Stuff it!

After waking up to a big change in the weather, Amy & I rolled down to Durango on Wednesday morning. We were greeted by the late fall/early winter snowfall on a typically warm ground. This combo produces that nasty wet slush...blecch. As we rolled up Turkey Creek Canyon on 285, the plows were busy doing their thing making the roads safe, but, I dunno...didn't seem like they were "getting it all"...the road was still kinda covered. Once we hit Gunsmoke, it was 100% clear and BONE freaking dry. Good news for the cyclists!? Kinda...We rolled into to Durango about 3:30 and had a great time just relaxing with the family, before eating a mellow-ish supper of Salsbury Seitan, mashed root veggies, some salad, a stellar loaf of Asiago/Parmesean Bread from Bread, and polished it down with some red. My riding schedule while down in Durango was simple...3-4 on Thursday before the meal, some intervals & lifting on Friday, nice ride with Amy on Sat, then return sunday and do what I can, pending travel plans. When we walked in, we were greeted by a cheerful mom, along with my dad holding his very own turkey...my nephew got huge over the 2 weeks since we last saw him. The trip turned out to be great for a little nephew bonding....got to feed him and hang! The smells of the holiday were just started to creep into the house, and they were delectible! You knew this was going to be a great holiday celebration...


We woke up Thursday morning to Tarheel blue skies, and a nice warm temp of about 48 degrees. Climbing out of my parents neighborhood of Rockwood is rather tricky as the roads are all about 9-11% in grade (STEEP!), winding, and with blind curves. IT's a short climb, albeit a tough one. After the 3 minutes of the Col de Rockwood, we were sweating and soaked. It warmed up considerably since we'd left the house. We started to shed some layers and then began the climb up up up. We stayed on 550 all the way to the summit of Coal Bank Pass. This was one of the harder passes I've done, but, as usual, the mountain goat just scuttled on up. My future wife can climb!I hope that's on the Y chromasome for our child, because the flat power gene will come on my X. Anyway, The climb was pretty unrelenting and never once let up. It's about 4.5 miles total, but way harder than something like Lookout of the same distance. I can usualy climb lookout lesiurly between 30-40 minutes. Coal Bank took us 54 minutes at that same pace. The views are amazing, but as we ascended, I was more focused on the fact that the temperature was dropping rather quickly, and that I was underdressed and obviously pretty wet from the climb up. We hit the top and snacked on a signature pumpkin bar of Amy's, the whole time dreading the descent back down. As we started down, I could feel myself getting hypothermia. My body was literally trembling and shaking, causing my front wheel to begin the wobble. I had to stop otherwise I was going to eat pavement. My teeth were chattering and my legs began to cramp up from trying to create some heat (aka "shivering thermogenesis"). I stopped 3 more times, while Amy was doing fine, as she was well prepared. Once we hit Cascade Creek things warmed up, but, the headwind started. We knew there was about 5 more mils of downhill, with a small bit of uphill here and there...nothing that would really cause us any slowdown, but still, we gave each other words of encouragement the whole way down to stay warm and focused. Eventually we hit the turnoff for Hwy 250, descended into Rockwood, and ran inside and got warm! ALl in all it was a 3.5 hr day with only 28 miles covered.

When we got home, mom was finishing up the turkey, tofurky, and all the trimmings! Riley, Wendy, and Jason were all camping out in the living room scoping the new crazy TV system my dad put in his house, and I have to say....I want one!

Dinner was stellar, not only because of the food, but, more importantly, because of the people. They are the greatest and most important things to me in the world! We ate around 3:30 which is super early for my family, but it was awesome because that left TONS of time to clean up nice and slow, and change into furry pants to prep for dessert!



Friday we woke up to 12 degrees and 6 inches of snow on the ground. Obvious I wasn't going to ride, so we hit the gym instead We then hung out downtown hitting up the normal shops (Mountain Bike Specialists, Gardenswartz, etc.), and, then of course had the inevitable leftovers for dinner. Man were they good!!

Saturday it was a bit warmer, hitting only about 28 degrees, but a good portion of Hwy 250 (the valley portion) was defrosted, so Amy & I decided to get out and ride for what we could. The wind kicked up and it was pretty tough, because again, the wind chill dropped about 10 degrees. We were able to get 1.5 hrs in, and, I got my intervals. We went home and warmed up again by the fire, preparing for our dinner at the Hamilton Chophouse. Holy smokes...best fish I've ever had. I got an onion-crusted Halibut steak that was probably a pound, and it had this lemon beurre blanc sauce (lemon butter) that was out of this world.

Sunday we woke up at the crack to get back, hitting Durango Joe's on the way out of town. I've noticed most indie coffee shops don't really serve much "coffee" these days, as opposed to Americano's, or, coffees with espresso, or some sort of variation that includes espresso. THey were delicious nonetheless and kept me going all the way from Durango to Guanella Pass outside of Crow Hill! That's about 295 miles or so. Then, I needed a break. We hit Bongo Billy's in Buena earlier in the trip for some lunch, and it was unreal. Tuna salad with some crazy smoke albacore or something. Sheeite!

When we got home, it was too late to really get gussied up and head outdoors, so, I hit the trainer while Amy graciously volunteered to go to the grocery store. I cooked us up some delish vittles that night and for the week...Veggie Chili w/ Avocado Salsa, some chickpeas & spinach, and a tofu/veggie stir fry....gonna be a great week!