For our 2019 Mission Trip in May, we headed south toward the land of cholla cacti, pinyon pines, green chile, and strong margaritas: we headed to New Mexico. Our destination was Glorieta Adventure Camps outside of Santa Fe, where we planned to work with the local trail crew to help get some of the rowdy, rocky, and technical singletrack ready for the Big Mountain Enduro that would take place there a few weeks later, May 25-26. (And of course, with nearly every member of the Colorowdies Ambassador Team registered for the race, we planned to get a little pre-riding in ourselves.)
We took off Friday morning from Golden with a group of over 30 riders—a mix of Rowdies ambassadors and new friends—and caravanned the six-hour drive, arriving at Glorieta in time for an afternoon ride on two of the lower trails, Chili Dog and Holy Molé. The trails are aptly named. The first word that comes to mind when I think of Chili Dog is “spicy”: chunky rock gardens, some where-the-hell’s-the-line moments, and of course the infamous Chili Dog drop (you’ve seen the crash reel, right?). Holy Molé, on the other hand, is all flow and berms and jumps that’ll have you thinking, I can’t believe I’m not in a bike park right now.
After riding, as the sun went down, we piled way too many people into a converted Humvee—as Rowdies Ambassador Jeremy Bradshaw recalls, “A truck load of Colorowdies comes around the corner, hooting and hollering”—and made our way to dinner, which was kindly provided by the folks at Glorieta Adventure Camps. A heaping load of hamburgers and brats were provided with a shoregasboard of veggies and condiments. After trail work plans were finalized, a bonfire at camp, with a bottomless cooler of beers from Rowdies sponsor Epic Brewing, capped off a fun first evening.
The next morning, some angel miraculously made a drop of spicy, potato-filled breakfast burritos upon camp (OK, so Jeremy made a run to Santa Fe’s Cafe Fina while everyone was snoozing, but when you wake up at a chilly camp in the morning and piping-hot green chile burritos are already there, it may as well be a miracle of divine intervention). Once we were carbed up and caffeinated courtesy of Treeline Coffee and their camp-friendly pourovers, we broke up into groups and spread out around camp, spending the first five to six hours of the day working on trails.
My group worked on a trail where multiple areas were being flooded by spring runoff. We worked on four different areas that required rerouting the trail around a creek, bolstering sections against running water, and building a creek crossing that’d be both hiker- and mountain biker-friendly. Another group helped shore up multiple creek crossings with rock armouring which added spicy rock sections to fast flowing valleys full of high speed drifty corners. The final two groups split the work of rough cutting a new climbing trail section that would separate directional bike traffic to give way to a full go Chili Dog run.
By mid-afternoon, we had the satisfying sense of having earned our ride. Even though we burnt a fair share of our calories, we headed up to Janker and Jagged Axe, two of the crown-jewel stages in the BME each year. Recognizing the work that was performed earlier in the day, the staff at Glorieta kindly offered to shuttle us up to the 4×4 road, saving us a 2,000-foot climb—huge thanks to these guys for being world-class hosts—and from there we ran the party train all the way back down to camp, via Janker and then a second lap on Jagged Axe. At the bottom, someone said, “That may have been the best trail I’ve ever ridden.” We finished the day with a large group dinner at Maria’s New Mexican Kitchen.
Day three presented the opportunity for us to access some early season high country riding led by our camp host. Like most epic backcountry rides, it involved a five-mile, 3,000-foot climb that became mostly hike-a-bike in the final 1,000 feet or so. Fortunately, as I always say, a tough climb means a fun downhill, and indeed we were rewarded with a long, raw, loose, and at times blazing fast descent. I don’t think a smile was lacking on any of the 26 faces, even after wiping the dirt grin away.
The trip was not without its benign mishaps. As Rowdies ambassador Jason Russell, who was nursing a broken femur on the trip, recalls, “The two biggest dudes, T-Bear and Don, broke their rear wheels within 10 minutes of riding at Glorieta. The next day I drove into town for them to get their wheels repaired since I couldn’t dig due to being injured.” I severed a brake line literally moments after making it down Janker—fortunately for me, fellow Rowdie Dom DeMaio happened to have an entire new bike in his van and performed a brake transplant worthy of a scene in Gray’s Anatomy. Oh, and there were some truly alarming sunburns in the group. There are some things teamwork can’t fix, I guess.
But mostly, those little mishaps became part of the funny stories the Rowdies still trade about that mission trip. As Rowdies vice president Jeff Watrobka said, “With the limited riding on the Front Range due to our long winter, the stoke everyone had to ride bikes was contagious. Pushing each other to progress was contagious. Getting that first high country ride in early May was stellar. All the new friends were a bonus as well.” Colorowdies Mission Trips are a huge way to show thanks to locations that are ‘doing it right’ for bikes. In 2021 we’re heading to Summit County to show much needed love to a trail that sits high in the penthouse above Arapahoe Basin—and you should join us this year!