gunnison, co
#1
06-13-2005, 10:27 PM
Join Date: Apr 2005
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#3
06-27-2005, 10:54 PM
#4
06-28-2005, 11:26 PM
gunnison, co
Without a doubt some of the best riding in Colorado in in the Taylor Park basin north of Gunnison. Go to the store up there at the lake and they have the maps you will need. During the summer over half the people staying at the cabins they rent are riding the trails and will give you all the pointers you need. Been riding there since 1987, going back this year again and never get enough of it.
#5
07-02-2005, 05:38 PM
gunnison, co
I just returned from Taylor Park 2 days ago. I stayed at the cabins at the Trading Post and rode for 7 days putting around 700 miles on the machines. Those miles are not high speed gravel road running either. A lot of the time you are in 4 low crawling over rocks and climbing steep hills. We rode an average of around 100 miles a day at an average of abought 10-15 mph. I wrote a full trip report o anouther site that I frequent more than this one. It is almost entirely Colorado people and people like me that ride there more than in there home state. Check it out and ask any questions you may have over there. The people will be more than happy to help you decide where to ride. ATVQUADSQUAD.COM is the site and Rocky Mountain Rock Hoppers is the fourum you want to check out. For great pics of the area check out the events and ride reports section. Look for anything dealing with Taylor Park. For a lot of great pics also look for any post buy ProspectorTim and look in his gallery for lots and lots of great pics.
Here is a copy of my ride report over on the other site.
Well it was anouther fun trip out to Taylor. We arived late Wednesday evening the 22nd. and left Thursday morning the 29th. I forget how many miles we put on but it was around 650-700. The first day we went threw Union Park to the south and took 758 to Lotus Creek Campgrounds then back up the blacktop to the cabins to get checked in. Then we went back to Union Park to the east down 764 to the south side of Tincup and then up to the top of Cumberland pass wich was just opened maybuy a day or two before. Then on down the back side of Cumberland on the unmarked trails that drop straight off the back side tword Pitkin. Then down to 766 and around into Pitkin. We stopped at the store on main street for icecream then on up to the Alpine Tunnel. Where the tunnel was is still baried in snow. Then we came back down and went up Hanckock Pass. Tomichi is still snowed under. We stopped at the top and dident try going down the back because it was getting late. We found a side trail that paraleled the Alpine Tunnel road and went down that. I dident see any numbers. The trail was under watter for well over a mile. That made it fun. It went a long ways down and then apeared to stop. We found a spot where others had crossed the grassy medow where the trail ended and we walked it first. We found that abough 200 feet across the grassy area it conected with a trail on the other side. We decided to try crossing following the other tracks. My cousin went first and hit what looked to be abought a foot deep mud hole. He is used to riding sled where if it is uestoinable you back up and take a run at it. I was just getting to him when I saw him punch it and I couldent yell fast or loud enough to stop him. He took a running start at a decivingly deep watter hole. All I could do was laugh. He launched off into a spectacular splash down and stopped dead in his tracks. The watter and mud where up to his seat and he stopped rite where he landed. We took a few pics and told him that wasent a wise idea. He just said thats what he does on his sled if it is questionable but obviosly it dont work the same on ATVs. We winched him out and found a better rout around the watter hole and went on down the trail. We wound up popping out in Middle Quartz Campground. It was close to dark now. We high tailed it back to the cabbins down the road and called it a nite.
