Posts Tagged ‘Sky Ute Casino Resort’

OFMC 2024: Making A Short Day Longer

Thursday, August 15th, 2024

You can see some of the work that has been done at this new national monument so far.

Leaving Durango on this year’s OFMC trip we had originally planned to ride down to Mesa Verde National Park where we were to spend the night at the Far View Lodge, the very cool old lodge inside the park. It was a treat I was looking forward to but Bill had announced he would not be going there with us and we ended up cutting that night out and moving everything else up.

That left us leaving Durango with the day’s destination of . . . Ignacio. Eighteen miles away. OK, let’s see what we can figure out here.

Because this whole trip was planned as a tourist trip, with us stopping at attractions and doing things that tourists do and that we generally haven’t, we had on our plan for the day leaving Ignacio to make a stop at Chimney Rock National Monument. I suggested that we head east on US 160, then turn back west at CO 151, which runs right by the monument before leading us directly on to Ignacio. Make it about a 100-mile day. The guys thought that sounded good.

The ride out US 160 was very nice as the entire state seems to have stayed green much later in the summer this year than usual. Really, really beautiful. We made the turn and were soon at Chimney Rock.

Chimney Rock National Monument is one of the newest national monuments in the country. It’s new enough that other times we have been past it it has not even been open yet to the public. Now it is but there’s still not a lot to it in terms of infrastructure.

First off we had to go in on a gravel road, and everyone knows how Bill feels about riding on gravel. He wasn’t thrilled but it was only a quarter mile. We got to the visitor center area and it is in such an early phase that the ranger did not have an actual visitor center, he was sitting there under an open tent talking to people and handing out literature. Besides restrooms the only structure was one building that was split with one half being a museum and the other half a gift shop.

It’s a good museum, though, and I found out a whole lot I had not known about the place. I’ve seen the rocks that give the place its name many times passing by and had assumed the monument was all about the rocks. And I thought making it a national monument for the rocks was a bit of a stretch.

In fact, it’s an archaeological site and up on the mesa above there are pueblos that are pretty well preserved. With the gravel road we were not going to ride up to the pueblos, plus it was a pretty hot day and we were in the middle of the heat. The ranger said they do have a shuttle going up for those who don’t want to drive but we passed. I’ll do that some other time when I’m out that way with Judy. Bill seemed positively disinterested and I didn’t know how Dennis felt about it.

So we saw what there was to see and then headed on to Ignacio. Even after our detour it was far too early to check into our rooms at the Sky Ute Casino Resort but they have a very good restaurant where we had lunch and then there was the gambling. This was one place where arriving early was not an inconvenience.

Biker Quote for Today

With the throttle’s roar, I ignite the adventure on the road.

OFMC Plans For 2024 Trip Are Set

Monday, February 26th, 2024

The OFMC on the road in 2016.

I was late getting the plans for this year’s OFMC trip set but finally did. It’s actually harder to plan a trip with shorter days than with longer ones. We’ll be staying almost entirely in Colorado this year.

The mandate from the guys–primarily Bill–was no long hard days of riding. Dennis suggested we play tourist a bit more than we generally have. I came up with a plan.

First off, following last year’s hellacious trip home on I-70 on Sunday with all the horrendous traffic that always entails, I suggested that hey, we don’t need to leave and come home on weekends. We can go and return in the middle of the week. Everyone agreed to that.

So we’ll be leaving on a Wednesday and going up over Berthoud Pass, through Winter Park and Granby just on to Hot Sulphur Springs. And there we’ll partake of the hot springs for a good hot soak. Just in case we’re a bit sore from the first day’s ride.

Next we’ll hit Kremmling and turn south, catch I-70 briefly to Copper Mountain, and then take Fremont Pass over to Buena Vista. We’ll make sure to get there early enough for this day’s activity: zip-lining. I had looked at doing some river rafting but we have all done that before and none of us has done a zip line. I’m hoping it’s going to be a lot of fun.

Originally I planned it out that we would backtrack to Twin Lakes and take Independence Pass over to Aspen and Carbondale and then turn south toward McClure Pass to spend a night at the Redstone Inn in Redstone. Calling for reservations, though, it turned out they have a big wedding going on that weekend and there is not an available room in town. Searching further and further afield it finally worked out that the best alternative was Montrose, and if we’re heading to Montrose from Buena Vista it made sense to take an entirely different route. So we’ll go over Cottonwood Pass down to Almont, to Gunnison, and then take US 50 to Montrose.

The next day we’ll just head straight down US 550 to Durango, going over Red Mountain and Molas Passes on the way. Durango will be a two-day stop because the next day instead of riding we’ll play golf. Golf is an always kind of thing on the OFMC trips these days.

We’ll have a pretty short ride the day we leave Durango as we are just going to Mesa Verde National Park. More playing tourist. In the early days of the OFMC we always found the cheapest place to stay we could. Nowadays we all have more money and we’re spending it. We’ll be staying at the grand lodge–the Far View Lodge–in the park. That should be really nice.

We’ll ride around and see the park the day we get there but the next day’s ride is not a long one either: it’s time for the mandatory gambling stop. We’re heading on to Ignacio, to the Sky Ute Casino Resort. We’ve stayed at the Sky Ute before but they used to be in a much smaller place and it was inexpensive. The new place is fancy and the price reflects that. And that’s before you give them money at the tables and machines. But we like a little gambling.

The next day of this trip is the longest one. We’re heading for Fort Garland and there were two possible routes to get there. One would be to just get on US 160 all the way, over Wolf Creek Pass. That’s a little shorter, but only a little, than what we’re going to do. We’ll take 160 to Pagosa Springs but then turn south into New Mexico, to Chama, and then turn northeast over Cumbres and La Manga Passes to Antonito. Then some mostly straight roads to Fort Garland.

Our final day, coming home, we have choices. The direct shots would be either to go east on US 160 to I-25 and take it all the way home, or jog west and pick up US 285 north all the way home. If we feel like a more scenic route I was thinking go east to Walsenburg and then turn northwest on CO 69 to Westcliffe, and then a series of roads up to Penrose, to Colorado Springs, and then pick a route home from there. This would be an equally long day as the previous one, so we’ll see what we all fell like at that point.

And that will do it. I’m thinking it’s going to be a good trip.

Biker Quote for Today

“I’m a decent sprinter and I can gun a motorcycle from zero to suicidal in less than ten seconds.” ? Mira Grant