Ouray

Ouray (pronounced 'your-ray’) is a neat town tucked into a fairly narrow canyon formed by the Uncompahgre River.  

The drive on Saturday from Taylor Canyon to Gunnison and then on Hwy 50 to Montrose is a really pretty drive.  Taylor Canyon towers over us while we parallel the roaring Taylor River.  Signs indicate that a lot of wildlife can be seen along this road but our old eyes never spotted anything more than birds and chipmunks. Highway 50 follows the Gunnison River that forms into the Blue Mesa Lake which is a long, snaking blue waterway among mostly scrub and dry high mesa hills.  As we near the Black Canyon area the topography changes into more forests and greener valleys that are already showing signs of the fall change to gold.  When we turn south from Montrose the San Juan Mountains take over the horizon and grow taller and more rugged the closer we get to Ouray.

Today we had a leisurely morning until we decided to ride our bikes into town.  The gravel road we take is just a short hop from the KOA campground but one has to climb one of the steepest hills ever know to mankind!  It is that steep! And that long!  

I may have exaggerated a bit, but both John and I ended up walking our bikes up that hill.  Once at the top, the ride wasn’t too bad as it skirted the west side of the canyon and gave us some great views of the surrounding mountain peaks.  We also spotted what appears to have been an old mine on the eastern face of the canyon wall.  The Uncompahgre River is very yellowish brown due to the leaks at mines in the mountains. It may be a long while before the river can run clear again.  After lunch we strolled the main street a bit and then rode back down in less than half the time it took us to ride up hill!  

Today is when all the Jeepers are to arrive for our week long adventure in the mountains.  Most of the group drive a Born Free RV, but not all as our fearless leader, Mike, invites all who might enjoy our caravan. Speaking of our fearless leader, Mike was unable to come west this year due to his wife’s health issues.  We didn’t know he wasn’t coming so started getting pretty worried when our meeting time rolled around and he wasn’t there.  But at 5 minutes after 5 our new fearless leader, Rick Z. aka Zoro, made his appearance and got us all organized according to Mike’s directions.  John will now be leading the group through the mountains along with Rick.  It may be a REALLY interesting week!