Day 2 we tryed to go over Taylor Pass. Tryed being the oprative word. We made it all the way up to the top and got stopped buy a LARGE snow drift at the top. It will be some time before that gets opened up. I jokingly told one of my crazier buddies he should winch up threw the snow and pull us all up. He said "good idea, I have an extra 100 feet of cable with me and a short strap." Well his 100 foot of cable was abought 50 foot shorter thatn he thought and abought 100 foot short of making it threw the snow when combined with his winch cable. So we accepted defete and turned back down the mountain. We then stopped of at Italian Creek and ran up that hopeing to get to American Flag mountain. We made it up to where there is an old mine and log cabin and hit DEEP snow. It will be a long time before that is passable. Defeted again. Back down to the cabins for the nite. Day three we went out the south side of Union park and to the left down 427 to the end. Then back up to 752.3C and then back up to 752 and then back up to Cross Creek Traol to the top of Cross Mountain. That was just open and passable. There was a fair amount of snow on top but not on the trail. We had a little fun playing in it. I tryed to get a call out from up there but I couldent get it to go out. My cousin did get his to work though and got a call out to his dad. On the way back down we stopped at the old mine and took a few pics standing on the dump cart rail bridge thingey. On the way back down one of the guyes hit a cattle gaurd to fast and it was sticking up out of the ground 4-6 inches and it pinched his sidewall between the rim and the gaurd and cut his sidewall. He limped it back to the Cabins and he was done for the day. While sitting at the cabins I noticed my wifes Grizzly that I was riding had a ripped CV boot. So I was done as well.
We jacked around a bit decide I would ride double with my wife and only the guy with the riped side wall had to stay at the cabins. We just went out and rode all the side trails off of 764 to waste the rest of the afternoon away.
Day four I got up and went to Gunnison with the guy that needed a tire. We were disapointed to find out that the Yamaha dealer was closed on Mondays but found Gunnison Motor Sports rite next dore was open at 9 so we wasted an hour driving around town and when they opened went in and found out they dont stock ATV tires. They did however have a new Artic Cat on hand with the same tires that where on his Sportman. So he convinsed them to sell the tires off the new machine. He only needed one but bought them both so they would be worn the same. Then he dident have a CV boot for the Grizzly but he did have one for a Polaris. It was way to big but it was my only option. Luckily I always bring all my tools on trips like this so I dismanteled the rear of the Grizzly in the trailer and put the Polaris boot on and clamped it down as best as posible. Then I wraped the ends in Black tape and Duct tape to help seal it up. We where ready to go buy noon but the rest of the group wasent back yet. I had no idea where they where so we just left them a note that we where going to run up Texas Creek and back. When we got back at 2:30 they where sitting there waiting for us. They said they needed to go abck to Gunnison to get some more parts. My cousins Outlander had fried the battery. He had to be towed back to the cabins from the top of Cottonwood Pass. Thats why they wernet back at noon like planed. So we turned around and headed back to Gunnison. For a battery. He called ahead and Fritz At Gunnison Mottor sports said he had one on hand for around $95. We stopped at Waly World because we needed a few other things and then checked and they had one for it on hand for $89 so he got that. We hauled but abck up to the Cabins and got that installed and charged and where back on the trail buy 5:00 or shortly after. We made it abought 10 miles and he stopped me and said his battery was boiling again so we shut it off and towed it half way back down Cottonwood Pass again. I never even thought to check the voltage output but the voltage regulator must have died and been overcharging the battery. We then called it a nite and parked the Outlander for the rest of the trip.
Day five My wife and I rode double to let my cousin ride the Grizzly we borowed for her to ride. We set out to see if we could make it up the back side of American Flag mountain from the Spring Creek side. We did a lot of jacking around and hit a lot of the side trails between the cabins and Spring creek. We got up to 759.1E, the trail that starts off the end of the Spring creek Resivor road late in the afternoon. We continued on up to where the Radio Repeater is and a couple of people climbed to the top of that hill and then came back down. We then took the low trail around and did not go down the trail marked caution. A few of us wanted to but some chickened out and wanted to take the low rout. So we went the low rout and hit a lot of snow. We busted threw all the snow drifts we came to but one. Rite after the high trail and the low trail met back up again and just after the small watter fall thing we hit an impassable snow drift that was mayby 75 feet long and a few feet deep. It wasent that it was to deep but way to much of an angle. We would have slid rite off the hill. It was obviouse we had already made it farther than anyone else this year so we pulled out the scoop shuvels that we brought along for just such an emergancie and started digging. We whernt going to let a little snow drift stop 6 midwesterners from having a good time. When we got threw that we continued on to find anouther imassable drift but we could go around the top of the drift and not get far off the trail. Then rite at the vally that you start climbing up the last clinb out of there was one last drift we had to go around. It was rite where the old cabin was and the little pile of mine tillings. After that it was clear sailing to the top. So I think it is fair to say we where the first ones up American Flag mountain this year. We had to do a lot of shoveling but it was worht it. The veiws from up there are awsome. So there a bunch of Iowans oppened Flag mountain for ya this year. You just have to come up from the Spring Creek Resivor side for a while.
