Haunted at Timberline Home

Ophir Pass connects Silverton and Ophir. It was opened in 1881 as a toll road. The two sides are very different: the mountains to the east look like those around Engineer Pass, while those to the west look more like the mountains around Telluride. The opening photo shows the view west from just below the pass; Ophir is seen nestled in the valley below. The photos below show the view east, toward Silverton. The bottom photograph shows not a cross, but an abandoned electric pole.

Ophir Pass is the setting for a famous story about Sven Nilson the mailman. As dedicated as the U.S. Postal Service likes its employees to be, he was determined to get the Christmas 1883 mail from Silverton to Ophir, regardless of a brewing mountain blizzard on the pass. He never arrived at Ophir and it was two years before his body was discovered in a ravine below the pass, mailbag still strapped on.