Adventure Cycling Association

No matter where I am in the US, there’s always an Adventure Cycling route close by. When I lived in Michigan, I pedaled out my door onto the North Lakes route. In Arizona, I was just a few miles from the Great Divide. When I visited my friend Alison in San Francisco, I biked from her house onto the Pacific Coast Route. And in Massachusetts, I got to host my friends Kaisa and Christoffer as they pedaled down the Atlantic Coast Route.

So when I moved to Durango, Colorado, this winter, I figured that trend would continue, and when I pulled up the Adventure Cycling route finder, I smiled. The Great Parks South Route started less than a mile from my house.

The first town along the path would be Mancos, about thirty miles away. My friend Dave lives on a beautiful homestead in Mancos. It was the perfect opportunity to invite myself over on a short bike adventure. And to test out Adventure Cycling’s newest innovation: hosting its maps on Ride with GPS.

On a Wednesday in February, I stuffed some clothes and snacks in my panniers, hopped on my bike, and pedaled out the basement door. It was warm and sunny. A perfect day. I’d downloaded the route onto my phone through Ride with GPS. In classic Adventure Cycling fashion, this showed me the route layout, distance, and points of interest along the way. Door to door, it would be 31.5 miles and 2,700 feet of elevation from my house to Dave’s.

I followed a moderately trafficked highway with a wide shoulder and over an 8,400-foot ridge before descending into the tiny mountain town of Mancos. I pushed the pedals, breathing deep and chugging slowly up the road. I’d been sick in bed for the last week with body aches and a cough, and this was my first ride since then. I had no idea how it would go. After a few miles, I got a text from Dave saying he was down with a migraine but still wanted me to come. Bodies do not always behave the way we wish they would, but the adventure must continue.

Durango’s houses and hotels thinned. Then they disappeared. I was left with the open road, flanked by landscapes dappled in snow. As I climbed higher, the temperature dropped and an icy headwind started to push against my face. The further I went, the louder the wind rushed past my ears. Bushes on the roadside whipped back and forth, and grasses bent to the ground. It reminded me of a stretch of road in Wyoming on the Great Divide, where the wind was so cold and strong it felt like a river.

I began to regret my choices. The wind pushed into my mouth every time I inhaled, and my lungs were already sore from coughing. Why was I biking up the ridge in this state? Why did I think this would be fun? In the last twenty years I’ve biked many thousands of miles around the world. Those journeys have been the best moments of my life, yet big portions of them were uncomfortable, scary, or difficult.

I kept pedaling and thought about my first bike trip at twenty-one, when I cycled alone against Iceland’s epic winds. What would that younger woman think about me now, complaining in my head about a short ride into a relatively small headwind? I imagined the younger version of me riding next to me on the road. She looked at me and started to laugh. Then I started to laugh, too. She was right — it was pretty funny.

I eventually made it up the ridge and coasted down into Mancos. Home to just over a thousand residents, Mancos is nestled in a little mountain valley. I turned off the highway onto a dirt road lined with farms and small houses. After a few miles, I recognized the greenhouses and the row of willows at the edge of Dave’s farm. Dave’s three-legged dog Roo ran out to greet me at the driveway. It’s incredible how fast Roo can run.

Dave came out and showed me where to store my bike under the eave of the farmhouse. I grabbed my stuff and followed him inside. Dave’s home is a fun, cozy space. Big windows overlook the mountains, and earthen pots fill the shelves. Dave is a farmer and a potter, so he makes his dishes himself from clay that he digs from the land. Each is a work of art. I felt wind-burned but happy. Dave was doing okay with his migraine, so we took a walk with Roo before dark. As we wandered up the dirt road, the sun began to set, turning everything gold and orange.

When we got back to the house, Dave made a delicious pot of miso sausage soup, and I brought out the sourdough flatbread and kvass I’d carried in my panniers. Kvass is a tangy drink made from fermented beets and spices. I’d brewed this batch with beets from Dave’s farm. We ate the soup out of beautiful, giant homemade bowls.

After dinner I was pretty much ready for bed, so I lay down on the floor with Roo. (I’m a really entertaining house guest.) Dave needed to practice a short talk he’d written for a storytelling event, and I really wanted to hear it. So he sat on the couch with his notes and read the story out loud while I listened from the floor. The story was about a close friend he’d had who died suddenly at a young age. Dave read slowly, stopping, pausing and re-reading sentences. The story ended years later on the farm, when Dave realized that his grief had grown into a larger understanding of love. As I lay listening, it reminded me of the times I’d lost someone or something I loved. There are so few outlets in society to talk about grief and loss in a way that leads us back to love. I knew Dave’s story would be a gift to everyone who heard it.

I slept in the cozy guest room, my head resting on a pillow decorated with a rabbit feeding salad to a mole. In the morning, we had breakfast, and I packed my bike for the ride home. It was a calm, sunny day. I hugged Dave goodbye, threw my leg over the saddle, and pedaled back out the driveway. My lungs felt good, and I was happy.

This time I took gravel roads back behind Mancos before popping out onto the highway. About halfway to Durango, I stopped at a gas station and got a burrito and some carrot cake. It was mostly downhill from there. Back at the house, I rolled my bike into the basement and unpacked. I’d only been gone for a day, but a lot had happened. Even a short ride can be a great adventure.

Great Parks South Route Overview

This paved route extends 695 miles across Colorado between Colorado Springs and Durango. It crosses eleven mountain passes and the highest point is 12,183 feet. Highlights include three national parks: Rocky Mountain , Black Canyon of the Gunnison, and Mesa Verde (via the Mesa Verde spur). The ideal riding season is early summer to mid-fall.