It will be a long time before Italian Creek is open past that mine the snow is REAL DEEP and the hole north side of that hill is burried. It was around 6pm before we made it to the top and it had been clouding up for a while. We could see a storm rolling in and new we where going to get wet so those of us that dident already have our rain suilts on put them on and we started down. We dident make it 1/2 mile before we started getting wet and sleeted on. When we made it back down past where we doug a path threw the snow we opened them up as much as possible and got down as fast as posible. We made it back down to the cabins in short order. The rain was COLD and miserable. One of the guys with us said from the top of Flag Mountain to the cabins was 45 minutes. It seemed like hours in the COLD COLD rain. We then went to the Gold Nuget for supper.
We ran into a guy from Illinois that was out with his family and doing a little riding and other stuff. He said he had been coming there for 10 years with his Jeep and sold it and bought a 2 person Artic Cat. He knew the Saint Elmo area desent so day 6 he tagged along and we went up threw Union Park up 764 to Tincup and then up over Cumberland Pass and down the trails on the back side to Pitkin where we topped off the machines and headed up threw Middle Quartz Campground. I dont know what the trail numbers are because my map don go over that far. We crossed the river out the back side of the campgrounds and headed up the trail a ways till we got to the crossing we had found the previouse time up Hankock. We crossed the wet area and headed up the river trail to Hankock Pass. He had been told that the trail was closed just up from the old townsite and was impassable. We dident know because the first day we tuned around at the pass and went back. He said he would be suprised if we made it to St Elmo. Sure enough we started hitting snow going down the norht side. We managed to bust threw it going down knowing that it would be a pain getting back up threw. We where about half way down to the old townsite frome the Pass and hit an impassable drift. It was LONG and DEEP. Tehy guy that was riding with us asked if it was passable and I said It wil be shortly as I grabbed at my scoop shovel. He just laughed and said he loved riding with us because we werent going to take no for and answer. After abought an hour of all 6 of us taking turns with the 3 shovels(2 of wich where colapsable camping shovels) we made it threw. We had dug a trench threw the snow abought as deep as the 4wheeler was tall and about 50+ feet long. NOW the trail was open. We took a bunch of pics as we all came threw to remember our craiziness. Now thats 2 trails us Iowans opened for ya this year. Again we where the first to make it from Taylor to St Elmo over Hanckock Pass. We went down into town ad had an icecream cone and fed the chipmunks and wached all the Jetsons (Humming birds) flying around. I jokingly said they sound like the Jetsons to a freind that had never heard them before in a previouse conversaition.
We then went up Mount Antero. We made it a long ways up but ran into snow at just short of 13000 feet. There wasent much but no one wanted to do any more digging so we sat there for a bit and decided we had better be headed back to the cabins because we had to get loaded up to leave the next morning brite and early. We got back up and over Hanckoc pass buy around 6:30 and my wife wanted to eat at the Gold Nugget the last nite so we stayed on the road and busted but back to the cabins. We cruised down the road abought 45 miles per hour and got to the cabins a little before 7:30 just in time to make it to the Nugget before they closed.
