Summer Vacation in Colorado (part II)

This is a con­tin­u­a­tion of my impres­sions from our trip to Steam­boat this sum­mer. This part will be the most lengthy detailed, longer than any sto­ry in this blog.

First Day and Donuts, June 21.

Not long ago, we decid­ed that the first day in Col­orado will always be a day of rest and acclima­ti­za­tion. Dur­ing sev­er­al of our pre­vi­ous vis­its, we spent the first day in exhaust­ing rush going to var­i­ous places, rent­ing skis, buy­ing Mark’s school sup­plies, ski pass­es, etc. So, we woke up late, had break­fast, and start­ed dis­cussing what to do today.

For some rea­son, I don’t know why, maybe I remem­bered the image of police offi­cers eat­ing donuts in their cars with cof­fee, I craved them ter­ri­bly. Of course, this is far from healthy food, but dur­ing vaca­tion, we some­times allow our­selves a lit­tle junk food. How­ev­er, I want­ed not just any donuts, but good donuts. We con­duct­ed a search of the local mar­ket, which turned out to be small, and in the after­noon, around one o’clock, we head­ed to a shop with the best reviews in down­town Steam­boat. This was new for us; we usu­al­ly don’t eat donuts. And who would have thought that, first­ly, the shop oper­ates from 6:30 AM to 1:00 PM, and sec­ond­ly, it was closed on Tues­days. So we missed out on the donuts and, feel­ing dis­heart­ened, bought some at Safe­way (which was a mis­take) where we went for gro­ceries. We decid­ed to come back on Wednes­day, hav­ing first placed a phone order, which was not­ed on the door.

The town, though small, is com­fort­ably locat­ed along the Yam­pa Riv­er. There are many ski shops, prices are high­er than online, but they will set every­thing up for you and gen­uine­ly advise what suits you best. The staff in such shops are main­ly young peo­ple, stu­dents — they cheer­ful­ly help with any prob­lem. Over­all, the atmos­phere of the town is very pleas­ant. At the moun­tain, you can rent skis in the usu­al way, or you can take a test ver­sion with the intent to buy, if you like the skis. We have used this ser­vice a few times — we liked it, it’s very con­ve­nient. In sum­mer, shops main­ly sell bik­ing gear and rent out bikes — they replace skis 🙂 If you look at the sum­mer map of the moun­tain, there are three times as many bike trails as hik­ing ones. There are a few large gro­cery stores — but they cov­er most of your needs. We don’t go to restau­rants, so I can’t say any­thing about them. There’s a nice pizze­ria on the slopes, Slope­side Grill, and we tried the local brew­ery, Moun­tain Tap Brew­ery, which we liked; it’s on the same street as the donut shop 🙂

We spent the sec­ond half of the day shop­ping for gro­ceries for the week, cook­ing, and in the evening, we took a short walk up the slope — along the moun­tain, there is a small glade, quite gen­tle, which we used to ski down in win­ter; this is the fin­ish­ing part of the green trail. In sum­mer, as it turned out, this is the first part of the trail, which we planned to take the next morn­ing, decid­ing to attempt a long hike up the mountain.

Second Day, June 22.

Even though we came to relax, Valenti­na need­ed to study every day, so I will say upfront that most of our vaca­tion con­sist­ed of sev­er­al attempts to “con­quer the ski moun­tain”, inter­spersed with out­ings to town and evening walks around the house.

In the morn­ing, we set off on a route called “Zigzag”, marked on the map with a white-blue dot­ted line. This is a mixed route (for cyclists and pedes­tri­ans), of medi­um dif­fi­cul­ty (marked with a blue square on the map). It was mod­er­ate­ly inter­est­ing and bor­ing because it is a ser­vice road going up — there­fore, it is open to the sun, and cars and cyclists passed by peri­od­i­cal­ly. There were a cou­ple of beau­ti­ful views, but over­all it was rather dull. We reached “Pio­neer” (we didn’t go up it, although I tried to per­suade every­one to climb to the sum­mit) and turned onto the “So What” road, which I remem­ber as a winter/​ski route, and then switched to the “Why Not” road. We descend­ed down this route. It took us 2 hours and 12 min­utes. The sum­mit remained uncon­quered.

