Telluride Colorado... and everything in between

First and foremost I would like to apologize for much a long gap between posts, it is hard to even fathom how much has happened between posts but I am sure that attempting to recall these events will bring me back as if it happened today.  I believe I left the blog soon before our rest day in Telluride Colorado which we had planned from the beginning of the trip as our unplanned rest day that we could pull out and use when we were fortunate enough to be in a town that we first of all wanted to stay in, and also when we desperately needed one, Telluride came and fulfilled both of these qualifications.  The ride into Telluride reminded us of how badly we needed a rest day.  We climbed and we climbed through the rockies to the top of Dallas pass, our 3rd of four passes through the rockies mountains, at 9,000 feet we looked ahead to what was to come and we saw what was a beautiful landscape shaded by ominous storm clouds and as we descended the mountain the rain descended on us. This thick fat rain literally felt with no exageration like needles on your skin with every impact, my bare arms legs and face were ripped to shreds as I tried to endure the pain, and cold, at 30-35 mph. I finally made it to the bottom after what was by far the worst descent I had ever endured considering descents are usually the highlight of a long day of climbing in the Rockies. And after a long and cold climb up to the valley, we had arrived in Telluride.

Telluride is a famous and very popular ski resort town in Colorado. It is so famous in fact that celebrities such as Tom Cruise and Salvester Stallone have or have had a vacation home in Telluride, this is also a great indication of the immense expense that is spending any amount of time in Telluride. When Telluride is not over run by wealthy ski-bums in the Winter, it is a popular outdoors and quite low-key town that has a great mountain biking scene. When Telluride mountain is not being used for skiing, its ski passes are converted into some of the best mountain biking trails in America. This is how we decided to spend one of few of our precous rest days.
From the bottom of the mountain to the summit there was a free Gondola, in fact it was the only free Gondola in North America which is ironic considering the cost of everything else in Telluride, anything free was pretty remarkable.  At the summit I prepared to embark on my first mountain biking experience on a $2,000 rented mountain bike down a massive mountain and some trails that would challenge seasoned riders.  The ride was absolutely exhilerating and absolutely terrifying! It was a great day of riding, especially for a rest day. It was a great day and one I will not soon forget, however leaving that morning was unlike any other morning knowing that from now on there is no more rest, until San Francisco.