Gunnison lies just 30 minutes from Crested Butte. It is a small town in Colorado that hides all its glory within itself. It has a certain small town charm and friendliness attached to it that you cannot miss. The town buzzes every summer and fall with activity. Trout fishing, camping, rafting, hunting and our very own mountain biking are some of the activities this small town in Colorado has to offer.

The Trails – Hartman’s Rocks

Hartman’s rocks are a great way to get your body adjusted to the mood. There are more than 25 trails in the area that will keep even the best of the bikers amused. It has short length, mid length and long trails as well. Once you are through with this area, you can enter proper Gunnison mountain biking region.

The Trails – Deadman Gulch

Enter the Deadman Gulch Trail, a 20 mile splendor which has burning climbs, monstrous descends and technical single-track. You can have a great view of the historic Elk Mountains. Large amount of exposed roots and rocks will make your ride even tougher.

The Trails – Deer Creek Trail

The bigger and harder version of this lies in the Deer Creek Trail. After a grueling but short climb through the aspens, you will have the longest stretch of single-track that any single trail has in the Gunnison area. This 29 miles trail is used for cattle grazing towards the end of the mountain biking season and hence you will find it ripped.

Other Trails

The water Gulch mountain biking trail is also a pretty easy 10-mile trail in Gunnison. You will reach Carson if you take this trail. You can go to the Continental divide from here.

The Strand hill trail is another short 8-mile trail, which has a stunning view of mountainous terrain and magnificent aspen groves. Then you have the 24 miles Lost Canyon mountain biking trail. This may take from 3 hours to 5 hours or more depending on your speed. It has a few steep rocky climbs, which will test the best of bikers.

The McIntosh Loop Mountain Biking Trail is a 35-mile trail that has everything you desire in terms of visual beauty. It passes through old logging roads and gives you a great view of the Elk Mountains. Follow the old jeep roads and drive up while having a look at the Gunnison valley.

It would be impossible to cover all the remaining trails of Gunnison Colorado in one single article. When you reach the place, check in any local store and you should find a good map with some solid info on the trails. Happy mountain biking!

For more information on the best Colorado Vacations try visiting Colorado Best Vacations located at http://ColoradoBestVacations.com where you will find valuable information on colorado mountain biking and other information.

If you plan to buy a mountain bike in the near future, there are several factors you will need to take into consideration. One of the most important factors of choosing a mountain bike is what you are going to be using the mountain bike for.

For example, the most avid mountain bikers, as the name implies, like to take their mountain bikes to rugged and rocky mountain terrain. Other mountain bikers prefer unpaved roads and trails, while other mountain bike enthusiasts stick to paved roads and bike paths.

There is a direct correlation to kind of riding you will do and the type of mountain bike you should buy. Three things to pay special attention to are the mountain bike’s tires, the mountain bike’s forks, and the mountain bike’s saddle.

Mountain Bike Forks

There are different types of mountain bike forks, but the main thing you want to look for are shocks. Mountain bikes with shocks will generally be more comfortable to ride than those that do not have shocks, and will also be better equipped to go over rougher terrain. Mountain bikes without shocks will have a more rigid feel to them, but you may find that these bikes are built more for speed than mountain bikes without shocks.

Mountain Bike Saddles

Some saddles are very light weight and do not offer a lot of padding. Some saddles are heavier and offer a lot of cushioning. Generally, mountain bikes that have saddles without a lot of padding are more high performance oriented, while those that have more cushioning in the saddle are designed for leisurely riding. Some mountain bikes also have shock absorbent seat posts.

If you find that you like a higher performance mountain bike better than a mountain bike that is designed for comfort, but do not like the saddle, keep in mind that you can always switch the saddle out for a more comfortable one.

Mountain Bike Tires

When you buy a mountain bike, take a look at the tires. Do you plan to ride on very rugged terrain? Then make sure the tires are wide, a little bulky, and provides lots of traction. Do you plan on riding only on pavement? Then stick with a tire that is a little narrower and smoother, but provides a little bit of traction. This doesn’t mean that you can’t use a tire with a lot of traction on pavement, but you will get more speed with a smoother tire.

These are just a few basic things to look for in a mountain bike. Ultimately, buy a mountain bike that you enjoy riding…you will probably be riding the mountain bike you purchase for the next 5 or 10 years!

Keith is the webmaster of http://MountainBikesAndParts.com For a HUGE selection of new and used mountain bikes and accessories, please visit http://MountainBikesAndParts.com

California Mountain biking can offer you all the pleasure of real biking drama. You will feel the adventure from the moment you begin your ride. While riding, you will not only enjoy the scenic beauty of Californian landscapes but also taste the excitement of mountain biking.

