Weimenuche - Chicago Basin - Wisdom Peak

September 2016 Cole, Ava, Brian, Dani and myself took the Durango to Silverton narrow gage railroad through the Weimenuche Wilderness and hopped off at Chicago Basin.

http://www.durangotrain.com/

This is a trip that we all wanted to do for some time. The Weimenuche has some incredible mountains, in particular the Grenadier Range - which is just north of Chicago Basin has some incredible peaks.

http://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/sanjuan/recarea/?recid=81032

The train follows the Animas river cut through the mountains toward Durango - and offers stunning views. of fall foliage, rivers, and mountain peaks. The Animas River is the location of the 2015 mine waste spill that made national headlines. The creek pictured above is in the Chicago Basin drainage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Gold_King_Mine_waste_water_spill

Chicago Basin

Mama goat and baby

Upper Chicago Basin. By the lake the trail splits towards the fourteeners Windom, Sunlight, and Eolus. We climbed Windom because it was supposed to be the easiest of the three.

On top of Windom looking SW - Eolus is the peak straight ahead.

Cole's obligatory night sky Chicago Basin shot.

Awesome trip guys - thanks to everyone for making it happen. Hope to go back soon.

Transplants Bike SWCO

The team went to SW Colorado to ride bikes.

Check out our video. The purpose of this trip was biking - but we have no pictures to show for it.

 

In fact, all of our pictures are from our rest day @ the OPUS hut, "Ophir Pass Ultimate Ski".

We took a rest day at the OPUS hut and did some light hiking. (Above) Me, Tyler, and Brian in Paradise Basin near the hut.

Night Sky @ the OPUS hut.

Morning @ OPUS

More night Sky.

Team shades. Our original plan was to ride from Rice to OPUS via Silverton and the Colorado Trail.

However, excessive rain caused us to abort to a shorter plan.... which included the Co Trail south from Lizard Head Pass to Ryman Creek.

We also climbed some peaks.

 


Including South Lookout Peak, which is a top ten ski destination looking North.

View from the OPUS - fog shrouds the valley.

Our rest day was the only day without rain.

so we read a bunch.... and sampled some excellent biking in the Cortez desert @ Phil's world.

Big shout out to Pepperhead Restaraunt in Cortez - home of the Ghost Pepper Honey Margarita!

http://www.pepperheadcortez.com/