“The Bells are ringing for me and my gal.”---Leslie & Goetz
There are roads and there are Roads. The Pacific Coast Highway ribbon through Big Sur comes to mind as does U.S. 1 from Islamorada to Key West. The Going To The Sun Road in glorious Glacier National Park is a stunner and there’s a cute little 15 miles of A1A from Hampton Beach to Portsmouth, Hampshire that will make you smile. But noone with a pulse can ignore the 48-mile stretch of Colorado’s Trail Ridge Road (secret identity, U.S. Highway 34) that traverses Rocky Mountain National Park from Estes Park in the east to Grand Lake in the west. The road is one of America’s Byways and a nationally-designated All-American Road. It’s got everything you could want in a girl---beauty, surprises, dangerous curves and a spirit of adventure---as it rollercoasters its way above the timberline to the Continental Divide at Milner Pass and down the mountain to salvation. At its highest point near Fall River Pass, TRR reaches a chilly elevation of 12,183 feet and the roadside winds will blow you to Pakistan. All of which makes Trail Ridge Road Siobhan’s ticket to drive. Pry her loose from the wheel and try to drive yourself, she’ll run for her life and disappear into the underbrush, never to be seen again. That’s okay, though. Wingman gets to take a lot of pictures.
Grand Lake is a small town of 410 blissed-out souls hard by a very large body of water of the same name. The lake has a surface area of 507 acres and a maximum depth of 389 feet with a total water volume of 68,621 acres, which makes it the largest natural body of water in Colorado. We dismounted there to catch our breath after navigating Trail Ridge Road and to visit the world-class Rocky Mountain Repertory Theater, which offers each summertime a lively quartet of Broadway musicals performed by an exceptional group of professional actors. This year the choice was The Pirates of Penzance, a comic opera by Gilbert and Sullivan, and a challenging test of fast-paced singing and dancing which will curtly shove rank amateurs to the sidelines without a fare-thee-well. The cast was marvelous, the production Broadway-worthy, and we’re not just being nice. By the way, The Pirates was originally performed on 31 December, 1879 in Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue Theater, where Bill saw it for the first time.
The town of Grand Lake, itself, is famous for the exploits of one Frederick Nicholas Selak, an early pioneer who operated a stage line, saloons and other businesses in the area. Dubbed The Hermit of Grand Lake, Selak was also a money-lender suspected of having half-a-million dollars buried on his property. In 1926, friends became concerned because they had not seen Selak in days and the local sheriff was dispatched to his place, finding a ransacked house with floorboards pulled up and poor old Frederick nowhere to be found. Selak’s sister traveled from California to Colorado and eventually tracked down the culprits, two men who had hanged Selak in retaliation for some fencing dispute, which seems unnecessarily harsh. When found one month after the murder, Selak’s remains were still hanging from the pine tree where he was killed, another reason to avoid getting into the coroner business. Remember the old line, Good Fences Make Good Neighbors? So, not always.
Trough Sledding
“Break on through to the Other Side!”---The Doors
Virtually noone will be thrilled to discover the long path ahead is a sometimes gravel, sometimes dirt and only occasionally paved thoroughfare named Trough Road. But it is a scenic byway, after all, which stretches through winding mountain country along the Colorado River between State Bridge and Kremmling in the Rocky Mountains, so it’s not all that---unless you run out of gas, bust an axle or run across outlaws with horses faster than your little Buick Malibu. Siobhan and I disembarked at one dusty point of interest and there were buckshot holes defacing one of the informational signs, so it was obvious Marshall Matt Dillon was not on the job and we were on our own. It’s at times like these you remember reading about malevolent GPS devices directing their masters down bleak Idaho roads to nowhere or into inescapable Montana snowdrifts. We offered ours a Brandy Alexander and she promptly escorted us through the wilderness and back to civilization in the form of Glenwood Springs, a nifty little resort town famous for its restorative hot springs, ancient underground caverns and the only roller-coaster within 200 miles. You can also swoop across the Colorado River on a giant pendulum swing at a local amusement park which describes the experience thusly; “The Giant Canyon Swing moves four passengers back and forth, then takes them nearly vertical at the height of each swinging arc, hits a top speed of 50 mph and delivers potent, tummy-tickling negative G-forces, all perched at the edge of the cliff on top of a mountain 1300 feet above the Colorado.”
I don’t know about you but when I see the phrase “tummy-tickling,” my wary mind immediately translates it to “sheer terror.” I asked Siobhan, who doesn’t like hot springs very much either, what she thought about the pendulum ride. “Where do we get the towels?” she asked, running toward the spa.