The rest of the day was spent in the apart­ment, and in the evening we went for a walk around. In the evening, we out­lined the route for the next day — we decid­ed to take a hik­ing trail, as we no longer want­ed to share the road with cars and cyclists. Accord­ing to the map, there are only two on the entire moun­tain — Vista Nature Trail and Thun­der­head Trail. The lat­ter suit­ed us perfectly.

Third Day, June 23.

Valenti­na stayed home, and the three of us went. The trail is long, 3.8 miles, and goes almost to the sum­mit of the moun­tain, to the final point of the gon­do­la, and is marked as dif­fi­cult. In fact, you can take the gon­do­la instead of this trail. And already from there, there are many beau­ti­ful trails. How­ev­er, Steam­boat decid­ed to move its gon­do­la slight­ly high­er on the slope this sum­mer, and there­fore a mas­sive con­struc­tion project was under­way — the gon­do­la, as you might guess, was not oper­at­ing. The con­struc­tion some­what dis­rupt­ed the beau­ty down near our house.

In any case, we set off on the trail. Ini­tial­ly, the ascent was not too dif­fi­cult, but then the incline became about 45 degrees, and T.S., although she was hold­ing up well, clear­ly didn’t enjoy such “walks.” Mark was march­ing along with­out any signs of fatigue. The first half of the trail is indeed a bit steep, but the sec­ond part is much eas­i­er and pret­ti­er. When we reached the mid­dle of the trail, T.S. admit­ted that she had cho­sen the wrong shoes (which is under­stand­able, as this was our first time hik­ing here) and agreed to wait for us there while we fin­ished the ascent and descend­ed. There is a small build­ing where the first lift comes, Christie Peak. It was oper­at­ing, and peo­ple were rid­ing it from below, but for a fee, so we didn’t use it 🙂

Mark and I con­tin­ued. And we did­n’t regret it; the beau­ti­ful part of the trail began. Below is a video from the sec­ond half of the trail, about 20 min­utes from the end point, and the end of the trail. We reached the very top in about 30 – 40 min­utes. In fact, my desire was to reach the very sum­mit of the moun­tain, but there was still at least an hour left to get there. On the map, the short­est path there from our trail is up the Storm Peak Chal­lenge ser­vice road. Mark showed no enthu­si­asm for con­tin­u­ing, and T.S. was wait­ing for us below. We had to turn back.

The descent didn’t take long; we decid­ed to short­cut down the black win­ter trail direct­ly down the slope. It was quick, and Mark found it easy, but my leg mus­cles ached after­wards from the descent. We picked up T.S. halfway down and went home; Valenti­na was so focused on her work that she didn’t notice our long absence; for her, no more than 2 hours had passed 🙂

We got home not late and decid­ed to go for the donuts we had ordered on Tues­day evening. We arrived at the bak­ery just after 12 PM, and I was pleased with our pre-order since only our 2 box­es remained. That was all! The own­er (who served us him­self) said that he could­n’t even imag­ine how much peo­ple love donuts; a cou­ple of hours ear­li­er, there were no box­es left at all. They made 900 donuts for the day — as many as 900 donuts! I don’t under­stand how one can eat that many donuts in a day, but they must be great. What we bought was absolute­ly deli­cious, espe­cial­ly the maple one with bacon — absolute­ly the best! It’s sur­pris­ing, but I want to men­tion that they had sev­er­al deli­cious options, but we didn’t try many; we bought 2 box­es and shared one box for break­fast the next day. After that, we left for the gro­cery store, bought more food for the week, and went home.

Joy­ful­ly, we head­ed home for a late break­fast with cof­fee. I gen­er­al­ly don’t like donuts much; I eat them rarely, once or twice a year. After try­ing these, I decid­ed that this year’s occa­sion would def­i­nite­ly be in Steam­boat because I have nev­er tast­ed any­thing bet­ter. Mark was thrilled and agreed with me that each of our vis­its should be marked by at least three box­es. Per­son­al­ly, I think that’s too much, but we still had one and a half box­es left, so we could see how it goes 🙂

The evening passed qui­et­ly as we strolled around the streets of the ski town, plan­ning to take the same trail the next day, now with Valenti­na, who was impressed by our story.

Fourth Day, June 24.

Valenti­na was glad she joined us; she enjoyed the trail. The ascent was unevent­ful; every­one chose the right shoes, so we reached the end­point in just over an hour. How­ev­er, the group again declined the sug­ges­tion to con­tin­ue climb­ing, so we had to descend once more.

