The 1994 Bump Mountain Bike Trek: Hope Pass.
Here's a belated report on our quasiannual weird find-another-pass ride, which for 1994 involved three stalwart souls (Well, actually TWO stalwarts, and one instigator) and went from point A to point B with no clear idea of what was in between. We now know.
The ride was on September 26, the day after the Leadville 100, and followed part of the course run by Kevin Kern (among other notables) so for SOME of the time we felt pretty confident about where we were going. Jim Murdock came over to our cabin near Leadville Saturday night, for a pre-ride bash, but found some trumped-up excuse to depart (escape?) the same evening. That left Bob Bump, Patience Russell, and myself, who started at about 9-ish, Sunday, at the trailhead on Lost Canyon Road, above Granite, at about 10,400 feet of elevation. Between cowering beneath trees, waiting for cornsnow storms to stop, we rode old jeep roads up to the top of East Quail Mountain, about nine miles, gaining 3000 feet, which was (near the top) downright tough going. There, we got a fantastic view of the adjacent fourteeners Oxford, Belford, and Missouri, immediately to the south. The vertical scale is pretty amazing, and the more so for having climed all three of those (by foot) the month before. We also got a pretty good view of our route, or the lack thereof, from East Quail over to West Quail. A bloke who was up there in a Jeep looked at where we were aiming, and expressed the opinion that we were doomed, that no one could ride that. We laughed confidently, and after a 500 foot portage (that's 250 vertical and 250 horizontal) we got to a sort of broad, level, rocky traverse between the two peaks, which some might consider rideable in part. For anyone who enjoys technical riding over loose scree at 13,000+ feet, it's a great place to play. Not all of us were so inclined, so we traipsed blithely across the granite and pegmatite for about a mile to Point Desperation (not listed on any map, but you'll know when you get there) and from there Bob led the way up to a little miner's cabin on West Quail, where we again hid from the cold and the storm, ate oranges, and reminisced on previous rides and how much harder and colder and nastier they were. There seems to be a point of minimum motivation in these rides, in which the acknowledged procedure is to say, "Gee, this is NOTHING compared to LAST YEAR!" and then cackle manaically, so, cackling, we proceeded west towards the saddle between Quail and Hope, where we hoped we'd find a somewhat more blatant trail.
After a nice long shoe-packing bit of screeing, we did indeed find our goal, complete with hikers reminiscing fondly over the Leadville 100. (They were still incoherent, I figure.) So, with our spirits buoyed, we blazed down this NIFTY little twisty turny singletrack, along the Colorado Trail. Patience demonstrated why front suspension is cool, and we got to do some interesting trail-finding in areas where the path is conterminous with the stream (something to keep in mind when wondering what time of year to try this ride) until the trail emptied out onto some old Jeep roads just to the north of Twin Lakes. We had a good time crossing Lake Creek, by the installment plan, and emerged wet, tired, and grinning foolishly onto Colorado 82, where, through rain and snow, we pursued our path back towards Leadville. Bob of course had to go catch a few errant miles of Lake County pavement, and my brother David, whose intention to go along on this ride was thwarted by his attempt to appendectomize himself with the saddle of his bike the day before, on our attempt to ride up Mount Elbert, was nice enough to drive out and rescue us from increasing rain.
Total ride distance from Granite to Twin Lakes would be about 22 miles, with about 3000 feet of elevation gain; roads range from passenger car/pavement to nonexistent, including some most excellent singletrack. I think it took us about seven hours, including a couple inclement weather breaks, and I'd advise bringing a LOT of clothing. Tough, thoroughly satisfying ride for people who want to get WAY off the beaten path.