Now where was I??? oh yes ok so Last Saturday we left Howard...the trip to here (Silverton) was only…

Now where was I??? oh yes ok so Last Saturday we left Howard...the trip to here (Silverton) was only 175 miles or so but took all day....we must have drove over 3 mountains to get here, reaching 12,500 ft or more at Red Mountain Pass...heading kinda South we drove through a very nice town called Ouray (check the photo of the town with a red crash barrier in front)....at the end of this town is the start of another one of these switchback full, mountain edge roads "The Million dollar highway" ...I feel I must tell everyone of the biggest jerk of that day....there we are climbing from about 7,000 to over 10.000 ft...with vertical rocks on the left, a sheer drop of some 2,000 ft on the right...rounding a switchback, this person behind decides we are not driving the 60 ft train fast enough around these sharp inclining bends and decides to over take...well just as he is half way along the coach yes you know it!!! A truck comes around the corner in the opposite direction, we (the truck driver and myself ) screach to a halt and the idiot scrapes through between us with millimetres to spare, almost swerving his car off the edge ( a sheer long drop)....Motto of the day "Patience is a safe drive home"

So Silverton..(there is a pic with us driving down to Silverton...you can see a red roofed building in the middle of the pic...slighly to the right, you might make out the Sun Voyager, also the small rail train in a siding near by...if you don't know, this town is the place that all America comes to drive Off Road...including and please excuse my spelling Michael Schumacker the world F1 racing champion of at least 7 times, we ate in the same ale house as him, every other vehicle is a 4x4, this town is the reason Rose and I had to purchase a 4x4, so we could run the Alpine loop....well after our fun with the Bonanza off roading we decided to rent a jeep....and oh am I happy we did....later!

Ok Sunday, it rained a lot so we just drove around exploring.
Monday we drove the 4x4 back over to Ouray...firstly going to close by Box Cayon Falls...wow, these were impressive....please check the pics..there the ones where the falls are seemingly dropping through Rocks...you can see how smooth these rocks are from years of fast flow...after we walked around checking out this fine town, we had lunch at an Irish pub...and then walked to another water fall not far from town called Cascade falls...I have a great pic of Rose and will post it....
Tuesday we at last put the Kayak in the water at Molas Lake, a very small but beautiful lake...and am pleased to report it runs true and straight...so were keeping it....there is a pic of this lake on our page..after that rode the bikes and hiked around trying to find the Colorado trail that we had some how not found Sunday and found that day....later we decided to visit the local Gold mine and do the tour thing, called "Old 100" it has not been mined since the 60's, the train ride (if you can call it a train) took us deep into the mine, we were at level 17 out of 32 (1700 ft and 3200 ft that is) our guide was kinda funny so it made the day and helped to forget all the rock above...to end the evening we drove past the mine all the time on almost 4x4 roads and ended up at an old unused gold mine and water fall....

Wednesday, ...wow!!! wow!!!!! wow!!!! ok so this day we drove back over and through Ouray to "The black canyon" what a day this proved to be, I will post pics shortly but can assure you all that there is only ONE way to see this place and, thats with your own eyes...."awesome" can there be a better word hmmm I doubt....we both enjoyed this day greatly, on the way back, saw 11 deer on the road side...I have posted 2 pics I think as it was getting dark by then to take any more...

Thursday was a stay at the coach and clean everything in sight day...also checked levels in both vehicles, put together the new bike rack as all the off roading had caused a bolt on the other to shear through...
Friday now what a Friday...but thats for another day