Breck, Soda Creek, and Salt Lick

Breckenridge Trail Systems: Experience flowy downhills, grinding climbs and historic mining roads. Tucked in the foothills of the Rocky Mountain’s Tenmile Range is Breckenridge, a small town with big mountain biking trails and terrain. At an elevation of 9,600′ with 800 miles of track — it is also a Gold Level Bicycle Friendly Community, awarded by the League of American Bicyclists. Mountain biking and cycling are a huge part of Breck’s backbone. From adrenaline downhills to relaxing cruisy trails, the town’s incredible network of trails all boast easy access and that will take you up and down Colorado’s famed terrain. Get ready for alpine singletrack, loamy forest trails, and fields of wildflowers as far as the eye can see.

Soda Creek (Horse Gulch Trail Systems, Keystone): Mountain biking in Summit County is more than flumes, pine forests and mine tailings. When you get away from the Breckenridge area — home to the county’s most popular trails — things open up to reveal rolling meadows and faded ranch buildings. It’s the other side of life in the Rocky Mountains: Alpine ranching, the High Country’s last, great industry before the rise of ski tourism. On the west side of Keystone Resort is a system of trails that weaves past the fairways of Keystone golf club and then north into Frey Gulch or south into Horseshoe Gulch/Soda Creek. The systems eventually connect with the wooded routes many mountain bikers know and love — Blair Witch, Gold Run Road, the Colorado Trail — but for a few short-and-sweet miles, it’s a taste of riding not often found in these parts (unless you want to pedal high above tree line, that is).

Salt Lick Trail Systems: Right out of the back door of our office in Silverthorne lie the Salt Lick Trail Systems. This series of trails pass through stands of lodgepole pine and aspen and you are greeted with amazing views of Lake Dillon, the Continental Divide the surrounding areas. The Salt Lick Trail System offers intermediate routes for more novice mountain bikers and includes Ute trail names such as “Nah-oon-kara” which is the Ute name for the land where blue water meets the sky, “Too-pwech” which means rock and “So-ov” which means Aspen tree. You can take the Summit Stage to the top of Salt Lick and ride the trails down or pedal from the bottom up with different possible types of loops and plenty of rolling terrain.