The evening again unfold­ed with a leisure­ly din­ner prepa­ra­tion and an evening walk around the area, fol­lowed by relaxed moments on the bal­cony with a drink of choice. Watch­ing the sun­set in the moun­tains is unmatched, at least in my eyes…

Fifth Day, June 25.

The morn­ing weath­er was cloudy with inter­mit­tent sun­shine, and rain was fore­cast­ed for the after­noon. How­ev­er, the rain had been promised for the past cou­ple of days, and the vari­able cloudi­ness had per­sist­ed, so I didn’t believe it and con­vinced the team to make a third attempt to sum­mit the moun­tain. I under­stood this was the only chance dur­ing this trip to go up there, but the oth­ers were much less opti­mistic and insist­ed it would rain.

Valenti­na stayed back to study, and the three of us set off on the trail. The weath­er indeed was get­ting worse, but the rain was still a ways off; in the dis­tance, about 15 miles away, dark clouds and rain could be seen, but we still had sun­shine. Despite the grum­bling, we climbed to the mid­dle of the trail, with the clouds draw­ing clos­er. Over­com­ing the dis­con­tent that near­ly turned into a revolt, we pushed on. It’s actu­al­ly bet­ter to hike in cloudy weath­er, as the sun doesn’t impede see­ing the sur­round­ings with heat and glare. We ascend­ed with­out any prob­lems on the trail that had almost become famil­iar over three trips.

The gon­do­la’s end­point, Thun­der­head Lodge, is quite a large build­ing, with a spa­cious area for gon­do­la ser­vice at the bot­tom and a huge café on the sec­ond floor, along with var­i­ous ser­vice rooms and a large rooftop ter­race offer­ing stun­ning views of the val­ley below. We climbed to the ter­race to rest, and from there, we could already see that the clouds were shift­ing toward us. Thus, my team, rep­re­sent­ed by Mark and T. S., stood firm­ly for descend­ing. I real­ized there was only one day left before depar­ture, and I like­ly wouldn’t want to climb for the fourth time in a row. We decid­ed that Mark and I would try to go fur­ther while T. S. wait­ed for us on the ter­race. This sum­mer, due to the coro­n­avirus and ongo­ing con­struc­tion below, there were very few peo­ple; the build­ing was closed, and only the restrooms and ter­race were operational.

We set off along the ser­vice road, Storm Peak Chal­lenge Road, to the inter­me­di­ate point on the route, Four Points Lodge. This is a small build­ing with restrooms and a din­ing area on the sec­ond floor; it oper­ates as a café in sum­mer and is a rest­ing spot for skiers in win­ter. How­ev­er, on the way, I had an argu­ment with Mark, who stub­born­ly refused to go fur­ther due to the approach­ing storm. I sent him back down to Grand­ma and told him not to wait for me and to head home. I con­tin­ued climb­ing the road and soon reached Four Points Lodge. The sun was shin­ing, and on the lawn in front of the build­ing, prepa­ra­tions were under­way for a wed­ding cer­e­mo­ny — chairs for guests and an arch for the cer­e­mo­ny were set up. I didn’t linger and con­tin­ued up the road.

After Four Points Lodge, the road goes up rel­a­tive­ly straight for a while, then starts wind­ing like a snake. By that time, I was a bit tired and decid­ed to cut across direct­ly up the slope between the road­’s curves. The weath­er had clear­ly begun to wors­en; real clouds cov­ered the sky, but I was close to the sum­mit, and it would be a shame to turn back.

By the time I reached the sum­mit, it became clear that a storm was going to catch me here. At the top stood a lone­ly small build­ing for trail main­te­nance, adorned with sev­er­al impos­ing anten­nas, a few doors, and through the win­dow, I could see res­cue sleds and some oth­er res­cue equip­ment, but every­thing was locked up. On the oth­er side of the moun­tain (who would have thought?) there was a lift. I hadn’t seen on the map that it was pos­si­ble to ski there. But the beau­ty of the sur­round­ing view was worth all my efforts.