While the primary resort in town is Glenwood Hot Springs with its one massive pool, we opted for an alternative, Iron Mountain Hot Springs, which has 16 smaller pools filled with mineral water that ranges in temperature between 98 degrees and 108, take your pick. Siobhan, a sociable sort, wandered off with some new friends to one of the hotter pools while I tracked down a nice, cozy, 98 degree alternative. She was over at my place before long. “Do you realize how hot 108 degrees is?” she wanted to know. “What do you think I’m doing over here.” I answered. The management will let you soak three hours for your $46 but that puts you pretty close to Pruneville, a place we’d rather avoid. Loose as a goose after 60 minutes of immersion, we stepped out of the pool, reapplied sunscreen and headed for Aspen, home of the wonders we most came to see---the fabled and venerable Maroon Bells, 14,163 feet high but not a bit haughty about it.
You’re So Vain
“About Aspen—This is no place for Ordinary.”---Aspen Chamber of Commerce.
I have never had any great desire to visit Aspen. I’ve been to Palm Beach, shopped on Rodeo Drive, checked out Saratoga Springs, I get it. Wealthy people languish there, entrees are 94 bucks and nobody knows how to make a pizza. Walking around, we noticed an active mob outside what appeared to be a music venue, loud twanging pouring from inside the place out into the street. Turned out to be a chic western wear shop filled with women of all ages trying on hats, shirts and boots, probably checking out the spurs they might need to get the boyfriend to buy them something. Aspen is cowboy after cowboy is cool. Pretty soon, that Beth Dutton woman on Yellowstone will have her own church.
From the time you circle into town around the western rotary, driving in Aspen will be a rare experience. For one thing, the streets are small, for another, there are too many cars, for a third, there’s not a ton of available parking. Nothing rare there, it’s something that’s going around. But Aspen carries things a step further by being “bicycle-conscious.” It seems that several years ago, alien Schwinn people planted pods outside the homes of Aspen city commissioners. They were pleasant-looking enough plants that noone took issue, but inside the pods the bikers were growing exact duplicates of the politicos. One night, when the plants reached maturity and the commissioners slept, the aliens replaced the politicians with their doppelgangers and they immediately imposed new regulations disallowing driving more than one contiguous block almost everywhere but on the main drag, fostering the Zombie Zone, which lives to this day. Meanwhile, you never actually see anyone on a bicycle in town.
But who cares? A few miles outside the city, harmony thrives in glamorous Snowmass, where buses live and the natives are singing and shopping and skiing in comfortable climes. Who cares, when just down the road we can hear the ringing of The Bells, jump on a bus and escape to as lovely a place as there is in the world. Are you ready? Then, let’s go.
The Bells
As even the most ferocious internet minimalist knows, you will not escape a day on that contraption without being assaulted by peddlers of every description. Sideshow barkers loudly hawk their wares, romance retailers offer to hook you up with Casanova, fish peddlers sell cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh! Somewhere along the line you will be introduced to The Ten Best Hostels in Zanzibar, The Secret Pizza Parlors of Montefalco or Five Places Where UFOs Have Sucked Up Cows. We here at The Flying Pie are not invulnerable to these tempting lures, especially when they offer inviting loci we have not heard of before, thus when every Top Ten list began including Colorado’s Maroon Bells on their must-see menus, we made a note. For once at least, the shills were on target. If there is a place more beautiful in North America, we haven’t seen it, although Fenway Park is close.
The Maroon Bells, twin peaks in the Elk Mountains separated by about half a kilometer, reach over 14,000 feet into the sky about ten miles west of Aspen. They are the most photographed mountains in America, and not without reason. The Bells are anchored by a stunning reflective lake surrounded by exotic woodlands filled with swaying aspens, creating an oasis of natural wonder that captivates visitors year-round. People get off the entry buses gawking and stay that way for most of their visit. While anticipation almost always dwarfs actuality, the Maroon Bells wonderland is just the reverse. It’s better than almost everyone expects, so compelling that it’s difficult to leave.
Since humans have a predilection for trashing areas like this, the protectors of the Bells allow entry almost exclusively by bus from a small mall at the base of the mountains. The round-trip is a puny $10, though our guide Elliot earned a good tip via his informative monologue and clever sense of humor. The buses operate all day, arriving every half hour, but the destination never seems crowded. There are easy trails for slackers and ambitious ones for fanatics, so everyone will feel right at home. Travel weary? Have a seat on this comfy bench and get out your camera or your lunch and chat up your fellow benchwarmer. Siobhan sat with an erudite author who just by chance was working on a book about suicidal veterinarians and craved her input. What are the odds?
More than 300 million years of geologic activity, including sedimentation, uplift and erosion by wind, water and ice are credited with the creation of Maroon Valley. Maroon Peak and North Maroon Peak received their distinct coloring from the weathering of hematite, an iron-bearing mineral, though the reddish color is only evident when the light is right. Maroon Lake occupies a basin sculpted by Ice Age glaciers. Together, the whole package rivals any visual treat a traveler is likely to encounter, and as an added bonus there are no Ferris wheels, edgy cartoon characters or $9 fresh fruit waffle sandwiches. Professional tourists, known to be achingly fussy, will whisper in your ear that it’s even worth driving in Aspen for.
That’s all, folks….
