Long after their race ended, kids on Strider bikes were logging laps on the course at the second annual Happy Trails Festival.
It was Isaac Payn’s first bike race and he kept riding along with many older kids.
“He’s all jazzed up about it,” said his father, Jeff Payn.
The Trails 2000 event drew several hundred people to Buckley Park Saturday afternoon for music, food, bike demos and the kids bike race.
In addition to raising money for the trails group, the event also benefits Thad Ferrell, a rock climber who fell 100 feet while climbing in an area northeast of Durango last week. The group set aside a portion of the beer sales for Ferrell, Trails 2000 Executive Director Mary Monroe Brown said.
The festival followed Todd’s Durango Dirt Fondo, an event focused on group riding rather than racing. At the event, cyclists chose between a 50-mile-long ride or a 15-mile short course.
Other groups, such as the Four Corners Back Country Horsemen, participated in the festival to help foster the spirit of inclusivity Trails 2000 encourages, Monroe Brown said.
The group, which has opened a new trail annually for 12 years, hopes to finish another new connection this fall, she said.
It is waiting for the Bureau of Land Management to sign off on an environmental assessment before starting to build a connection between the Sugar Trail, in the Telegraph Trail System, to the Skyline Trail, she said.
The assessment is required as part of the National Environmental Policy Act.
mshinn@durangoherald.com
