After so many days of inclement weather, this morning and most of today was absolutely beautiful! It was our plan to drive Phantom Canyon Road, which is one of the most scenic and historic drives in Colorado to Cripple Creek and then Shelf Road back to Canon City. Both roads are a part of the Gold Belt Scenic Byways. The Gold Belt retraces the historic route connecting Cripple Creek and the Victor Mining District, site of the world's largest gold rush! And, on our way, we actually saw a young man panning for gold with his dog! Yes, he said he had gotten a few flakes. We got the map provided by the travel magazine and off we went!
CANON CITY TO PHANTOM CANYON ROAD
Our view from our motorhome this morning!
Another view from our campground! Absolutely beautiful!
We are on Phantom Canyon Road and we are so excited! This type of drive is what we live for!
On our way we saw this very old backhoe (we think)!
Oh wow - "warning", but our Jeep is not over 25 feet!
Okay, now we're excited! I'm thinking about the wonderful pictures I will be able to take!
WHAT? ROAD CLOSED? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME - BECAUSE OF FLOOD DAMAGE!
With the road closed, we decided to head to Shelf Road via Florence, which is where the United States Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum Facility is located, which we were told was half buried underground! It also houses the Unabomber and the Shoe Bomber, just to name a few. Timothy McVeigh was there until his execution for the Oklahoma City bombings. No, we did not go see the prison. I just thought I would throw this bit of information in!
On our way to Florence we came across these beautiful horses!
And then out of nowhere, Pike's Peak pops up!
Arkansas River, still flowing hard, flooding!
We found this very nice café and stopped for breakfast.
Thom: Cinnamon Roll; Bonnie: Cinnamon Muffin - Delicious!
Florence, Colorado is known for its antiques!
WHAT? Filet Mignon for $9.95! That's what the storefront said.
FLORENCE TO CRIPPLE CREEK VIA SHELF ROAD
Okay, here we go again! Warning signs about our planned drive!
More warnings as we drive a bit.
This road doesn't look like it needs all those warnings we have seen. Yes, it was curvy but that was about it, at this point!
Can you see the sleeping Indian?
This cabin was built into the ground.
One thing is for sure, this Shelf Road has some beautiful sites!
Now one can see why it's in the Red Canyon!
Here we go ... Pavement Ends!
And, more warnings!
We are headed to Cripple Creek, not the Bank! LOL!
And then the real fun begins! This is crazy!
But this road offered us a part of Colorado we have never seen.
Thom did a fabulous job of driving the Jeep, especially when you could not see if anyone was coming around the mountain curves, as we drove the "shelf"!
Do you see how close to the edge we were? If we weren't there, we would never have seen this beautiful stream though!
More of the fabulous red rocks along this drive. This is actually just above us. We were able to drive the Jeep with the top down for quite a while today.
More of the red rocks.
The rushing stream was just below us. This road took us from an elevation of 5303 at Canon City to 9395 at Cripple Creek.
We are driving "up" again. And, it was beginning to drizzle.
But just around the corner is always a view never to repeat itself.
Okay ... this is where Bonnie starts getting a bit antsy. Thom is so close to the edge, to allow this car to pass us, and I'm letting him know just how close we are! But, as always, Thom is level-headed and knows how to calm me down!
This is my view as the car passed us. I figured I would look down and just talk myself out of the "what if" of the situation!
Clear!
Shelf Road - what a drive, literally a shelf alongside the rocks!
When we got to this point, there were a few vehicles in front of us. There was a sign saying to not cross the road if it is covered with water. Well ... they crossed, so we did! Hey, we have a Jeep, and as they say, "you can go anywhere in a Jeep"! Or is that just a Coste saying?
I took over 250 photos of this drive and it was so hard to break it down. It is such a beautiful drive.
Spectacular rock formations.
Beautiful valleys where you feel a bit safer, even though we wouldn't trade in the adrenaline rush of a drive like this!
One of my favorite scenes. I could have sat there with a chair if we were allowed to stop on the road (and if I had a chair)!
What a great arch to come to. Magnificent!
This marked the end of our Shelf Road Gold Belt Tour, now it was on to Cripple Creek, still with some dirt roads but nothing like what we just drove on.
All of a sudden the mountain formation changed.
Less red and more grey.
Along the way, there are lots of cattle and horse farms but very few farm homes visible.
As we got closer to Cripple Creek, signs of mining became quite evident.
This is a retention wall just south of Cripple Creek. It is made of wood and rocks.
As you can see, it rained! What's new!
CRIPPLE CREEK TO CANON CITY
In retrospect, not going to Cripple Creek via Phantom Canyon Road and returning on Shelf Road was a good thing. Shelf Road would have been much more of a challenged return drive. We took Colorado 11, which turned out to be a really nice drive with a different terrain.
We came up a mountain pass and saw this sight! Breathtakingly beautiful! This is not Pike's Peak!
It is just about June and many mountain ranges are still covered with snow!
So many different rocky mountains - duh!
I wonder what's at the top of this rocky mountain!
Deer and more deer! These are the first of a just a few more deer seen all day.
Check out his horns!
We came around a corner and now things are green! It is like a "view master". Each "click" is different, sometimes more spectacular than the last.
Click!
ROYAL VIEW CAMPGROUND, CANON CITY
There is a place at our campground where you can go up to a viewing area and you can see the Royal Gorge Bridge. As the sun passes, the bridge becomes brighter, and we were lucky enough to catch the change this evening (see below).
In the opposite direction of the bridge, this is the view.
Zoomed in.
OTHER SIGHTS ALONG THE DRIVE
Tomorrow we head west with our destination being Gunnison, which means crossing Monarch Pass and the Continental Divide with an elevation of 11,312!
Until next blog ...