On the reverse side, there were many wood­ed slopes and pic­turesque lit­tle clear­ings gen­tly descend­ing— I real­ly want­ed to wan­der there some­day, but I couldn’t afford dis­trac­tions any­more — the first drops of rain began to fall, and a fair­ly strong wind picked up. It was aston­ish­ing to watch how quick­ly a cloud can approach. Just a moment ago, it was five miles away, and with­in ten min­utes, it began to envel­op the sum­mit in gray puffs. Light­ning was strik­ing in the dis­tance, but I under­stood that I need­ed to find shelter.

The build­ing was shaped like a thick “L”, all the doors were locked, and there were no awnings, just a roof that jut­ted out 40cm all around. I entered from the lee­ward side and pressed my back into the inner cor­ner of the house as if it were a nook. Almost imme­di­ate­ly, heavy rain began to pour down, hit­ting every­thing around me in the gusts of wind. Luck­i­ly, I was on the shel­tered side, but I still got quite wet. The tem­per­a­ture felt like it dropped to about 10°C (and I was in shorts and a T‑shirt). Light­ning began to strike all around, quite close — one hit a tree about 50 meters away. I just stood there and observed it all; I felt only curios­i­ty and a sense of enjoy­ment from nature — though lat­er I regret­ted not film­ing it, at that moment, I didn’t think of it.

So I stood there for 30 min­utes, and the rain began to ease. After anoth­er 20 min­utes, it tran­si­tioned to a light driz­zle, and I decid­ed it was time to move, espe­cial­ly since the respite was tem­po­rary — I saw anoth­er dark cloud approach­ing. I walked briskly, then ran down the road, but still the next por­tion of rain caught me halfway to Four Points Lodge, and I ducked under the low­er branch­es of a road­side pine 🙂 After wait­ing it out, I dashed to Four Points Lodge.

The chairs sat lone­ly and wet in the rain, while guests began to gath­er — cars were pulling up to the house one after anoth­er. Inside, wait­ers were bustling about, and ele­gant­ly dressed guests stood in the cor­ners; nobody paid atten­tion to me in my wet and com­plete­ly unfes­tive cloth­ing. After warm­ing up a bit, I con­tin­ued my descent. By the time I reached Thun­der­head Lodge, the rain had stopped, the clouds began to dis­perse, and the sun appeared. I chose not to descend via the trail, as it was quite steep in some places, and after the rain, it was like­ly wet and dan­ger­ous. I opt­ed for the ser­vice road and descend­ed calm­ly. The entire jour­ney took me 3 hours 36 min­utes (I paused the timer when I stopped) and cov­ered 9.67 miles.

Mark and Grand­ma also had their adven­tures on the way back — they descend­ed halfway to Christie Peak before the rain start­ed, descend­ing quick­ly, but they still didn’t make it to the lift in time — it had already been shut down, such is the pro­ce­dure dur­ing a storm. They were picked up by a truck that was going down with work­ers from the sta­tion. Just then, our heavy rain began; I was stand­ing at the sum­mit while they rode in the truck. Valenti­na texted Mark, ask­ing where they were, to which he replied suc­cinct­ly: “in the truck.” Mom, con­fused, asked, “What truck?” and Mark con­tin­ued just as suc­cinct­ly: “in the Ford.”

Lat­er, Valenti­na called him, and every­thing was clar­i­fied 🙂 They had a smooth ride. Over­all, for every­one (espe­cial­ly for me), this was a won­der­ful adven­ture, just the kind that makes the trip to the moun­tains worth­while.

Conclusion

We spent Fri­day leisure­ly pack­ing and enjoy­ing our last day of relax­ation 🙂 I real­ly didn’t want to leave; I could have stayed for anoth­er cou­ple of weeks 🙂 Next sum­mer, I def­i­nite­ly want­ed to come back, as there are still some unex­plored places. One hike was planned 10 miles from home, but it didn’t hap­pen (the pho­tos and reviews were very intrigu­ing). There are still hot springs to check out, and numer­ous hik­ing spots at the moun­tain’s sum­mit (but the fam­i­ly is only will­ing to do this with the gon­do­la oper­at­ing 🙂 ). And we will def­i­nite­ly try moun­tain bik­ing next time! The upcom­ing win­ter trip doesn’t count—sum­mer and win­ter in Steam­boat are two dif­fer­ent places.

We left ear­ly in the morn­ing and made the jour­ney with­out any adven­tures, as usu­al, in one day. Sum­mer is much eas­i­er, so we were home by sunset.