It was a good run
Tons of hikers when we drove up Friday, and aside from a broken down side by side with no one around we passed on the way up and another side by side that passed by our camp in the evening, we were the only vehicles around. We got glares from a few of the hikers, but it was surprising how many were really interested in our vehicles and impressed that we drove the trail and generally made positive comments. It was an awesome trail and I would definitely do it again. Probably my favorite Colorado Alpine trail I have done to date. The combination of scenery and difficulty was excellent.
The trail didn't have the pucker factor of difficulty I had the impression of when I had done the research, but it was still fun in our rigs. I would rate the trail a 5/10 or a weak 6/10 for difficulty with the exception of the Jaws 2 obstacle that's easily bypassed now that they widened the trail there. Jaws 2 I would put at a 7-8 out of 10. It denied both of us although
willis_racing came really close to getting it until his rear end slipped off the line and he got hung on his rear diff. We cruised through the rest of the trail aside from a few deceptively slick spots that required a bit of wheel speed and took each of us a couple of attempts. My carburetor wasn't super happy above 10,000', but it wasn't too much of an issue as long as I stayed in lower gears and kept the RPM up.
Everything I read said it was 4-6 hours one way and that you wouldn't beat the hikers up, but it took us exactly 2 hours and 45 minutes from when we left the trucks and trailers until we reached the end of the trail at the Blue Lakes. Route finding was super easy, I never looked at the GPS tracks I downloaded before the trip. We camped above Lake Como at ~11,800' in a pretty good spot away from all the hikers camped around Lake Como. Aside from some light rain that started around 8:30PM and being cold at night (as to be expected at that altitude), the weather was great.
On the way down we came across a group of four rigs camped in the middle of Jaws 3
We were able to squeeze by them making some multi point turns. Apparently they had started the trail at 6:00pm Friday and only made it to Jaws 3 by 11:00pm and decided to just camp there. We made it back to the trucks and were loaded up a little after 11:00am, so we decided to make a quick stop at the Great Sand Dunes National Park before heading home.
Beginning of the trail going up the switch backs.
Jaws 1.
Jaws 2.
The view from Jaws 2.
Jaws 3 which is two separate obstacles back to back.
Jaws 4, we camped just above this on the way back down.
Heading up above the timberline.
Jaws 5? I don't believe this is officially named but it was definitely harder than Jaws 1, 2.5, 3, and maybe 4 due to being a slick SOB.
