March’s Microadventure: Saturday drive up Poudre Canyon

 

Microadventure: National Geographic’s 2012 Adventurer of the Year, Alastair Humphreys, made this his thesis for life. He believed that capitalizing on small, close-to-home adventures was not only fun, but healthy for the explorer in all of us. Or as Alastair says, adventures that are “small and achievable, for normal people with real lives.”  Just get out and do something you wouldn’t normally do.

Our original plan for March 9th was skiing at Snowy Range, but 50mph winds led to the alarm getting turned off, and a late breakfast at our favorite, Luxury Diner.  Kubo and I didn’t want to spend the day sitting around the house, so we exchanged “I dunno, what do you wanna do?”‘s, before Kubo suggested we hop in the car and go on a mini road trip up Poudre Canyon.  I was game, so we threw some things in the car, filled our water bottles and headed out!

Immediately upon getting onto I-80 we saw the road closure sign, so we shrugged off all guilt about not going skiing, as we wouldn’t have been able to get there anyway.

Skies were blue as we took some back roads down from Cheyenne to get over to the highway heading up Poudre Canyon.  We enjoyed the drive, stopping a few times, and continuing on towards Cameron Pass, where I hadn’t been before.

As we neared Cameron Pass, the blue skies gave way to a snowstorm, but we continued on, making it to the summit, where we jumped out for some quick photos and laughed at people in their big trucks getting stuck.

We backtracked, stopping for a late lunch/early dinner at the Glen Echo Restaurant, enjoying some big burgers and soup before continuing on.  The menu puts dessert first, which was clever, and I shocked Kubo by insisting we order real food instead of pie to eat.

After eating we cut over on some back roads to the Red Feather area before rejoining 287 briefly before we cut off on Larimer County Road 80, which I have ridden on my bike as one of my favorite gravel riding routes.

All in all, we drove well over 200 miles and enjoyed the sun and snow all the same.  It was great to get out of the house, and do a bit of exploring of new-to-me sceneries, especially since the wind and chilly temperatures put a hamper on other ideas for things to do.  Nothing like a nice, Saturday drive!