Friday, July 16, 2010 U.S. BASIN and BROWN MTN

I watch the hummingbirds every morning while I eat breakfast.  They are just so darn cute, it's hard to not keep taking pictures of them.  They have gotten used to seeing us through the window.  We have to refill the feeder daily.

 After yesterday's adventure, we took easy trails today.  We headed north out of Silverton on Hwy 550 and took U.S. Basin's south entrance and back to 550 from the north entrance.  Last time we were in U.S. Basin, it snowed and sleeted on us.  It was beautiful today.  I was experimenting with my camera and took quite a few shots of the mountain range across the highway.

You can see some of the trails across the way.

None of us had ever been to Brown Mountain.  It's between Ouray and Silverton.  It's a pretty easy trail, although, Jane wanted to change the name to "Hood-Trail," because she said that's all she was seeing today -- her hood as we went up and down some good size bumps.  Lots of Evergreens; pretty ride.  For some reason, it does not appear in any of the trail guides. 

This is Silver Mountain Mine.  

There was a sign posted saying that it is being "Preserved."  ???

This is supposedly an engine from an old Army truck.  

The engine was being used by the mine.

Looking towards Ouray

Red Mountain(s) are always easy to identify.

The summit of the mountain is 13,327 feet elevation.  

The trail continued on, but it was a ledge road of skree, 

and we had been advised to not attempt it, so we turned around here.

Headed back down.