Mountain Biking At Its Best In California

Let us find out what is so special about mountain biking in California. Biking here is wonderful especially up and down the coast. San Luis Obispo County is THE place where biking is immensely popular. You will find that the trails are not only better but also diverse and the best part is that this place is less crowded. These are just the ideal ingredients that can make your ride even more fascinating.

You will be fascinated with the uneven old roads that run deep into calm mountains and if that’s not enough then you can also try your hands at some technical tracks. It is a fact that San Luis Obispo County is quite known for it’s diverse topography. Well, some moderately flat coastal roads, gentle climbs, and of course a mass of extinct volcanoes adds that bit of variety to the terrain.

When it comes to scenic beauty then hold your breath for the Valencia Peak out of Montana de Oro State Park that boasts awesome views of the ocean, coast, Morro Bay as well as the Chorro Valley. While riding on the Santa Lucia Mountains, you can take a loop round western town of Pozo through Navajo Canyon.

Now, you can fetch your bike here and begin mountain biking all by yourself. Setting up your own tour is one option while the other is to indulge in a customized bike tour. The tour operators make sure that their local expertise and experience can see you through your tour successfully. They may also cater a package including lodging and transportation.

Californian bike tours witness countless riders each year. It is true that having a ride along the beautiful coast here is quite irresistible. And the benevolent weather, thanks to the Mediterranean climate, the long distance ride is a thousand times more enchanting.

The rural roads here are present with no traffic at all, making it much easier for you to venture into the forests, meadows or vineyards. You can also feast your eyes at the beach towns and seaside agricultural areas while riding.

Much to the convenience of the Mountain bikers, Mammoth Mountain in California’s Eastern Sierras is one of the many ski resorts here. You will find extensive trail network that is well maintained. And how about, the water coolers, restrooms and phones made available at most points.

It’s about time that you realize your dreams in California. If mountain biking is your passion then California is the right place to be in. What you get is more than what is told here.

Robert Sheehan is a freelance writer and co-owner of

http://www.bicycles-are-us.com Visit Robert And

read more about bicycles at

http://www.bicycles-are-us.com/Mountain-Bikes.html

One day, James, a friend of mine here in Cotahuasi, Peru, approached me and asked a favor. He said he was putting on a large mountain bike tour the beginning of May. He had asked for my help in checking out a potential route across the high plain to Charcana, as I was familiar with part of the route. I had done a 16 hour hike across that area with Max, another friend who is a government official working on many projects here. That time he was researching an area on the high plain to use for a vicuña preserve. Vicuña are an endangered wild animal, related to the llama, whose wool is VERY valuable, and hence poaching is a big problem.

Back to the bike trip, at 3:15 Saturday morning, a horn honked outside my house and I joined Julio and Daniel in a truck for the three hour ride up to our starting place at 14,000 feet elevation. On the way we stopped three times, each time picking up a horse and numerous people who were going that was as well. Fortunately we got to ride in the cab instead of in the back of truck in the cold with the horses. There is no public transportation that goes up to the high plain in spite of the fact that many people live up there. The villages are small and far apart so it would probably not be economically feasible for combi (minivan bus) service. After what seemed like ages, we were finally dropped off in the middle of nowhere at a sign for the school in "Laxa" with an arrow pointing to the left, there was nothing in sight except a small trail.

It was light by the time we started to ride at 6:15, following the very rocky trail Max and I had hiked previously. Of course, riding a bike is much different than hiking. The trail dropped down into a deep gully and climbed steeply back up the other side. It was too steep to ride so we had to push our bikes. Julio soon had a flat tire from the thorns on the trail. We passed by the one room school that was near a few houses, but otherwise out in the middle of a large empty plain. We were on the trail to Lacsa but reached a point where I was pretty sure that we needed to head in a different direction to go to Charcana, as we had hiked to Andamarca on the previous trip. Fortunately, we saw a woman walking off in the distance so were able to get general directions from her. She had pointed off to the right of the trail we were on and we could see the trail climbing up a ridge on the other side of the plain. Thinking that cutting cross-country would be as good as the poor trail we were on, we headed in that direction.

That wasn’t a great decision but we had almost arrived at the trail when the strap on my daypack broke. Here we are at about 14,000 feet with no needle and thread, how do we fix a broken strap? The brake cable on my bike was longer than needed but I had not cut off the extra length, I just left it sticking out the end. We broke a few strands off of that and Julio used the wire to sew the strap back on the pack! Crisis averted and we were on our way again.

Now we were finally on the main trail to Charcana, which was an old Inca trail. We went through the ruins of the old village of Lacsa, bypassing the current village. We followed the trail across the high plain for miles, going down into and climbing out of numerous deep gullies on the way. At one point there were a few stone towers, about six feet high, near the trail. Of course we had to stop and take pictures with our bikes on top of one of the towers.

