Leadville to Dillon, Colorado. Friday, July 12, 2024
We snickered as we drove through this tiny town in 1977, couldn’t believe they would really name a town that. Today, Climax, Colorado is technically a ghost town, although there is still an active mine there, the largest molybdenum mine in the world.
Molybdenum is one of those elements you may have struggled to pronounce in chemistry class, but never thought about again. Unless you were a bike geek like me. My first two fancy bikes, my Peter Mooney and my Greg LeMond, were made of very fancy steel, chrome molybdenum alloy, Cro-Mo for short. It was lighter, stronger, more rust resistant, and definitely a status symbol. That is, until carbon fiber and titanium bikes came along. Bike snobs are so fickle. La primadonna è mobile.
The Climax mine was on top of Fremont gap, the second of the 12,000 foot gaps I was going to have to cross, although actually this one was only 11,400 feet. Yeah, I was slumming it. And sure enough, it did seem quite a bit easier, but maybe that was because I was looking forward to the Climax. The downside was hardly anticlimactic (sorry), it had one of those bike trails so glorious you didn’t want it to end, brand new, smoothly paved, taking away all the traffic anxieties so you could enjoy the spectacular views, especially of the Mount of the Holy Cross, one of the Fourteeners. The Mount was dazzling when first photographed by William Henry Jackson in 1873, but the cross is very dependent on the snow cover, and more recent photographs, including mine, don’t show it as well.
The bike path swooped down to Copper Mountain, ski resort, and the town of Frisco where once again I joined the Transamerica Trail, that I had veered off in the Grand Tetons. I was hoping to meet some long-distance road tourists, but didn’t see a one. I did chat for quite a while with Jason, who is doing the Continental Divide Trail on his mountain bike, but when he gets down to New Mexico, he will be taking the ACA Southern Tier route all the way to Saint Augustine, Florida. A native Floridian, he was unfazed by the prospect of record heat, said he would just ride in the early morning and take siestas during the heat of day, possibly under the fly of his tent, or in the shade of a rock. Does that really work at 110°?
I made a curious discovery in a bike shop. I usually asked to use their floor pump, to top off my tires, especially since I have a big climb tomorrow. I was astonished to see that my tire pressure was over 100, when the goal is 85 psi. How could that be? I had filled them to 85 in Aspen.
Then it occurred to me: Aspen is just under 8,000 feet, Frisco is at 9,500. I wonder if at lower atmospheric pressures, internal tire pressures read higher (I had to drop physical chemistry/thermodynamics twice at MIT before I finally passed it). Anyway, I’m glad I didn’t pump them up any higher—instead, I bled them off.
The day wrapped up with a beautiful bike trail around the Dillon Reservoir, where I passed the 3,000 mile mark.
Then to bed early for the big climb up Loveland Pass tomorrow. Almost as high as Independence, but this time I’m going to try it in a single day. Hmm.
Distance 37 miles, 3,004 total. Time 7 hours with stops. Elevation gain 1,969 feet
©️ 2024 Scott Luria
The Ends of the Earth 
Hi Scott, I used to work at Climax mines from 1975 to 1978 . I made 8 dollars an hour when minimum wage at the time was $1.80 an hour. . I often worked double shifts which ended up paying me $180 a day.I felt rich at age 21 and made that trip many times living in Leadville, Copper Mtn., Frisco and Breckenridge. While working there I climbed 26 of the 52 fourteeners with a fellow miner. This is Fred. Madeleines other half. I worked underground for the first year and a half. we took a big cage (elevator kind of) that fit about 30 miners with big batteries to power our headlamps and a self-rescuer in case of fire.I carried a special tool which I had made out of a 12″ crescent with bolts welded over the end so it could be used as a hammer and a wrench because i was a trackman and my job was to repair the tracks. The man cage as we called it dropped us 300 feet down. then we all boarded a train that took us 3 miles into the mountain where we unloaded and started our work day. The temperature was always around 38 degrees year round no matter how hot or cold it was outside and there was usually water on the ground in the tunnels so we had boardwalks along side of the train tracks to walk on. When I had to repair a track that had broke I had to dam off the water, attach a hanging light that grounded on the track and hooked on to the power above like the old cable cars as all the trains were electric. So basically lots of shovel work. Then I transferred to open pit which was above ground and we used big equipment. Electra Haul 120 ton trucks which were 20′ wide, 20′ tall and 40′ long. They had two in-line 6 cylinder diesel engines with pistons about 8″ across and they powered a huge generator that powered the truck by means of electromagnets. ie there was no mechanical linkage. when you got going too fast (18 mph ) the dynamics would kick in which reversed the polarity on the elecromagnets and slowed the truck down. if that didn’t work at 22 miles per hour the brakes would automatically applied. Three discs brakes back to back on each of the back wheels. So as a lubeman two of us could fit in the rear differential to fill the 30 gallon tanks per wheel of brake fluid. Such was the life of a miner. You will certainly enjoy Loveland Pass, I think. I am so glad you get to enjoy the Colorado Mtns as they are very dear to our hearts. Fred
LikeLike
What a great story, Fred. I will update the blog to have people look at that comment. Sounds like it was pretty dangerous, but what a life! Thanks for contributing. Best to Madeline. Scott.
Get Outlook for iOShttps://aka.ms/o0ukef
LikeLike