We had got spread out on the trail because of the dust and we had one single lady with us that wasent the britest bulb in the box. She was in 3rd out of 6 machines when we left Hanckock Pass. We sat around for a while waighting for her. We had to decide quick wether to go serching for her or go for supper and hope she was just out site seeing on her own. We decided to skip supper and go looking. On group ran up threw Union park and down 764 and anouther went back down the road to tincup and we met up at the south side of Tincup where 764 pops out. No one had seen her. Then we got a little woried. I had speculated that she probobly took a left turn at the end of Alpine Tunnel road and wound up back in Pitkin. But we decided that if she had she should have figured out we wernet there and headed back down the road to the Cabins. So I turned around and went back to the cabins to get the truck while 2 guys went back over Cumberland to Pikin and 1 went back threw Union Park one last time. When I got back to the Cabins there she was. I abought blew a nut when she started explaining what she had done. And tried to play it off as if she had gotten lost and magicly found her way back. Now we had 2 guys on the back side of Cumberland Pass looking for her and it was all but dark out. I took the truck and headed back up twards Cumberland Pass and waited for a long time for the 2 guys to come back over. Finaly abought dark I went back to the Cabins knowing they would stop looking after dark. I was talking to the lady trying to decipher wat she had done and how she got past us with out us meeting her. She claimed to do just as I had speculated and whent back to Pitkin and realized she was alone so she turned around and headed back to the cabins. I asked how she got threw us with out us finding her. She said she went threw Union Park buy accident. I said there is no way to get into Union Park buy accident. The road goes straight back to the cabins. She said she dident know how but she ended up in the back side of Union park down buy the Ranchers Cabin. Then I realy got mad. There is absolutly no posible way to get ther accidentaly. It took all my mite not to start yelling at her. I asked exactly how she got there and she said she took a wrong turn. I said there is no way to take a wrong turn because teh entrance to Union Park is directly across the road from the cabins. I asked if she came in from 764 on the south side of Tincup. She said no she went threw Tincup but seen a sighn for Union Park and decided to go there thinking the cabins where on the back side. Now the crap is starting to get deep. She had comented that she wanted to get pictures of the Elk that come out at dusk in the west side of Union Park and this was the last opertunity to do so. She still swears up and down that she was just lost but we ahd been threw Union Park a dozen times over the corse of the week and she knew exactly where she was. You can see the Cabins from the entrance to Union Park. Now its getting late and the 2 guys wherent back from Pitkin yet and it had been 2 hours from when we seperated on the back side of Tincup to go seching for her. Now I was real mad. Abought 10:30 we decided to take the truck over to Pitkin and see if they had run out of fuel. We already had the trailer hooked back on and half loaded and the back of the truck half loaded. So we unhooked the trailer and unloaded the back of the truck beause it was a real bumpy ride over Cumberland in a 3/4 ton truck. Just as we are getting to the end of the driveway they came pulling up and we turned around. Now its 11pm and we had to finish loading take showers and get some sleep so we can leave at 5:30am. Needless to say she is not comeing along next year. Come to find out she was sitting on the back side of the Ranchers Cabin watching people drive around Union Park looking for her.
Day 7 We got up at 5:30am and drove 15 hours home.
Brandon
01 DS 650 (His)
04 Grizzly, 54" Eagle snow plow (Hers)
04.5 2500 Dodge Silver QC SB 4x4 325/600 Cummins six speed (HIS HIS HIS)
Here is a copy of my ride report over on the other site.
Well it was anouther fun trip out to Taylor. We arived late Wednesday evening the 22nd. and left Thursday morning the 29th. I forget how many miles we put on but it was around 650-700. The first day we went threw Union Park to the south and took 758 to Lotus Creek Campgrounds then back up the blacktop to the cabins to get checked in. Then we went back to Union Park to the east down 764 to the south side of Tincup and then up to the top of Cumberland pass wich was just opened maybuy a day or two before. Then on down the back side of Cumberland on the unmarked trails that drop straight off the back side tword Pitkin. Then down to 766 and around into Pitkin. We stopped at the store on main street for icecream then on up to the Alpine Tunnel. Where the tunnel was is still baried in snow. Then we came back down and went up Hanckock Pass. Tomichi is still snowed under. We stopped at the top and dident try going down the back because it was getting late. We found a side trail that paraleled the Alpine Tunnel road and went down that. I dident see any numbers. The trail was under watter for well over a mile. That made it fun. It went a long ways down and then apeared to stop. We found a spot where others had crossed the grassy medow where the trail ended and we walked it first. We found that abough 200 feet across the grassy area it conected with a trail on the other side. We decided to try crossing following the other tracks. My cousin went first and hit what looked to be abought a foot deep mud hole. He is used to riding sled where if it is uestoinable you back up and take a run at it. I was just getting to him when I saw him punch it and I couldent yell fast or loud enough to stop him. He took a running start at a decivingly deep watter hole. All I could do was laugh. He launched off into a spectacular splash down and stopped dead in his tracks. The watter and mud where up to his seat and he stopped rite where he landed. We took a few pics and told him that wasent a wise idea. He just said thats what he does on his sled if it is questionable but obviosly it dont work the same on ATVs. We winched him out and found a better rout around the watter hole and went on down the trail. We wound up popping out in Middle Quartz Campground. It was close to dark now. We high tailed it back to the cabbins down the road and called it a nite.