In typical local fashion, my fellow bikers had a bag of bread rolls and about a quart of water between them, and I’m sure were laughing at my full pack. However at lunchtime, after sharing my water, trail mix, cheese, an apple and cookies with them, they probably were glad I had brought more than they did.

We were on a trail that was new to me, and I was the guide; all we knew was that we were going in the right direction for Charcana. We passed a few houses and buildings, all made out of stones as that was the only building material up on the plain. Also lots of llamas and sheep, which somehow survive eating the very rough and sharp grass that grows up there. We couldn’t actually see Charcana because it was down in a canyon somewhere ahead of us. After many false sightings of what I hoped was the correct canyon, we finally reached the far rim of the high plateau and I could see Charcana on the other side of the canyon. It seemed so close that we weren’t worried about the time and spent too long taking pictures on top of a couple of large boulders that were on the edge of the rim.

Finally realizing that is was getting late; we started down the trail that led down the canyon towards Charcana. However the trail soon turned off and headed up that canyon instead of continuing down to the bottom in the direction of Charcana. It also became a very poor trail, overgrown and in bad condition, nothing like the main trail that we had been on. After awhile we decided that we must be on the wrong trail. But there had been no obvious junction and by that time we decided it was better to continue than to go back and try to find the correct trail, especially as we had no idea where to look for it. We could see a trail heading towards Charcana on the other side of the canyon, so we agreed to continue going up the canyon to intercept that trail as the river looked too deep to cross if we were to go straight down to it.

After over an hour the trail arrived at the river and there was a suitable place to cross it, for which we were very thankful. We were even more thankful to discover that the trail we had seen on the other side was a beautiful trail for biking, with gentle ups and downs and lots of fun curves. We had a great ride but we were hungry, thirsty and very tired when we finally arrived in Charcana at about 4:15 in the afternoon. We were the local heroes when they heard we had ridden our bikes across the high plain but then confirmed that we were "loco" when we said we were going to continue on to Cotahuasi instead of staying there. The locals tried to convince us to spend the night there but we all had plans for things to do in the morning and said that we needed to get back to Cotahuasi that evening. There is a phone in Charcana so we called Max in Cotahuasi to see if he could come in his pickup and meet us part way and give us a ride back. We weren’t able to talk to him directly but did leave a message for him. We bought a large bottle of soda and some cookies and after a short rest headed down the trail towards Andamarca and Cotahuasi.

This was a trail I was familiar with and it was a fairly good trail so we were able to make good time for a couple of hours, until it started to get dark. I have a good set of bike lights but before we left in the morning I realized that the batteries were not charged so hadn’t brought them with me. All I had was my small LED headlamp, and the batteries in that were not fully charged, and I didn’t have any spare batteries. Daniel had a small bike light but his batteries weren’t fresh either. By the time it got dark, we had reached a new dirt road. It had just been built and wasn’t firmly packed yet so wasn’t the greatest for biking. So here we were, three bikers with two lights going as fast as we dared down a very winding mountain road, trying to get as far as possible before our lights went out.

We had been riding at night for about two hours with our dimming lights, and had passed through Andamarca to a better and safer road, when we saw some lights coming towards us. We soon realized that it was the Cotahuasi police but figured that they must be going to some emergency, as they had their light flashing. By this time our lights were worthless so we were walking, pushing our bikes. We met the police at 8:15, 14 hours after we started riding, and found out that Max had sent them to rescue us because he didn’t have any gas for his truck. We gladly put our bikes in the back of their pickup and rode back to Cotahuasi with them, saving us a couple more hours of "hike a bike" in the dark.

Vic Hanson is the founder of Adventure Cotahuasi Tours, which offers pre-planned and custom adventure travel tours in Cotahuasi Canyon and other areas of Peru.

http://www.adventurecotahuasi.com

Everyday when I look out my window or go out of my house, I see a large mountain across the canyon. I had hiked up one trail a couple of times and found some Inca ruins at about 11,500 feet and also realized that the trail continued around to a new road that went up to the top of the mountain from the other side, and then on to some other villages. Later I rode my bike up the road, it took about 2 ½ hours to the junction with the foot trail but I didn’t have time to continue up any farther. The following week I hiked up a different trail and reached the top of the mountain, it is actually the rim of the canyon and beyond that there is a rolling high plain. I went to the nearest high point, which was 14,200 feet. This is 5,400 feet above my house.

From there I had a great view of the Canyon, the village of Cotahuasi and the snowcapped peak of Mt. Solimana across the canyon on the other rim. I also saw the road coming up from the backside and knew that one of my next outings would have to be to ride up the road, my first “14er” on a bike! When I say road, don’t think of anything like a nice paved mountain road in the U.S., we’re talking narrow gravel road like the fire roads going up the mountains in Southern California. It was summer but also the rainy season and usually the rain clouds come from that direction in the afternoon. I decided to give it a try on a Wednesday, about a week later, but when I woke up at 6:30 it was very cloudy and looked like it would start raining early. However by 8:00 it started to clear up so I decided to go for it.

