US-550: Durango to Ouray over the Million Dollar Highway
Up the Animas Valley, over three passes above 10,000 feet to Silverton, and down the Uncompahgre Gorge on a road with almost no guardrails.
The Route at a Glance
US-550 runs north from Durango to Ouray, about seventy-one miles and two hours in good conditions, over three high passes and through the heart of the San Juan mining country. It is open all year, but the upper sections are steep, narrow and avalanche-prone, and much of the road between Silverton and Ouray has no shoulder and little or no guardrail above long drops.
It begins at the 1882 depot on Main Avenue in Durango, where the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad still leaves for Silverton behind steam, and follows the Animas Valley north past farms and the ski area at Purgatory. The highway climbs over Coal Bank Pass and Molas Pass, both above 10,600 feet, before dropping into Silverton, a silver town at 9,300 feet with the railroad's end of track in its streets. From Silverton a county road runs about twelve miles up the Animas to the ghost town of Animas Forks, passable for ordinary cars only part of the way.
North of Silverton the stretch everyone means by the Million Dollar Highway begins. Nobody can now say for certain whether the name came from the cost, the views or the ore in the fill. The road climbs to Red Mountain Pass at 11,018 feet and descends past the headframes of the Red Mountain Mining District, the Yankee Girl most famous among them, and the Idarado's buildings at the overlook. Below Ironton it follows the line of Otto Mears's 1880s toll road into the Uncompahgre Gorge, cut into cliffs above the river, passes the falls at Bear Creek where Mears kept his toll gate, and switchbacks down into Ouray.
Check the Colorado Department of Transportation for closures in winter and after storms; the road over Red Mountain Pass can close for avalanche control in winter.
The Drive, Stop by Stop
3 stops along the route, in driving order from Durango, Colorado to Ouray, Colorado. One of them sits off the road itself — the distance is noted on each.
- 1
- 2
- 3
That's the drive. Take your time, pull over often, and let US-550: Durango to Ouray over the Million Dollar Highway do what it does best.
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