort, so we're not going to post any more pictures for privacy issues.

Today, we're going to the Sand Dunes National Park. Apparently, sand from somewhere gets blown over the Rockies and gets deposited between mountains. They're the largest sand dunes in North America, and it's bizarre to sit on sand dunes when the mountains are right next to you.

But I gotta pack up and get ready for the day ahead of us.