I’m interested in a 7-10 day mountain biking holiday in Utah and or Colorado with a group of friends (5 of us in total). Can anyone recommend a holiday company to go with? I’d be particularly interested in people who have actually done it.

I know we could fly out and DIY from there but we had a brilliant time when we went to British Columbia last year with a guiding company who had local knowledge and also enjoyed riding/meeting with the others on our tour so with limited time and doing enough navigating at home we are looking to book up on a tour.

Budget is important but not as important as having a good time whilst we are there.

We would like to go September/October. Does this sound like a good time to visit these spots?

Any other tips on what to do whilst we are there to round it out to 2 weeks would be great.

Keppoch.

'Fraid I can't advise on a bike company but can comment on the Sept/Oct time of year in Colorado, as I went out there mid September a few years ago to Crested Butte.

The weather was superb all week, clear blue skies, very warm (not super hot) and bone dry trails (they were in a longstanding drought then). Of an evening it got chuffing cold – autumn at altitude (9,000ft).

However, the day I left to head up to Colorado Springs the snow came down big style. So, you're possibly pushing your luck as to whether the high trails will still be open. Possibly further south (Durango, Telluride) might have a longer summer season.

I found this to be a really useful site when researching going out there, it has trail condition info / web cams / accommodation:-
Crested Butte trails info

The link has some guiding options on it. There's also a good outdoor shop, The Alpineer, which hires (good quality) bikes: it's on that link too.

If you're interested I still have trail maps around somewhere I could dig out (I keep hoping to go back!).

I've been to Colorado / Utah a few times now and since the demise of Rocky Mountain Adventures I don't think there's a tour company working out there for / from the UK.

The last few times I've been I've done it all myself on the back of booking cheap flights in BA's sales. Last time was Sept / Oct last year (9 day trip) – weather was spot-on although we targeted Fruita / Moab for the trip and did little in the Rockies.

It's very easy to ride in Fruita and Moab without a guide as long as you are sensible and appreciate the terrain and locations for what they are, i.e. deadly very quickly if things go wrong. Most of the rides are now way-marked and there are good guide books available from places like Amazon which you could get hold of in advance of the trip.

I can send you a spreadsheet for last year's ride showing where we rode, where we stayed, travel distances etc.? There were 5 of us on this trip and we hired a small Focus type car and a BIG 4×4 which easily swallowed the 5 bikes and 3 people – other 2 people and bags went in the Focus. Accommodation was a mix of hotels / motels and a rental cottage in Moab. Worked out fine, and cheap, although a couple nights had to involve 2 sharing a Queen size bed – how friendly are you with your mates?

Breckenridge is a good base for the Rockies but Sept / Oct may be a little late in the season and you may get snow on the higher rides.

This year I'm organising a Phoenix based 9 days, again, on the back of cheap BA flights.

Next year is Breck / Crested Butte / Fruita / Moab for 3 weeks – meeting up with a load of mates from Oz and really looking forward to it.

If I can help with any info let me know.

Cheers,

Mark

not much to add to ^ except to say you lucky swine – some of my fondest mtb memories are from Durango – it's fantastic

Not used them but had it bookmarked
http://www.ride-the-world.co.uk/

As above though DIY it – it's easy
If you want guiding, most of the shops have rides on evenings & weekends

in Fruita we stayed at the Balanced Rock motel which is very bike friendly & cheapish so can recommend that
For Moab we stayed in cabins
http://www.archviewresort.com/cabins.html – again good

We flew to Vegas, hired a great big **** off pick up & drove to Moab & then onto Fruita & then back to Vegas for a 3 night rest 😯
3 nights in the MGM grand for $100 each 🙂

superb !!

Durango is awesome. Spent 3 days there when I did a Colorado / Utah / New Mexico roadtrip a few years ago. Happened to be there at the same time as a Harley Davidon festival which made the drinking establishments interesting places in the evenings.

Can't remember the names of the rides that we did but basically looked at the route guides on MTBR and made it up from there.

Possibly further south (Durango, Telluride) might have a longer summer season.

This isn't true – they should be fine until mid september, then it will be hit or miss with the weather. Wolf creek pass (to get in to durango) is the snowiest place is CO, and its winter starts pretty early

Ah, ok, that's good to get some better info on that. Guess I should have put a "?" on the end of my "Possibly further south…" sentence! 💡

Interesting stuff, you are kind of interesting me in the DIY angle but the guiding (and learning new skills from them) and organisation of all the bits round the side was so enjoyable last time.

Sounds like we should plan for less Colorado more Utah if it is to be October that we go.

keppoch.

Western Spirit out of Moab are a good company, they do trips all over the US.

Sounds like we should plan for less Colorado more Utah if it is to be October that we go.

Oct is probably the perfect time for Fruita/Grand Junction area
The high country is really Summer only

Oooo exciting we are off to Colorado, Boulder then long weekend in Crested Butte in July (yes whoppingly hot I know!) but I can't wait!
Brother went out to Colorado in October a few years back and yup the snow was down and he ended up road riding and snow shoeing instead!!! May want to push it to early Sept.

