Road Trip Reveals Bicycle Ride Back in Denver History, and Scenic Pit Stops Along the Way

By Alan Snel

LVSportsBiz.com

 

I remember the final weeks of construction of Coors Field in Denver’s Lower Downtown in early spring 1995 when I would ride my bicycle from suburban Westminster along the Platte River Trail and pedal to the $300 million ballpark that had its main entrance on Blake Street.

 

I admired its red-brick veneer, which was reminiscent of many of the red brick buildings in Colorado’s mountain towns like Idaho Springs 30 miles to the west. Coors Field opened April 26, 1995 and at the time was the first baseball-only ballpark built in the National League since Dodger Stadium in 1962. It was built into downtown, and there was an organic feel to its location.

 

On Saturday, I renewed the bicycle rite. This time, I was bicycling with my long-time pal Rich in LoDo where we pedaled to Blake Street and gazed at the ball yard’s brick exterior. From the outside, the ballpark looked like it never aged. Its bricks gave the building a timeless feel.

 

At 24 years old, Coors Field has aged regally compared to Broncos stadium, which opened Sept. 10, 2001 to replaced old Mile High Stadium. I loved old Mile High with its seats and stands that were so close to the field and were so intensely vertically pitched to create one of the loudest NFL stadiums in pro football.

 

But as Rich and I biked to new Mile High today and the football stadium came into view from the Platte River Trail, the exterior looked like a giant tuna fish can that had absorbed a punch to its side.

 

The Rolling Stones are playing Broncos stadium tonight, and we met the first man on line to get a crack at standing in the pit. A lot of sales tax revenue had to be collected in Denver and its five neighboring counties to pay for the Broncos stadium that cost more than $400 million.

 

It was disheartening to see the football stadium show its age. At 19 years old, the Broncos stadium looked like an elder venue, with a gray exterior showing its literal old age and wrinkles.

 

Here’s a rendering showing the Raiders stadium scheduled to open July 31. 2020.

 

 

Rich and I biked on no less than four different trails in Denver and its southern metro area. With the Cherry Creek and Platte River trails as the backbone for as a wonderful superhighway network for two-wheelers, there were many trails feeding into both trails from every direction.

 

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One day earlier on Friday, I began the day bicycling a scenic drive at Capitol Reef National Park outside Torrey, Utah in south-central Utah,

 

Capitol Reef was a very underrated national park with magestic walls of red rock blended with the greenery of orchards that bear fruit and homage to the historic community of Fruita. Let’s take a peak at some of the photos.

 

 

 

The Capitol Reef park offers a more laid-back vibe than the busier Zion and Bryce national parks, giving a feel that is more consistent with Great Basin off US 50 in eastern Utah than with Zion. It has a campground that showed more tents and than RVs and there was a quaintness to the handful of buildings offering a look back at the orchards that were in the shadow of the regal red rock formations.

 

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To the South was Utah’s famed state route 12, which is home turf for Escalante and the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

 

Two days ago, I drove 12 through Red Canyon and near Bryce Canon before I settled at Torrey for the evening.

 

The drive through Escalante and over the pass was breathtaking. Take a look.

 

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And Day 1 ended at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon — a much more relaxed and less hectic scene than the big crowds and commercialism of the South Rim.

 

There’s no substitute for drinking up the  views of the canyon.

 

 

 

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