Heather and I packed up this morning and drove east out of a westcliff on 96. Westcliff has highways 96 and 69 that intersect and go through town…..confusing! Ironic! Anyone else think so?! Anyway, we ended up intersecting hwy 165 at McKenzie Junction and heading south. It was a really pretty drive and we enjoyed it.
Greenhorn Trailhead
We bypassed Bishops Castle for the afternoon drive back and headed into Rye to locate the Greenhorn Trail and the Bartlett Trail heads. After some wandering around and guessing we found the Greenhorn Trailhead- easy if you get on Cuerna Verde Are and stay there- it is at the end. Greenhorn….Cuerna Verde it all makes sense if you think about it. The trailhead is above the Rye Mt. Park area if you go searching and end up there it is easy to get lost in the maze of roads and picnic areas there. Cuerna Verde Rd takes you above that and just a little to the south and East. So once we found that we headed back I got town to check out the downtown Rye district! Two fun stores caught our attention and we did some shopping. Fun local foods from Colorado and a touristy travel store.
Bartlett Trailhead
We got directions to the Bartlett Trailhead from the second and she drew me a map too! I found a fun wildflower book that had lots of stuff I have around home and even a checklist so I could check them off once I have ID them. We drove out to the Bartlett trailhead with the lady’s map and it was easy to find, just go to the end of Bartlett Rd- don’t give up n the way there. Lots of houses etc in the area. The last house that is right by the parking area is kind of seriously signed to stay off their property. As we were checking out the trailhead area, a place big enough to park and turn around a horse trailer, the guy from the house walked up his yard, over the fence and right by us up the trailhead. It would have been totally fine but he didn’t acknowledge us at all other than to glare in our direction as he slunk by. I am not going to lie it was weird and creepy. Like the beginning scenes of a horror film. We left. Don’t go there alone!!! I’m serious.
Bishop’s Castle
So we went instead to Bishops Castle. Another totally random place that didn’t make much sense to me at the time. A large tree house is mind of the feeling I got a play castle with spiral stairs made out of see-thru diamond patterned metal welded together. A little unnerving – well maybe a lot. It took me two tries to get to the top, but I did. Even out into the metal cage on top of the tower and across the metal see thru bridge at the top connecting two towers. It was like a thrill ride – not at all what I expected. You felt like you could fall thru at any time. It was a cool place though. Bizzare and interesting.
Greenhorn Trail Wilderness Parking Area
After we had as much as we could stomach we took FS 360 east into the mountains and eventually caught FS 369 south along the some of the mountains all the way south to the Greenhorn wilderness parking area. Here the Greenhorn trail and the Bartlett Trail both come in at this parking area from below. The view from up here was absolutely amazing. You could see forever clear over to Gardner and past and clear up the wet valley towards Wesrcliff and the Sangres off to the north where they faded out into the evening sun. You could see as far as you could see. It was like Looking out from an airplane! We took Picts up here and started back down to find a place to camp among the hunters and weekenders scattered out along the road at various pull offs. There is a ton of free camping up here and you can get pretty big RV’s up the road easily bit also off into camping areas. I was amazed where people stuffed RV’s. We set up our tent by two RV’s and are a quick supper by headlamp before trying to sleep as cars drove by up to hinting camp until late in the night.
