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Continuing my journey of locating abandoned stations on the old GSSR Railway.......today I tracked down Gorafe Station. Or rather, the ruins of Gorafe Station as it's currently being used as a goat shed. What a waste! This was the most difficult station so far as neither Google Maps nor Google Earth were that clear on what sort of terrain I might have to cross. It turned out to be pretty rough, full of rocks, and very bumpy. Whoever owns the place now had two guard dogs roaming as well.....just to make things more interesting. What was a surprise was that I also found some other abandoned buildings following the trail to the station......one looked like a former bar and hotel. Went into the bar actually......and everything is still in place despite being abandoned in 1984. Bit spooky really. Watch the vid first (all offroad).......that way you'll get a better overview of where everything was located. This one was hard, the terrain wasn't so clever, it was baking hot, and I ain't getting any younger! But it's better than languishing in an Old Folks Home! Here's the updated map.......green spots are completed stations. This is how it looked in 1966..... And this is what it looks like now........

A muddy day on the trails, won't be much more of this for a few months as it gets warmer and dryer.....dusty days ahead ?? Bath time for Bagheera ?

I seem to take a shitload of pictures of trains as I ride around the Rocky Mountains. All of the towns have a train or two up on blocks in the town center. So here are a few. I'll add more here as I see them. Starting off with my home town - Black Hawk, Colorado. These are the trains that were used to haul gold ore from the mines to stamping mills for processing....

On the way to work earlier in the year.........

Gilpin Hotel now and then. Just up the street from the train. Look at that sparkling clean bike!

We have a bobcat that hangs out in our front yard from time to time, he's a fat bastard, too. Haven't got a lot fo good pics of him as he's always here during low light times; early morning, late evening. Don't see them much in daylight.

Progress is overrated when is sacrifices quality of life.

Ride along with a New England fast guy My brother Jim, captain of the OldMenThatUsedToRace had his GoPro 360 rolling. He was clearing all the big jumps, I was not. He came up on me and passed me at about the 2min mark in the video. There's also an old RM370 that he passes at the tail end. Enjoy!

Fuckmine Pete, that's the best one yet You actually did some off-roading there, of course it may have been different had it been raining ?

They're wild animals, but they do have their standards.

I can't imagine they'd eat the shit that @Pedro seems to like!

A neighboring town, Silver Plume (wonder what they mined there?) has it's own train for tourists to ride as well as a small museum. But the cool part is the engine house where they repair the trains. They also have a nice, original station...

The other train in town, bears the same Engine Number - although I don't know why. Maybe they shared the same line / route or something?

Same train in use.....

I tried to get up and over Boreas earlier this year, but the Pass was clsoed. Wide open today. This road used to be a train track; the route to Breckenridge from Denver and the east. Beginning of the pass...

I'd run outta that bar room as fast as I could. Some places just give me the creeps and this is one of them.

Your bike is only as old as its newest farcle

Plus i get to clean up this 17+ year old steel tank, look how horrific the inside of the gas tank looks like, who lives like this. ?

Then there are these guys - loads of them, hunting in packs. My driveway appears to be a good hunbting ground for them as we always seem them there. They are the main culprits for snagging cats and smaller dogs for dinner..

That's a nice steam locomotive there, in front of that train

I should do a train thread - every freakin' town here has at least one or two old steam loco's sitting on rails in their town center. Our small town has at least 2-3 of them. Here's one from Idaho Springs - next town over from ours..

It's funny, people that just move here are always posting pictures of their lost lost cats and small dogs that are lost. "Help me find Buffy" type posts. Lady, your cat isn't missing, he was lunch.

Mos tof these places were probably built by one or two guys with limited tools. So wood was probably the easiest and most plentiful materials available. There were no towns to go to get help, stone mason s, etc. So wood it was. The train station in Black Hawk is all brick, as most of the town's buildings are brick / stone - but labor to build them was available here in the big city.

Well maybe i;ll pontificate on the significance of changing my tank. I'll loose the" black" part of the black and green which were my 2003 KLR's colours that year. Which btw was probably the only thing going for my KLR was that it was an 2003 and it came in green and black, not all the other puke me colour combo's Kawasaki came up with for the KLR.

Brilliant @Earache.........and you got a train in there too! I'm still hunting for one! And I'm always amazed at how all the buildings are wooden. You don't see that here.......they'd probably all burst into flames in the Summer!

Some pics from last year when I was up there on my XR. Knew there was a box car up there!

Route...

Couple of hours later and I'm home. A pic of our abandoned railway station here in Black Hawk...

One last ranch home in Tarryall before I head out...

A couple of open range pics. One thing we have here is open land. Lots and lots of open land...

Some more of Tarryall's best and finest homes...

Old farm across the street. Who knew that they had caravans back then?

Old homestead cabin in Tarryall....

100 miles later and I'm passing through what used to a be a town called Tarryall. The Tarryall School, built in 1898, is slightly more spartan than Fairp[lay's school...

Making a big loop to turn back north to get home and I pass the Fairplay School in Fairplay, CO...

At the western bottom of the Pass are a steam engine and other cars used on Boreras. Quite the snow shovel on the first car...

The views across the valley are of Breckenridge Ski Resort - you can see the ski runs carved out of the woods...

10 miles later......

About 5 miles down the hill from the Station House is the water tank...

I swear to God, the last time I was here there was a train car sitting on these now empty tracks. That was about a year ago. Have no idea where it went. Probably those fuckin' gypsys - they'll steal anything!

We're at 12,000'-ish above sea level here. Nice and cool as well as beautiful...

Built in 1880, this is where the train workers spent the night during their trek westward...

Cresting the Pass, the old Station House comes into view....

Cleaned her up a bit

It would have been different Bob.......it wouldn't have happened!

Fantastic stuff This is very interesting to me as my niece is married to a 'Gilpin' , it's not a very common name

That is sooooooooooooooooooo right Tym, what is this feckin 'growth' thing that economists talk about all the time. Why is it so important to just make more money all the time ?

Notice the Twilight Zone pic in the bar.......with the hat still there? @Earache pointed it out on Facebook!

Pete needs an XR650R so he can be cool, too....

Dirty bike pics? ? You got me there......out of thousands of bike pics going back to the 70's......there isn't one!