I've been riding/driving the scenic byways here in Colorado since January. Friday (the 25th) was my first ride on a byway. I wanted to see the Grand Mesa...it's the largest flat-top mountain in the world, plus it has breathtaking views. It's in western Colorado, so to get there and back in one day, we did have to take the highway to get there. The road begins at mile marker 49 on I-70, so that's about 220 miles west.
Anywho, enough of my babbling...check out some pix and/or my blog at mtnairloversview.wordpress.com. I'm riding/driving all 25 byways over the next two years.
There's a road that goes out to a point called Land's End along the byway. This road is 12 miles, but with about 5.5 miles of dirt. The views are spectacular at the point. The Grand Mesa rim stands at about 10,000 feet above sea level. The only thing that wasn't so nice about the views on Friday was the haze....
Edit: total round-trip miles on my odo = 595 miles