10 Day Epic Road Trip: The Birthday Adventure Vacation

with 2 Comments

Day 4, Trestle Bike Park & Exploring Some Lakes

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Trestle Bike Park is situated right in the middle of Winter Park. It’s my favorite bike park to date. After a big breakfast, which of course proved to be a stupid idea, we hit the chair lift to the top of the mountain. Our plan was to stick to the green trails since Anna was pretty much brand new to downhill MTB. I needed an easy warm up anyways before tackling anything more difficult.

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mmm, warm cinnamon roll
Going up!
Going up!
Awesome views
Awesome views

This place is so awesome. There are random creeks running under the wood features and the amount of green up there is just incredible.

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Back up we went.

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Green World Trail

 

I played around on a couple features while Anna took a couple pics. Then Anna went for it.

It felt great to get back up here on my own bike. The last time I was here I had to rent and I just never felt very comfortable on any of the rental bikes.

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Rainmaker ♦️

On one of our last runs down the mountain, we split off and I hit one of the black diamond trails, Rainmaker ♦️. By now, Anna was confident enough and did Green World on her own. I felt really good this time. It sucks that it takes almost an entire day to feel good enough to really start pushing it. I was finally clearing a good portion of the jumps and pretty much nailed everything on Rainmaker. Jumping has never been a strong point for me so I was really happy with how I did.  I only cased a few jumps.

 

I couldn’t be more proud of Anna. She conquered her fears and did great on the mountain that day. She is officially hooked on downhill and wants a full suspension bike now.

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Unscathed, she finished the day strong.

 

After about 4-5 runs, we decided to call it quits. That is a normally a very short day for me, but I was happy and so was Anna. I figured we’d quit while we were ahead and grab something to eat and go do some more exploring. We stopped at a pizza place and took advantage of their pizza slice & PBR special. It hit the spot after a day on the mountain.

I loved their bicycle themed pizza size representations.
I loved their bicycle themed pizza size representations.

 

Lake Granby

After we left Winter Park, we headed north to check out Lake Granby. It is the 3rd largest body of water along the Colorado River and was formed when the Granby Dam was erected in 1950. We drove along the shoreline all the way from Sunset Point to Arapaho Bay and eventually to Lake Monarch.

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Lake Monarch

There are many restrictions on Lake Monarch to keep it a primitive, natural area. We couldn’t even drive to it and had to park and hike in. I can see why.

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After we got our nature fix, the sun set behind us as we drove back to our hotel.

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We capped off the day by soaking in the hot tub.

That water was insanely hot! I could only take about 10 mins in there.
That water was insanely hot! I could only take about 10 mins in there.

 

Day 5, Aurora for our RoofNest and our drive north into Wyoming, continued on page 5

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Follow Pete:

Do more with less! That is my motto lately. I love getting outdoors and exploring new places, usually on my KTM motorcycle. My wife, Anna, and I recently bought and built out a Sprinter van to do more of the things we love. Traveling and seeing new places is always at the top of our to-do list.

2 Responses

  1. Corey
    | Reply

    Killer trip Pete!! Looks like you had a ton of fun. Makes me want to pack the wife and kids up and go camping this weekend.

    • Pete
      | Reply

      Thanks Corey! You should go for it. The mountains are the best place to be in summer. 🙂

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