Day 2 we tryed to go over Taylor Pass. Tryed being the oprative word. We made it all the way up to the top and got stopped buy a LARGE snow drift at the top. It will be some time before that gets opened up. I jokingly told one of my crazier buddies he should winch up threw the snow and pull us all up. He said "good idea, I have an extra 100 feet of cable with me and a short strap." Well his 100 foot of cable was abought 50 foot shorter thatn he thought and abought 100 foot short of making it threw the snow when combined with his winch cable. So we accepted defete and turned back down the mountain. We then stopped of at Italian Creek and ran up that hopeing to get to American Flag mountain. We made it up to where there is an old mine and log cabin and hit DEEP snow. It will be a long time before that is passable. Defeted again. Back down to the cabins for the nite. Day three we went out the south side of Union park and to the left down 427 to the end. Then back up to 752.3C and then back up to 752 and then back up to Cross Creek Traol to the top of Cross Mountain. That was just open and passable. There was a fair amount of snow on top but not on the trail. We had a little fun playing in it. I tryed to get a call out from up there but I couldent get it to go out. My cousin did get his to work though and got a call out to his dad. On the way back down we stopped at the old mine and took a few pics standing on the dump cart rail bridge thingey. On the way back down one of the guyes hit a cattle gaurd to fast and it was sticking up out of the ground 4-6 inches and it pinched his sidewall between the rim and the gaurd and cut his sidewall. He limped it back to the Cabins and he was done for the day. While sitting at the cabins I noticed my wifes Grizzly that I was riding had a ripped CV boot. So I was done as well.
We jacked around a bit decide I would ride double with my wife and only the guy with the riped side wall had to stay at the cabins. We just went out and rode all the side trails off of 764 to waste the rest of the afternoon away.
Day four I got up and went to Gunnison with the guy that needed a tire. We were disapointed to find out that the Yamaha dealer was closed on Mondays but found Gunnison Motor Sports rite next dore was open at 9 so we wasted an hour driving around town and when they opened went in and found out they dont stock ATV tires. They did however have a new Artic Cat on hand with the same tires that where on his Sportman. So he convinsed them to sell the tires off the new machine. He only needed one but bought them both so they would be worn the same. Then he dident have a CV boot for the Grizzly but he did have one for a Polaris. It was way to big but it was my only option. Luckily I always bring all my tools on trips like this so I dismanteled the rear of the Grizzly in the trailer and put the Polaris boot on and clamped it down as best as posible. Then I wraped the ends in Black tape and Duct tape to help seal it up. We where ready to go buy noon but the rest of the group wasent back yet. I had no idea where they where so we just left them a note that we where going to run up Texas Creek and back. When we got back at 2:30 they where sitting there waiting for us. They said they needed to go abck to Gunnison to get some more parts. My cousins Outlander had fried the battery. He had to be towed back to the cabins from the top of Cottonwood Pass. Thats why they wernet back at noon like planed. So we turned around and headed back to Gunnison. For a battery. He called ahead and Fritz At Gunnison Mottor sports said he had one on hand for around $95. We stopped at Waly World because we needed a few other things and then checked and they had one for it on hand for $89 so he got that. We hauled but abck up to the Cabins and got that installed and charged and where back on the trail buy 5:00 or shortly after. We made it abought 10 miles and he stopped me and said his battery was boiling again so we shut it off and towed it half way back down Cottonwood Pass again. I never even thought to check the voltage output but the voltage regulator must have died and been overcharging the battery. We then called it a nite and parked the Outlander for the rest of the trip.
