Passes & Canyons Blog

It’s common for me to receive emails planning Colorado trips, asking for suggestions on riding routes. It’s interesting for me because everyone’s plans are different, everyone has different interests, amounts of time to spend, and starting and ending points. I look at their particulars and see what I can come up with.

Here’s a query I received recently, and my response. I’m always hoping that other folks who read this will say, “Wow, I’ve never done that road. Maybe I will.” Or maybe you’ll leave a comment telling me what you think a much better route would have been. Maybe you’ll turn me on to something I’m not aware of.

Anyway, here’s the exchange.

Hey Ken!
Love your website!!
I don’t know if you have the time to answer individual inquiries but we thought we’d give it a shot!

We’re planning a mid-July 2015 ride to Colorado after our yearly ride to Red Lodge, MT and the Beartooth mountains.

Our plan is to leave Red Lodge and ride to Estes Park (stay in Estes Park) and then ride Rocky Mountain National Park.
After our tour of RMNP we’d like to go down and ride Pikes Peak.

There are a lot of roads leading from Estes Park to Colorado Springs but since this is our first ride to CO – we have absolutely no clue which ones would be the absolute best for a day ride from Estes Park to Pikes Peak and back again the same day.

Unfortunately we’ll only have about 3 days for the Colorado portion of our ride.
Some of the young ones have to get back to something they call work!

If you have any time to help us out – it’d be GREAT!!

Thanks much!!

Greg

My reply:

Greg–

Here’s what I would suggest. It appears to be around 325 miles, maybe a bit more. In July if you get an early start the days are long so it could work. It may be a bit longer than you would like. I’m attaching a map.

Head west out of Estes over Trail Ridge Road, down to Granby, and then take US 40 to Winter Park, over Berthoud Pass, down to I-70 and take I-70 west to Georgetown. Go into Georgetown and take Guanella Pass over to US 285 at Grant and then east on that to Pine Junction, where you go south on 126, to 67, to Woodland Park and US 24. That will take you to the well-marked turn-off to Pikes Peak. Once you come down off the mountain, continue east on US 24 through Manitou and catch I-25 briefly north to Monument. Get off at Monument and take 105 north to Sedalia, where you’ll hit US 85. Continue north. In the Denver suburbs you’ll hit C-470. Take that around Denver to the north and west and where C-470 ends you’ll be on US 6. Take that up Clear Creek Canyon to the Peak to Peak Highway and take the Peak to Peak the rest of the way back to Estes.

Be advised, that’s a lot of riding. A possible different approach would be to take the Peak to Peak out of Estes and at the turn-off past Black Hawk, where the road splits and one way goes to Golden and the other way goes to Idaho Springs, go to Idaho Springs and on to Georgetown and then back on the route. You’ll be backtracking on your way home that evening but you’ll save a good bit of time not going the Trail Ridge/Granby/Berthoud Pass route.

Whatever you do, have a great time!

Recent from National Motorcycle Examiner
Motorcycle race where you would never expect it

Biker Quote for Today

PMS – The Silent Killer. Parked Motorcycle Syndrome symptoms include pacing back and forth in the garage, irritability, headache, and nausea. If you or a loved one is suffering from any of these symptoms, get out for a ride. Prolonged exposure to a parked motorcycle can drive you completely insane.

Tags: Colorado motorcycle roads

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 19th, 2015 at 12:36 pm and is filed under Colorado motorcycle rides. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.