Southwest Colorado Trails

It’s been a few months, but I wanted to post some pictures and details about a trip I took this past September. I will try to keep this post as short as possible, but it was an epic trip with lots of stuff to talk about!

A buddy and I decided to head to southwest Colorado and do some camping and exploring this fall. We wanted to run the Alpine Loop and some other trails in this area.

I was in my 2024 Tundra TRD Sport with a TRD Pro Suspension and 275/65/20 tires, he was in a 2022 4Runner with stock tires.

We ran the following trails in southwest CO:

Stony Pass
Corkscrew Pass
Hurricane Pass
California Pass
Animas Forks
Picayune Gulch
Ophir Pass
Last Dollar Road
Yankee Boy Basin
Imogene Pass
Engineer Pass

Day 1: Stony Pass

We were coming from Arkansas, so we started Stony Pass on the east side and ran it to the west side. This trail was by far the most remote feeling and beautiful trail we ran. When we return again, I plan to spend at least a day on this trail exploring and looking around. This pass had probably some of the most challenging and tight sections out of all the passes we did. We didn’t get any body damaged, but it would have been very easy too, and with a full-size rig if someone would have been coming in the opposite direction it would have been very interesting! After we finished Stony Pass we went and checked out the town of Silverton and then ran up the Million Dollar highway to Ouray.

We then went to Ironton and ran Corkscrew, Hurricane, and California pass. Everyone was super nice and although there were some tight passing spots in the Tundra it all worked out fine. We ended up camping off Picayune Gulch for the night.

Even though it was September we still woke up to frost on the windshield each morning (this just surprised me because back in Arkansas it was 90°+).














Day2: Ophir Pass, Telluride, Last Dollar Road

We ran south on Animas Forks into Silverton and then took Ophir pass over into Telluride. Ophir pass was a cake walk, but it had some super cool rocks and views. While in Telluride we spent half the day riding bikes at the Telluride ski resort which was totally awesome! After riding we took a quick shower at the Telluride city park which had showers you could pay for. Then we headed to Lost Dollar road to find a place to camp for the night! I start to get a little bit anxious as I pass camp spots that have already been claimed by people for the night, and I start wondering what happens if I can’t find an empty camp spot! Then I come around the corner to this spectacular mountain view and see an empty camp spot. As soon as I pull into the spot and turn my truck off someone pulls in behind me and asks if I’m camping here for this night, I tell him I am, and he moves on down the road.

We get camp setup and cook dinner just before we run out of day light and the temps start dropping fast.






Day3: Ouray, Yankee Boy Basin, Imogene Pass, and Engineer Pass


So, if I had to do it again, I’m not sure I would take Last Dollar Road again. The first half of it coming out of Telluride had some good views, but the second half was meh and then the entire road is beyond rough with tons of potholes and just pretty boring. The town of Ouray is really a cool town in the most picturesque setting. We got to Yankee Boy Basin around 9am and luckily, we beat most of the Jeep tours and were able to get up there with not much traffic. This was a really cool trail and lots of magnificent views.

I did experience somewhat of an issue with my Tundra on this trail, the transmission gave me an overheating warning. I believe the issue was because I was trying to run it in 2wd, but even with the shifter in S in 4th or 5th gear I guess it kept shifting and caused the transmission to overheat. I will note that I also learned on this trip that the Tundra won’t go past 4th gear I believe in 4Low so you can only average around 20mph unless you want to burn lots and lots of gas lol

After Yankee Boy Basin we headed down Imogene Pass and we made it probably ½ mile or so, to the first rock wall. This was a pretty good rock wall for a stockish height Tundra and honestly I should have turned around, but this trail is a bucket list item so I went down the wall, as I did my fancy bed step decided it wanted some custom fab work done by the rocks so now it folds up kinda weird! My buddy who has minimal off roading experience got nervous, so we decided to turn around before we tear anything else up.

We decided to head to Engineer pass and explore it and setup camp somewhere on the east side.

This was definitely a mistake, but we decided to go north up Animas Forks to Engineer pass, and my god is Animas forks a rough trail too. We got to check out the Ghost town which is really a cool area. Engineer pass was really an awesome pass with crazy views and crazy drop offs from the trail lol.

We survived Engineer pass without anything exciting happening or anything breaking.




All and all the Tundra did very well running these trails (they aren’t anything extreme or difficult) but they are steep and there are some sections that with a full-size truck you need to choose the correct line, or you may get some custom rock fab work done. When I do it again, I will plan to do about half as much as we did because it seems like all we did was drive all day everyday and I always felt rushed.

The Tundra average about 18mpg on the trip there and back and is beyond comfortable on the highway.

The high altitude and thin air are pretty wild. You would feel out of breath trying to setup your tent or do just normal easy tasks!


I hope you enjoyed this report and let me know if you have any questions or comments!

 

Looks like an amazing trip! Go Hogs

 

It was I can’t wait to go back next year!

 

Probably my favorite section of the planet I’ve been able to explore so far.

No pics of Lake Como?!?

 

I will for sure be back to check it out. I bit off more than I could chew and tried to cram to much stuff into my time frame so I didn’t get to see all I wanted too unfortunately.

 

Oh no!!! Must not have looked the right direction down the hill from California Pass! It’s right there!


Definitely try to do Imogene next time - it’s easier going Telluride to Ouray than Ouray to Telluride.

 

I took my 2016 lifted Tundra over mosquito pass from Alma to Leadville. Never doing that again. After 210K on that truck and three suspension rebuilds, I just don't think these trucks are made for these types of trails. It severely shortens the life of the the suspension and steering column.

 

What suspensions did you go through?

I’ve done about a dozen trails in that area, half a dozen in Moab including Hells Revenge, probably 2,000 miles off-road in AZ all on the same Bilstein setup. I can agree they aren’t “made” for it but with decent driving and a little tweaking they are certainly suitable, capable and almost boringly reliable.

 

Toytec Boss and a Fox 2.5

 

Op you probably want to drain and flush your transmission fluid, once you get the overheated transmission light it means you already burnt your fluid since it doesn’t come on until it gets really hot. Also you want to keep it in 4lo to lock the torque converter in place to keep your transmission cool