Day five My wife and I rode double to let my cousin ride the Grizzly we borowed for her to ride. We set out to see if we could make it up the back side of American Flag mountain from the Spring Creek side. We did a lot of jacking around and hit a lot of the side trails between the cabins and Spring creek. We got up to 759.1E, the trail that starts off the end of the Spring creek Resivor road late in the afternoon. We continued on up to where the Radio Repeater is and a couple of people climbed to the top of that hill and then came back down. We then took the low trail around and did not go down the trail marked caution. A few of us wanted to but some chickened out and wanted to take the low rout. So we went the low rout and hit a lot of snow. We busted threw all the snow drifts we came to but one. Rite after the high trail and the low trail met back up again and just after the small watter fall thing we hit an impassable snow drift that was mayby 75 feet long and a few feet deep. It wasent that it was to deep but way to much of an angle. We would have slid rite off the hill. It was obviouse we had already made it farther than anyone else this year so we pulled out the scoop shuvels that we brought along for just such an emergancie and started digging. We whernt going to let a little snow drift stop 6 midwesterners from having a good time. When we got threw that we continued on to find anouther imassable drift but we could go around the top of the drift and not get far off the trail. Then rite at the vally that you start climbing up the last clinb out of there was one last drift we had to go around. It was rite where the old cabin was and the little pile of mine tillings. After that it was clear sailing to the top. So I think it is fair to say we where the first ones up American Flag mountain this year. We had to do a lot of shoveling but it was worht it. The veiws from up there are awsome. So there a bunch of Iowans oppened Flag mountain for ya this year. You just have to come up from the Spring Creek Resivor side for a while.
It will be a long time before Italian Creek is open past that mine the snow is REAL DEEP and the hole north side of that hill is burried. It was around 6pm before we made it to the top and it had been clouding up for a while. We could see a storm rolling in and new we where going to get wet so those of us that dident already have our rain suilts on put them on and we started down. We dident make it 1/2 mile before we started getting wet and sleeted on. When we made it back down past where we doug a path threw the snow we opened them up as much as possible and got down as fast as posible. We made it back down to the cabins in short order. The rain was COLD and miserable. One of the guys with us said from the top of Flag Mountain to the cabins was 45 minutes. It seemed like hours in the COLD COLD rain. We then went to the Gold Nuget for supper.
We ran into a guy from Illinois that was out with his family and doing a little riding and other stuff. He said he had been coming there for 10 years with his Jeep and sold it and bought a 2 person Artic Cat. He knew the Saint Elmo area desent so day 6 he tagged along and we went up threw Union Park up 764 to Tincup and then up over Cumberland Pass and down the trails on the back side to Pitkin where we topped off the machines and headed up threw Middle Quartz Campground. I dont know what the trail numbers are because my map don go over that far. We crossed the river out the back side of the campgrounds and headed up the trail a ways till we got to the crossing we had found the previouse time up Hankock. We crossed the wet area and headed up the river trail to Hankock Pass. He had been told that the trail was closed just up from the old townsite and was impassable. We dident know because the first day we tuned around at the pass and went back. He said he would be suprised if we made it to St Elmo. Sure enough we started hitting snow going down the norht side. We managed to bust threw it going down knowing that it would be a pain getting back up threw. We where about half way down to the old townsite frome the Pass and hit an impassable drift. It was LONG and DEEP. Tehy guy that was riding with us asked if it was passable and I said It wil be shortly as I grabbed at my scoop shovel. He just laughed and said he loved riding with us because we werent going to take no for and answer. After abought an hour of all 6 of us taking turns with the 3 shovels(2 of wich where colapsable camping shovels) we made it threw. We had dug a trench threw the snow abought as deep as the 4wheeler was tall and about 50+ feet long. NOW the trail was open. We took a bunch of pics as we all came threw to remember our craiziness. Now thats 2 trails us Iowans opened for ya this year. Again we where the first to make it from Taylor to St Elmo over Hanckock Pass. We went down into town ad had an icecream cone and fed the chipmunks and wached all the Jetsons (Humming birds) flying around. I jokingly said they sound like the Jetsons to a freind that had never heard them before in a previouse conversaition.
