Information request Colorado and Moab

[Rusty]

Hello,

A group of us from the Montreal Jeep Club are planning a trip to Moab and Colorado, to run trails for 2 weeks around september 2016. We are just getting a head start on gathering information and making sure everyone has time to settle their rigs.
We’d be open to the possibility joint trail runs as well with locals clubs.

Basically, We’re looking for the Best trails to run in Moab and Colorado, to get the most bang for our trip and have really good memories. At the moment I only have three trail names that I’ve been able to look up in colorado, and we are looking for trails rated around 4-9, we like rocks.

The official trip will be 3 weeks but minus 6 days of road to get there and go home.

We’d off road week one in Moab and week two in Colorado;

Here are the three trail names from Colorado that I’ve gathered info on already: (Thank you jk experience for the idea’s)
Holy Cross,
Chinaman Gulch,
Black Bear Pass,

Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you very much!

 

[Berzerker]

What kind of info are you looking for? Those are all good trails. I would also look at independence trail.

 

[Rusty]

Basically which trails we should do, we have +/- 14 days minus road days between trails, to do as much good off roading as possible in both states as we have no knowledge of the area we are asking for recommendations for good trails anywhere between a difficulty rating of 4 and 9.

We have 3 good trails that we know of that we have to do which I mentioned above. The rest as of now are a mystery to us.

Thanks again will look into the Independence trail.

 

[Rusty]

Anybody? Moab or Colorado...good trails fun to run,

 

[NAUJK]

Red Cone in Colorado if you are looking for something not to difficult but has some awesome views as you drive up to 12800 feet. If you want a list of good trails in Colorado look at traildamage .com they have a list of Colorado trails and Utah trails with a map showing where they are. Hope this helps.

Cheers
Mike

 

[Rusty]

Red Cone in Colorado if you are looking for something not to difficult but has some awesome views as you drive up to 12800 feet. If you want a list of good trails in Colorado look at traildamage .com they have a list of Colorado trails and Utah trails with a map showing where they are. Hope this helps.

Cheers
Mike

Sorry for the delay didn't notice anyone had posted :doh:

Thank you, I was trying to get peoples personal opinions as to which they liked more, rather than go through web sites, but was already looking into trailamage very informative website so far.

 

[RanchoRubi]

Generally, Colorado is a high altitude destination with old mining shelf roads that pass abandoned ghost towns, mining areas, and views and vistas like you have never seen. Given the time of the year you are looking at the aspens will be turning gold. Personal I have run most of the trails in the southwest part of Colorado in the San Juan mins. You can make base camp silverton, ouray or telluride and explore trails that span out from these towns about 40 mile and be able to get back to town. Beyond black bear, Ophir, Imogene, California gulch, engineer pass are all in the vicinity. Colorado back roads and 4wheel drive trails by Charles wells is an outstanding reference guide I would highly recommend. In Moab, the choices are unlimited.
Sound like an incredible trip.

 

[RanchoRubi]

Btw, send a pm to mechengineer2. He lives in colorado and has been most places.

 

[Moochie]

Btw, send a pm to mechengineer2. He lives in colorado and has been most places.

Mechengineer does not participate here anymore.

 

[Ldogg]

Take a look at traildamage.com for your trail info. Also look at avenza PDF maps for your iPhone, android or tablet. It's a free maps app, and in Colorado the MVUM (motor vehicle use maps) are free from this apps store. there you can plot your trail heads and when connected and gps is working on those you can see real time where you are on the trail. You can export your pins and import into other devices so that if your in a group they all can use the same pins. Again it's all Free and it works great!

 

[Rusty]

Thank you everyone, I will be looking into the information more into detail when I have time! from the looks of it. It sounds like it'll be an amazing time.

RanchoRubi: When you say aspen will be turning gold at that time do you mean leafs changing or it actually snows that time of year?

 

[RanchoRubi]

Thank you everyone, I will be looking into the information more into detail when I have time! from the looks of it. It sounds like it'll be an amazing time.

RanchoRubi: When you say aspen will be turning gold at that time do you mean leafs changing or it actually snows that time of year?

Colorado silver aspen trees. Their leaves turn yellow gold early sept. A slope with a grove of them will be blanketed in that color.

 

[Rusty]

Colorado silver aspen trees. Their leaves turn yellow gold early sept. A slope with a grove of them will be blanketed in that color.

That'l be nice, Used to seeing tree's turn from green to yellow to brown to red. When the colours start to change it makes the scenic part of trailing so much more nice.

 

[NFRs2000NYC]

Pick up both books by Charles Wells, Moab and Colorado (not the northern colorado book). Unless you are going for 14 days, I'd say each location has enough to fill you wheeling needs, and doing both is a bit ambitious if you have a tight timeline.

 

[Rusty]

Pick up both books by Charles Wells, Moab and Colorado (not the northern colorado book). Unless you are going for 14 days, I'd say each location has enough to fill you wheeling needs, and doing both is a bit ambitious if you have a tight timeline.

Thanks and yes we are going for 14 days of trails, not including road from Montreal to Utah, and from Colorado back to Montreal.

 

[rdreng]

I will second what RanchoRubi described of Southwest CO. With a vacation house in Durango, CO, I have been 4-Wheeling in the San Juan’s for a number of years. The scenery is spectacular surrounding Ouray, Telluride and Silverton (Southwest CO). Mid to late September is best for fall colors, but the longer you wait the more chance you have of running into foul weather at the high elevations. Moab is just the opposite, hot during the summer and cooling off in the fall (going from uncomfortable to pleasant temp wise).

If your club ends up in Southwest CO, I would strongly recommend the books by Charles Wells (as others have mentioned). Additionally, purchase the program PDF Maps by Avenza Systems, Inc (as mentioned by Ldogg – I took his advice last summer and the program worked great). Within the Avenza maps library, there are two map files to purchase for the Ouray, Telluride and Silverton area.

They are:

1) Ouray Route Planner (East) by Zaxyn Media
2) Ouray Route Planner (West) by Zaxyn Media

These two map files contain the off road routes mentioned in the Wells book in the Ouray, Silverton, Telluride area. They will greatly assist you in navigating the area.

 

[UtahJohn]

Pick up two books. Guide to Colorado Backroads & 4-Wheel Drive Trails [Paperback] and Guide to Utah Backroads & 4-Wheel Drive Trails [Paperback] by Wells. They are the best books for detailed trail info.

 

[Rusty]

Pick up two books. Guide to Colorado Backroads & 4-Wheel Drive Trails [Paperback] and Guide to Utah Backroads & 4-Wheel Drive Trails [Paperback] by Wells. They are the best books for detailed trail info.

Nice thanks.