Maybe do a bit of a road trip? Week in Colorado then scoot down to Moab? Its not that far..

These guys do trips all over..clicky

My mate has done a bunch of trips with Western Spirit (and I almost did one – if I had made it out of the car park! They do a mean shuttle to the ER/OR). He rates them highly.

October is getting late for the high mountains as its not unknown to get snow in September (but for that i think you'd be unlucky).

You'd be fine in Utah though (or Fruita) in October I'd have thought.

If in sept, though +1 for Repack's suggestion (I've done that twice myself)

Myself and a mate did a week in Moab/Eagle (nr Aspen)at the end of last October. We flew to Denver and drove to Moab via Fruita. Motels are very cheap-we booked one in Moab but just turned up everywhere else. Self guided riding is easy in and around Moab with a guidebook and the weather was spot on in the desert-cold in the morning but still hot (verging on too hot for me!) in the day. There was a bit of snow in the La Sal mountains behind Moab and some on the higher mountains around Eagle on our return. There are loads of good bike shops in Moab that offer uplift to the La Sals-we went with Uranium Bikes and with a guidebook a guide would not be necessary providing you're happy to head off by yourselves-as mentioned above some of the rides are pretty remote and quite tricky (IMHO!) so an accident could have serious consequences. We had an excellent time and I can't wait to go out there again.

Mary's Loop, Kokopelli Trails, Grand Junction

Last October
Down in the canyon is Horsethief Bench trail – if you really like your trails technical, you can try riding down to it

+1 for Western Spirit. A friend and I went out to Oregon with them in 2008 to ride the Umpqua trail. Quite simply the most fantastic experience; the trail itself was superb, the group a really nice bunch of people and the guides themselves were phenomenal. They were good in setting out the trail for the day, giving advice for particular section or more general technical advice and in camp we ate like kings. My friend had been out with them to ride their Bryce to Zion route the year before, neither of us would hesitate to go with them again.

Quite simple really, contact Ride The World who are run by Paul who used to work for Rocky Mountain Adventures.
I had a great trip with them last year taking in Colorado, Moab & Fruita.

http://www.ride-the-world.co.uk/

we are doing Moab 1st week of October as one of the boys went a couple of years ago mid Sept and said it was too hot, can't wait oh and 'diy ing'

keppoch

As others have already said you'll be pushing your luck with riding the high trails in Colorado in October, This was us on the Monarch crest trail early October in 2004

But the weather in September can be superb – theres no afternoon thunderstorms, most of the bugs are dead as it gets cold in the evenings and the aspens will have started to turn so will be nice and pretty !!

I'd aim to ride some of the higher trails in sept and then head over to fruita in October

I've not done an organized trip myself to colorado or utah But there are so many good guide books you dont really need an organised trip

I'm flying out to Las Vegas on 17th April for a 2 week trip on my own – i'll be riding around Vegas, Flagstaff, Sedona, Prescot, Fallup, Cortez, Moab, Fruita, Grand Junction, thunder mtn, St George before heading home – it would be hard not to have a good mountain bike holiday out there 😎

Check out my web site My Web site i've posted details of quite a few of my trips out to the states – It should give you some good pointers

I flew to Denver, picked up a car, and then did Winter Park / Fruita / Durango / Moab / Fruita in two weeks. Picked up minor injury and missed out Vail. Dead easy to do. All the places have bike shops and trail guides.

I out flew very late Sept and it was cold at night in WP / Durango but still hot in Moab / Fruita (they are only at 4/5,000 ft!).

Moab particularly as a number of places who will take you out if needed, Western Spirit and Kaibab tours are the ones I recall.

Thanks for all the info, this is the tour I was wanting to compare with:
http://www.sacredrides.com/tours/utah/slickrock/

We went to British Columbia in Canada with them last year but I wanted to make some comparisons before paying out a whole heap of cash!

I just wondered if the price and local knowledge might not be quite so good as we had in BC as they are locals there.

Western Spirit look a similar kind of outfit but tours are often shorter.

Food for thought, thanks loads for all the suggestions, the DIY angle has grown on me somewhat too, perhaps two weeks with the second under our own steam would be a good way to do it.

Keppoch.

We tagged a road trip around utah & colorado onto a business trip this year in June. I dnt think u need a guide really, local shops r the best source of info and its v easy to meet ppl and buddy up.

Its a given at moab ul do slick rock, Kokkopelli/porcupine etc & they r gr8 as ud expect.
Soverign trails r fantastic desert rock singletrack 10miles out of moab. Moonlit Meadow trail up in La Sal mtns coul be the best of the lot, we did it but had to hike a bike in snow for 2 hrs! After getting lost and an encounter with a huuuge bear we founs the best singletrack iv ever done, fallen trees call for some gr8 log hopping too!

In Colorado all the Fruita stuff is mint with Marys loop standing out for me! Techy as u like! 😆