Crested butte

Oh I love a good commute. I used to drive twenty-five miles each way to Denver and back. I drove off-peak traffic times, so it was quiet time for reflection and music. Relaxing, really.

Now it’s different. Sometimes we park the motorhome close enough to walk to work. Usually we’re within a few minutes in the car. But here, in Gunnison, we have a forty-five minute commute through the mountains to Crested Butte each day. It’s not spectacular mountain pass road, but wide-open traffic-free high country highway. Colorado Highway 135 north from US 50 follows river valleys, first the Gunnison, then the East, then the Slate, through pastoral forests farms and fields, right into the old 1800s mining town, elevation eighty-eight hundred feet, at the base of surrounding high peaks.

There is still snow on the ground in Crested Butte.