Southwestern Colorado

Sunday, May 28th

Molly and I went to Durango this weekend to visit Sandy and Doug, and my parents. We were looking for a nice ~8 mile run, and we weren't dissappointed. We ran the southern end of the Colorado Trail, from Junction Creek to Gudy's Rest. The first book we had, Hiking Trail of Southwestern Colorado, said the distance was 8 miles (round trip) , with ~1,000 feet of elevation gain. The other book, Trail Runners Guide to Colorado, said it was 5 miles (round trip) with ~1,500 feet of elevation. Hmmm, only one way to find out...

The run was awesome - about 2 1/2 miles of rolling/uphill along the river, then another 1 - 1 1/2 miles of switchbacks to Gudy's Rest. I think the first book was close to being right on the distance - it took us ~ 55 minutes to the top. We enjoyed the views on top for a few minutes, and the return trip took just over 40 minutes for a total time of 1:42. I thought it was one of the best runs we've done so far. Molly was really pushing me on the way up - I think she only stopped once on the switchbacks, while I had to stop 2 or 3 times.