We then went up Mount Antero. We made it a long ways up but ran into snow at just short of 13000 feet. There wasent much but no one wanted to do any more digging so we sat there for a bit and decided we had better be headed back to the cabins because we had to get loaded up to leave the next morning brite and early. We got back up and over Hanckoc pass buy around 6:30 and my wife wanted to eat at the Gold Nugget the last nite so we stayed on the road and busted but back to the cabins. We cruised down the road abought 45 miles per hour and got to the cabins a little before 7:30 just in time to make it to the Nugget before they closed.
We had got spread out on the trail because of the dust and we had one single lady with us that wasent the britest bulb in the box. She was in 3rd out of 6 machines when we left Hanckock Pass. We sat around for a while waighting for her. We had to decide quick wether to go serching for her or go for supper and hope she was just out site seeing on her own. We decided to skip supper and go looking. On group ran up threw Union park and down 764 and anouther went back down the road to tincup and we met up at the south side of Tincup where 764 pops out. No one had seen her. Then we got a little woried. I had speculated that she probobly took a left turn at the end of Alpine Tunnel road and wound up back in Pitkin. But we decided that if she had she should have figured out we wernet there and headed back down the road to the Cabins. So I turned around and went back to the cabins to get the truck while 2 guys went back over Cumberland to Pikin and 1 went back threw Union Park one last time. When I got back to the Cabins there she was. I abought blew a nut when she started explaining what she had done. And tried to play it off as if she had gotten lost and magicly found her way back. Now we had 2 guys on the back side of Cumberland Pass looking for her and it was all but dark out. I took the truck and headed back up twards Cumberland Pass and waited for a long time for the 2 guys to come back over. Finaly abought dark I went back to the Cabins knowing they would stop looking after dark. I was talking to the lady trying to decipher wat she had done and how she got past us with out us meeting her. She claimed to do just as I had speculated and whent back to Pitkin and realized she was alone so she turned around and headed back to the cabins. I asked how she got threw us with out us finding her. She said she went threw Union Park buy accident. I said there is no way to get into Union Park buy accident. The road goes straight back to the cabins. She said she dident know how but she ended up in the back side of Union park down buy the Ranchers Cabin. Then I realy got mad. There is absolutly no posible way to get ther accidentaly. It took all my mite not to start yelling at her. I asked exactly how she got there and she said she took a wrong turn. I said there is no way to take a wrong turn because teh entrance to Union Park is directly across the road from the cabins. I asked if she came in from 764 on the south side of Tincup. She said no she went threw Tincup but seen a sighn for Union Park and decided to go there thinking the cabins where on the back side. Now the crap is starting to get deep. She had comented that she wanted to get pictures of the Elk that come out at dusk in the west side of Union Park and this was the last opertunity to do so. She still swears up and down that she was just lost but we ahd been threw Union Park a dozen times over the corse of the week and she knew exactly where she was. You can see the Cabins from the entrance to Union Park. Now its getting late and the 2 guys wherent back from Pitkin yet and it had been 2 hours from when we seperated on the back side of Tincup to go seching for her. Now I was real mad. Abought 10:30 we decided to take the truck over to Pitkin and see if they had run out of fuel. We already had the trailer hooked back on and half loaded and the back of the truck half loaded. So we unhooked the trailer and unloaded the back of the truck beause it was a real bumpy ride over Cumberland in a 3/4 ton truck. Just as we are getting to the end of the driveway they came pulling up and we turned around. Now its 11pm and we had to finish loading take showers and get some sleep so we can leave at 5:30am. Needless to say she is not comeing along next year. Come to find out she was sitting on the back side of the Ranchers Cabin watching people drive around Union Park looking for her.
Day 7 We got up at 5:30am and drove 15 hours home.
Brandon
01 DS 650 (His)
04 Grizzly, 54" Eagle snow plow (Hers)
04.5 2500 Dodge Silver QC SB 4x4 325/600 Cummins six speed (HIS HIS HIS)
