We woke early and packed our bandit's camp, cruising our bicycles down into Ouray's main street. After a turn up and down, we hadn't yet seen a coffee shop to procure breakfast from. A lady stopped and asked us how far we had traveled and where we had come from, a question often asked that deserves a prepared response, and yet I still haven't learned to spit one out cohesively. Adele snapped to action and gave the basics: from Portland, about 2000 miles. We ask if there's a coffee shop nearby, and while she thinks, a passerby chips in with a location half a block away.
The bistro is busier than any place we've been for months. A long line of customers stands in a queue along the narrow space between the wall and the counter surveying the many options listed on seven chalkboard panels. As we near the register to place our order, the passerby who had recommended the place materialized near us and chipped in again, "I'd like to buy your breakfast. I admire what you're doing."
Scott is a schoolteacher and athletics director like my father is, but works on the opposite corner of the country at a boarding school in Georgia. We swap stories of adventure while eating; we're on a bicycle trip through Colorado, he's on a road trip before school starts, we camped in the hills last night, he drove past us and the Volkswagen van parked on the shoulder there this morning. We talked for what seemed to be lovely hours about the things we had in common. Adele explained the basics of Montessori schooling philosophy, and Scott asked a poignant yet not too pointed question about how we balance ambition and simplicity in our lives.
Scott bid us farewell and we wished him luck on the rest of his journey with a grateful thanks for the meal. We moved to a two-seated table on the wall to get some office business done, and while Adele typed, I read a novel until I was approached by an old man with a cane, about four and a half feet tall and wearing a cap and pearl snap shirt. He had been making the rounds through the shop meeting strangers and ribbing folks he knew, and began telling me tales of his boyhood in Ouray as a cook's helper feeding 700 miners every day, black coffee and pancakes. Known to the workers as "Shorty," he was the butt of many practical jokes such as shoes nailed to the floor or long woolens stretched out to twice his length until the foreman threatened to fire anyone else who messed with the boy. I asked his name, and he gave it as Gilbert, a native american and cousin to Geronimo, as he claimed. He turned to a posse of motorcycle travelers at the next table as we prepared to leave. The whole time he spoke, he nursed a cup of homemade wine that he carried with him. Gilbert was a long talker, but not unpleasant and good natured. He knew a lot of jokes, one about the devil and Chief Joseph... we saw Gilbert again later in the day as we were making sandwiches on a street bench. "Why didn't you get me one?" he laughed as he slowly walked across the street.
We hiked the perimeter trail around the city, climbing to high points in the hills around the canyon and getting spectacular views of the small town. A few hours later we paid our admission into the city's pool system, fed by a natural hot spring, and gloried in the relaxation of hot showers and warm water to lounge in. We stayed for several hours and then dropped by the town's other brewery, a quirky one-man operation with enormous steins.
We camp on a ridge above town tonight with our bicycles sitting behind a big rock in the parking lot below. With any luck they will still be there in the morning when we plan to leave to Durango through the Red Mountain Pass.
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