The picture above is at the summit of Lizard Head Pass on CO145 between Dolores and Telluride. This is a steep, winding highway through the canyon of the Dolores River. It essentially follows the old railroad bed so we are taking the same route the Galloping Goose took!

This mountain is Sheep Mountain; the namesake mountain, Lizard Head is the other direction (NE) and not visible from the summit, ironically. This mountain rises 3000 feet above our 10,000' elevation. Lizard Head is even higher, being a 14er (a Colorado term for mountains over 14,000').

The picture below is us approaching the summit.

The two pictures above are different views of the same scene. The balls of snow made tracks on the sides of the valley all along the higher elevations. Kinda miniavalanches. Some of them originate a hundred feet or more above us. The snow has to be a bit wet to stick together and form balls which reduces any danger of a real avalanche.

The stream is the upper reach of the Dolores River.

The picture below is near the Ophir Loop, a famous bit of gold field railroad engineering on the Telluride side of the Pass. What made it dramatic was a series of six bridges and a spectacular large wooden trestle bridge over the Lake and Howard Forks of the San Miguel River (bottom picture taken in 1946 -- courtesy of the Old Colorado City Historical Society http://history.oldcolo.com/history/research/riogs3_tmb.jpg)

Ophir was a gold mining town so the constant rebuilding of these trestles from spring flooding still made it worthwhile. There is litle trace of all this effort today, however. The elements here are not kind to human endeavors.