It was 9:05 before I finally left my house and it had turned into a beautiful but cool morning. I knew it would be cold on top so I put my tights on over my bike shorts. The first 20 minutes is a technical single track that goes down into the canyon, crosses a bouncy suspension bridge and then climbs back up to the road. This is the walking shortcut. Following the road from my house takes about 40 minutes. From there it is about 10 minutes on the road down into another canyon and then the climb starts. However before I got to the second bridge, I had a flat tire. There are cacti of many different kinds everywhere here and they all have nasty thorns. Anyway, I only had two freshly patched tubes with me so was hoping I would be OK on the road. I found one thorn and removed that, fortunately I took extra time checking the tire and found two more thorns before putting in the new tube. I have had up to five holes in one tube when I went to patch it!

For the next 1 ½ hours I was roasting but didn’t stop to take off my tights because I kept thinking it would be getting cooler any time now. About 2 ½ hours from the start, I went through the small village of Cocchapampa at about 10,500 feet, where I had attracted much attention from some kids the first time I rode up. I think I must have been the first biker they had ever seen riding through there. This time a group of little girls took one look at me and ran off screaming like they had seen a monster! Just past the village the new road forks off, and after about 10 minutes of flat riding around a hill it starts climbing again. Looking ahead there was nothing but long switchbacks heading up the side of the mountain.

For some reason I wasn’t feeling very strong or motivated this day and at this point wasn’t sure if I would make it to the top. I stopped for lunch at 10,750 feet and decided to set a goal of 13,000 feet and see what time it was then and what the weather looked like. At the beginning I had set a 3:00 pm turn around time because it usually starts raining shortly after that. One of the problems with having an altimeter watch while climbing is that I keep watching it to see how fast I am climbing. It is like watching a pot waiting for it to boil, very slow! It seemed to take forever to get from 11,000 to 13,000 feet but I finally made it with numerous rest stops on the way. At this point I could see where the road went over the rim of the canyon and it was too close to turn back so I kept going. I got to the rim before 3:00 pm but my joy turned to groans when I realized that I was only at about 13,800 feet.

The road was still climbing gradually so I kept going, aiming for a high spot a ways up the road. The good news was that it wasn’t a very steep road at this point so was easy riding, the bad news was that is wasn’t a very steep road at this point so I wasn’t gaining much elevation! I reached the high point at exactly 3:00, five hours and 55 minutes from the start but it was still only 13,950 feet. I was now only about 50 horizontal feet from the rim of the canyon facing Cotahuasi (I had come up the back side) so walked over to enjoy the view and see if it was possible to hike up to that point (looked challenging) and also hoping that my watch would “catch up” and register over 14,000 feet, but it didn’t. At this point the road dipped down again and the next high spot was probably a couple of miles away. ‘

The weather was cloudy and cool but rain didn’t look imminent so I continued. At 3:08 I went over 14,000 feet but decided to continue on to the high point. A couple of minutes later I was at a narrow flat topped ridge and could look down at the road I had just come up as well as over a few miles to where I had hiked up to the week before. The elevation here was 14,140 feet and the road marker showed that I was 14 Km from Cocchapampa. I had climbed about 6,000 vertical feet in about 15 miles and was already wondering what my next goal should be (besides doing it faster). The road continues on the high plateau for about five hours by car to Oyolo, or going the other direction it goes near the base of Mt. Solimana at about 15,500 feet.

By now I was getting cold, had my fleece pants and jacket on, added a windbreaker, and a hat under my helmet and started down, wishing that I had brought my full finger gloves as well. You would think I would remember, I had done the “cold-numb-white-knuckle” braking thing before, coming down similar loose gravel switchbacks from the other rim. Fortunately it wasn’t as cold this day and I was soon down to lower and warmer elevations. Two hours and 40 minutes from the top, I was back at my house with no problems (other than scaring the little girls again) but did walk more going down the single track due to being very tired, there is a very unforgiving drop of 150 to 200 feet on one side, down to the river. Actually I walked more of the uphill on the single track too. After nine hours it was good to be home to warm food, cold orange drink and a hot shower, pleasantly exhausted. The next day I hiked about 22 miles to a village downriver (but up in elevation), returning the following day, but that is another story.

Vic Hanson is the founder of Adventure Cotahuasi Tours, which offers pre-planned and custom adventure travel tours in Cotahuasi Canyon and other areas of Peru.

http://www.adventurecotahuasi.com