Season Opener—Montrose Adobes

Fun day today. The weather has at last cooperated, giving us all a taste of spring. I celebrated by taking the dirt bike to an area just north of Montrose, Colorado, known locally as the “adobes.” The soil in this area, as you can see from the pictures, is pretty bad and doesn’t support agriculture and isn’t frankly very pretty, so several thousand acres have been set aside for motorcyclists. Local organizations have established many, many trails.

One of the things that makes the Adobes great is the low elevation. The high country is still snowed in, but at an elevation of less than 6,000 feet, the snow has dried up and gone. The soil is soft and absorbent—not a place where you want to get stuck in the rain, but after the rain has had a chance to soak in, it’s nice, traction-friendly, loose dirt.

Although the soil looks bad, that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything at all. In fact, I caught some flower pictures—some of the earliest wildflowers.

Since I was by myself today, I didn’t try anything too daring. It seemed like just yesterday that I was there, but actually the last time was last November. There’s a main “road” that goes through the entire area. Trails such as “Skull and Crossbones” and other gentle-sounding things take off everywhere. Yes, I tried a couple miles of “Skull and Crossbones.”

Not content with just photographs, I took some video too. I’ll process that and put it in a separate post. In the meantime, let the season begin!