LOCAL CUSTOMS
Bike builder gains esteem with each handcrafted frame

Beautiful byway
Take a into a hiker’s on road that leads to scenic landscapes, trails

FEE FIASCO
Some travelers headed up highway to Mount Evans are confused about or opposed to access fee - which they can skip if they don't use amenities.

A LIFE ON THE ROCKS
Pioneer climber not only touched almost every cliff in the region, he touched generations of climbers

WEB SITES CAN SAVE YOU MONEY WHEN SEEKING NEW OR NEW-TO-YOU GEAR
With gas prices and a comatose economy nibbling away at adventure funds, it's time to let you in on a few secrets that will stretch your outdoor dollar. Check out these Web sites and sales, and never pay retail again. And don't miss a parting bit of advice that may save you the most money.

SINGLE-MINDED
The growing one-speed cycling cult may make you a believer

SPRINGTIME ON THE SLOPES
This year some of the best skiing is happening after the resorts have closed

BEJEWELED AVIANS
Hummingbirds, fast-moving signs that spring has returned, fill canyons with frantic antics and inspire awe with their beauty, intelligence

PAWS ON PATHS
Owners and furry pals enjoy parks and trails, but there are good reasons for leashes.

CAMPING INNOVATIONS
A new generation of backpacking stoves promises faster cooking - and fewer singed eyebrows

SYBARITES ON THE SLOPES
Under the springtime sun, crowds flock to A-Basin for end-of-season soirees. But few can outdo Colorado Springs' Sno Jets

SLOPE TO TRAIL
Pack the skis for Powderhorn and rack the bikes for Fruita as one outdoor season gives way to another in Colorado

GET SOME SCHOOLIN'
It doesn't take much money to tap local clubs and guides for expertise in safe kayaking, biking, mountaineering and other sports

PEAK 6 TUG OF WAR
Breckenridge sets sights on a favorite playground of backcountry skiers, with plans for a new lift, restaurant, warming hut

CAN AN AMERICAN CONQUER GLOBAL CYCLOCROSS?
Katie Compton is blazing a trail in a grueling racing sport long dominated by European athletes

Check outings off this epic list
It's easy to be overwhelmed by the barrage of outdoor opportunities in Colorado. You can go out every weekend and still get to the end of another year wondering where all the time went. We picked our brains and archives to come up with a monthly guide to the sweetest time-sensitive happenings that will not only get you out more, but let you see and do things few people ever consider.

Updates on the most intriguing stories of 2007 from Out There
When Andrew Skurka walked out of the woods in Summit County in September and talked over beer and nachos about his 6,875-mile walk, he still had 1,000 miles to go through some of the most rugged corners of the Rockies. Snow was approaching.

Volunteers have mountains of work to do, organizing ski museum's vast, untidy collection of memorabilia and artifacts.
What the blank-looking warehouse in a grubby industrial strip off I-70 holds depends on perspective. It's either the ultimate skier's treasure vault of rare and wonderful relics, or the ultimate mess and evergrowing collection of clutter. Maybe it's both.

ADVENTUROUS PRESENTS
Sure, enjoying the outdoors isn't about stuff. The true point, as Robert Louis Stevenson said, "is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilization, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints."

Arapahoe Basin's long-awaited opening of the 400-acre, 36-run Montezuma Bowl tops a storm of ski improvements
ARAPAHOE Basin is letting skiers in on a local secret. For years savvy snow riders have slipped through a backcountry gate hidden just over the 12,460-foot alpine crest that forms the ski area's southern boundary.

LIGHTER, LONGER, FASTER: Mega hiker carries weighty issues - but an extremely light pack - during his 6,875-mile summer journey around the West.
ANDREW SKURKA stood in front of hundreds of members of The Explorers Club in the gilt ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria hotel 18 months ago as a featured speaker at the club's annual dinner. The other speakers were Ed Viesturs, America's leading high-altitude mountaineer, and Harvard professor Edward Wilson, one of the preeminent biological theorists of the 20th century.

Easy-going animals lend strong bodies, pleasant attitudes to hikers looking to lighten loads
COLUMBINE PASS • The wind pouring through this 12,600-foot notch on a rocky ridge was so fierce and icy that a climbing party gaining the pass last week stayed only long enough to catch their breaths and take in the view. On one side lay the way they had come: 18 miles of rough trail along the roiling Animas River and up to the crest of the Needle Mountains.

CONQUER A FOURTEENER: Mild temperatures, dry skies and fewer tourists make September a great time to trek up a mountain or two
Who knew the seasons could change in just a few hours or just a few miles? "It feels like August down below, but here it's all Octobery," said Bailey Trimble. The 14-yearold was trudging up the last mile to the summit of Pikes Peak in late August with her hands plunged deep in the pockets of her hooded sweat shirt against a misty wind.

Rafters flock to Gore for state's toughest whitewater
What makes rafting Gore Canyon so different from rafting most other commercial whitewater in Colorado? "The fact that you could die today," said raft guide Keith Kirchner. The Arkansas Valley Adventures rafting company guide was in a van with 11 clients, bumping down a dirt road to the start of the 10-mile, Class V run through some of the nastiest, most remote rapids in the state.

Bikes without shocks and gears gain ground
Deirda Schaneman loves bikes, but come on. She is never going to ride in the Tour de France or bomb down a boulder-choked singletrack. "I'm not what you'd call a speedy person. And I don't like how most bikes make you sit hunched over," she said recently as she caught her breath while pedaling around downtown.