Well, actually I was not intending to give a day by day account of the trip however sometimes thats how good it is...the day after the fabulous Monday at Royal Gorge we did what they call the Golden…

Well, actually I was not intending to give a day by day account of the trip however sometimes thats how good it is...the day after the fabulous Monday at Royal Gorge we did what they call the Golden Belt drive...most of it recomended 4x4...this route was from Cannon City through 3 different routes to Victor and Cripple Creek, this is where they mined Silver....before I was born that is...now why 4x4 you ask...ok so imagine a railtrack winding up the side of a mountain, um well perhaps several mountains, if they could not run the track over rock then they blasted a tunnel through it, so rail your asking? Well no not quite now the track has been removed and gravel left, this is what we drove on just the width of a rail track at well over 10.000 ft .....the sceanery just totally awesome, the majestic magnificent Mountains seemingly covering up the whole sky, after reaching Silver creek...the book said an hour and a half hmmm what turbo driven drag car did they drive....must of been wearing horse blinkers too....any way...the trip back to Cannon city yet another 4x4 route on the belt way but, just a bit more extreme...er no not the worst extreme thats to come.. but certainly a rocky winding road that you need to view the pice to appreciate the view and even then the fish eye lens will make it less impressive...you need to see this for your own eyes and I'm hoping that one day you all will...maybe then you will consider this country as being as big and as beautiful as they say....
Friday of that week...last week as it is we decided to have an easy day because of packing for another long trip Saturday...I suggested a place called Bonanza, drive so far across the mountain and then hike the rest...Bonanza is a very small town an ex miners town no doubt, smack in the middle of huge mountains...as it was we took the wrong road even though it said Bonanza, this was a steep incline track, through cow fields that ended and then we walked around for a bit but could not find a good trail through to Bonanza...so back on the road we found the right one ending up in this mining village that has seen better days to say the least...however at the end of town there was a notice board and map of 4x4 trails etc...we decided on the easy looking one called Otto Mears toll road...hmmm the trail started ok we even met some people coming in the other dirrection and asked if there was a road through to where we were heading...(yes we could of drove the reverse trip from Bonanza but um this looked quicker and more interesting) (right!!) the guy in the passenger seat (I think he was sat on a seat) (could of been a spike though) said that he had lived there all his life and had not known a road going through to the 285 to Howard..(this is fun is it not) National parks sign saying there is, he saying there is not...your right we had to find out for ourselves...this road took us up the sides of mountains, down valleys over rivers (litrally) down and up mud slides, through forest's that left an inch both sides of the truck, imagin throwing a few house bricks on a make shift side walk, now imagin that side walk with a 5.000 ft sheer drop one side of the vehicle (and "no" there was not even enough room to squeeze out the door and take a picture further along the road, of the truck oh and of Rose shivering in the truck to show what angle it was perched at, please just take out five minutes to view the pics, as said driving these roads and taking pics er not a good idea so use your imagination on how bad they were.....lol good fun though and we made it back in one piece....I'm going to have to leave the trip over here to Silverton till another time....I've posted pics of the Golden Belt will post pics of Bonaza..shortly