Day 1: Welcome to Ouray

MATT IS A MORON. Ahem. He said I could say that. ;) Being a creature of habit, he left home without his earplugs and without his documents (driver's license, ownership, and insurance slip). Why? Well, we were not leaving on our bikes; we were taking the TTC and then travelling by air to meet the bikes. Luckily, we had pre-arranged for some friends to water our plants while we were away. Matt sent a tearful email pleading with them to hurry along to our condo and take his documents to be scanned and emailed to us so that he could at least have a printed copy to carry with him for the duration of the trip. Thank you, Martin, for rescuing Matt in his grovelling state. =)

We chatted briefly with the tour organizer, Ben, for a few minutes before we headed out. He gave us a list of the living arrangements and the local contact person should we arrive in Ouray first. We would be staying with 3 other people in our "unit".

After breakfast, we set out from Denver for Ouray. The weather was fantastic. The ride to Ouray was mostly uneventful. We stopped at a few scenic lookout spots to take photograhs. We stopped in Clifton for lunch. When we finally rolled into Ouray, it turned out that we were not the first to have arrived. We gratefully got our key and headed to our accomodations to check it out. 

As it turns out, our "unit" is actually a sprawling three bedroom, 2 bathroom house. The kitchen is very well equiped and has a breakfast nook. There is also a large living room and a dining room. The two-car garage has ample space to park our 5 motorcycles. The outdoor space has ample seating (in the front and the open space in the rear) and comes with 2 different barbecues and a fire pit. Wow.

After settling down, we headed back to town to have dinner with the rest of the group. In total, 18 people were participating in this trip, with 15 bikes. We had a hearty dinner of elk burgers and sweet potato fries. After dinner, we took a stroll down the main street of Ouray. It's definitely a small town. We managed to purchase milk, eggs, and bread to make breakfast for ourselves for the week. Then we headed back to the house for the night.

Route for the day:

 

View of I-70 elevated above the ground:

Cess' evil eye during a rest stop:

Clifton - crappy town with a great backdrop: