The Beginnings

The love of bluegrass music and festivals. The love of bicycling. A penchant for doing things simply. These were the seeds that led to the idea of the "Heart of the Mountains Bluegrass Bicycle Tour".


It began with our bicycling to the Four Corners Folk Festival in 2008 from our home in Crested Butte, Colorado. A 3-day ride for someone taking backroads and more importantly, taking it easy. It was so liberating to be at such a big event and not have all the stuff we normally take in our cars and trailers. We realized that all that extra stuff just made our life extra complicated and we could enjoy the festival so much more by having less and yet still having everything we needed.

So then my long-distance hiker/biker mind began to do some research on how we could link up more festivals. I found what I believe to be the ultimate bicycle tour.

6 Festivals in 8 Weeks, 1750 miles, 99 bands, 0 Gallons of gas. Now we're talking!

We (wife Kiki and I) have done a coast-to-coast bike tour (1999) and really enjoyed it, but I have to say, I am way more excited about this tour because of all the carrots at the end of many sticks, the festivals. Now we will be bicycling for 3-4 days, then hitting a huge camping party with my favorite type of music. It'll be almost as if the party is simply for our arrival! Here's the itinerary:


(All mileages approximate, dates are for the festivals)
Crested Butte ---> Pagosa, CO June 5,6 200 miles
Pagosa ---> Palisade, CO June 11-13 200 miles
Palisade ---> Telluride, CO June 18-21 150 miles
Telluride --- > Bighorn Mnt, Buffalo, WY July 10-12 600 miles**
Buffalo, WY ---> BearTrap Casper WY July 17-19 200 miles
Casper, WY ---> RockyGrass, Lyons, CO July 24-26 300 miles
Lyons, CO ----> Crested Butte (home) 150 miles

**This 600 mile leg will go via the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone NP.

On average, we cover 65 miles a day, sometimes more sometimes less. We ride mountains bikes with slicks on them and use 4 panniers each. So as you can see, we are not built for speed. We love to stay on smaller roads when possible and often like to do 20-40 miles of dirt roads as an option that might help us avoid something not so desirable.

That's it in a nutshell, The Heart of the Mountains Bluegrass Bicycle Tour. Heart of the Mountains, because when drawn out on a map, it roughly makes a heart shape, plus we love the bluegrass band Mountain Heart, so it all seemed to fit.

The BBT is open to anyone who wants to do it. All you have to do is free up some time and come along. The BBT is not a supported bike tour. That is, there is no car following us. We carry everything we need on our bikes and buy food along the way. The BBT is Free. It doesn't cost a penny to do it. (Compare this to the $335 per person for Ride the Rockies). It sure would be nice if there are others doing it with us so we could have a mini-peloton of bluegrass afficianados making the tour that much more fun! Think about it.

Look for more posts as the BBT takes off on June 2, 2009. We'll be giving updates on how the riding is going and how the bands are performing. And if you'd like to join for any of the legs, email kikngar@yahoo.com .