September 2010 Colorado Trip (not South KC)

Sorry, not so helpful for the south Kansas city routes, but I wanted to post about the bike trip that my friends Kent and Khari and I took in Keystone, CO.  Keystone is at about 9000 feet and we're only at about 900 in Kansas City, so I was pretty worried about the altitude.  Luckily, I had a few days at my parents' house in Larkspur at 7000 feet to acclimate.  Turned out we were all about the same conditioning after factoring in the altitude, so it didn't really matter.

Day -1 (2 days before Khari arrived)
Did a fire road about a mile from my parents' house for about 30 minutes up and 10 minutes down.  Adding time to get there, I rode about an hour total

Day 0 (1 day before Khari arrived)
Kent and I met near Morrison, CO for the Lair of the Bear park loop.  Lots of tough parts, including the one in the pic, where we had to get off.  Great weather and scenery.

Day 1
Khari arrived and the 3 of us did trails around the base of Keystone, up to aqueduct trail and some clear cut regions.  About 2 hours.

Day 2
This was the big day.  Did the Westridge Loop trail, which was about 30 miles total from our house.  Started with lots of gradual climbing to 10,500 feet, then steeper stuff up to about 11,000.  Then single track downhill most of the rest of the way home.  Took us 5 hours total.

Day 3
Khari and I rode from the west end of the ski area to the east side and back, about 11 miles.  Then I continued on the very nice paved Lake Dillon trail to the Lake Dillon dam and back, another 9.  32 degrees when we started, about 50 when I got home.