Sangre de Cristo Range

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Sangre de Cristo Range
Northern Sangre de Cristo Range
Range
Mount Adams and the northern Sangre de Cristos, looking north from the northern slope of Challenger Point
Name origin: Sangre de Cristo Spanish: Blood of Christ

Country	United States
State	Colorado
County	Chaffee, Fremont, Custer, Saguache, Huerfano

Part of	Sangre de Cristo Mountains, Rocky Mountains
Borders on	San Luis Valley, Arkansas River watershed

Highest point	Blanca Peak
- elevation	14,345 ft (4,372 m)
- coordinates	37°34′38″N 105°29′7″W / 37.57722, -105.48528

Length	59 mi (95 km), north-south
Width	48 mi (77 km), east-west
Area	1,250 sq mi (3,237 km²)

Orogeny	Fault-block mountains
Period	Precambrian, Permian-Pennsylvanian

This article is about the northern-most portion of the larger Sangre de Cristo Mountains. If you were looking for the mountains as a whole, see Sangre de Cristo Mountains.

The Sangre de Cristo Range is a narrow mountain range of the Rocky Mountains running north and south along the east side of the Rio Grande Rift in southern Colorado in the United States. The mountains extend southeast from Poncha Pass for about 75 miles (120 km) through south-central Colorado to La Veta Pass, approximately 20 miles (32 km) west of Walsenburg, and form a high ridge separating the San Luis Valley on the west from the watershed of the Arkansas River on the east.

According to the USGS, the range is the northern part of the larger Sangre de Cristo Mountains, which extend through northern New Mexico. Usage of the terms "Sangre de Cristo Range" and "Sangre de Cristo Mountains" is varied; however this article discusses only the mountains between Poncha Pass and La Veta Pass.

1 Notable peaks
2 Geography
3 History and economy
4 Geology
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Notable peaks

Major peaks of the Sangre de Cristo
Named peaks over 13,500 feet
Sources: peakbagger.com 13ers.com
Peak name	Elevation	Prominence
Blanca Peak	14,345 ft = 4372.4 m	5326 ft
Crestone Peak	14,294 ft = 4356.8 m	4534–4574 ft
Crestone Needle	14,197 ft = 4327.2 m	437 ft
Kit Carson Peak	14,165 ft = 4317.5 m	1005 ft
Challenger Point	14,080 ft = 4291.6 m	281 ft
Humboldt Peak	14,064 ft = 4286.7 m	1184–1224 ft
Ellingwood Point	14,042 ft = 4280.0 m	322 ft
Mount Lindsey	14,042 ft = 4280.0 m	1522–1562 ft
Little Bear Peak	14,037 ft = 4278.5 m	357 ft
Columbia Point	13,980 ft = 4261.1 m	320–360 ft
Mount Adams PB	13,931 ft = 4246.2 m	851 ft
California Peak PB	13,849 ft = 4221.2 m	609 ft
Rito Alto Peak PB	13,794 ft = 4204 m	1114–1154 ft
Colony Baldy PB	13,705 ft = 4177 m	905–945 ft
Pico Asilado [1]	13,612 ft = 4149 m	837 ft
Tijeras Peak PB	13,604 ft = 4146 m
Electric Peak PB	13,595 ft = 4144 m
Cottonwood Peak PB	13,588 ft = 4142 m	1108–1148 ft
Twin Peaks [2]	13,577 ft = 4138.3 m
Broken Hand Peak PB	13,573 ft = 4137.1 m	653 ft
Fluted Peak [3]	13,554 ft = 4131.3 m
Milwaukee Peak [4]	13,522 ft = 4121.5 m

[edit] Geography

Most of the range is shared by two National Forests, which abut along the range divide. Most of the northeast (Arkansas River) side is located within the San Isabel National Forest, while most of the southwest (San Luis Valley) side is included in the Rio Grande National Forest. The central part of the range is designated as the Sangre de Cristo Wilderness. The Great Sand Dunes National Park sits on the southwestern flank of the range at the edge of the San Luis Valley. The range divide is traversed by no paved roads, but only by four wheel drive and foot trails over Hayden Pass, Hermit Pass, Music Pass, Medano Pass, and Mosca Pass.

The highest peak in the range, located in the south, is Blanca Peak (14,345 feet/4,372 m); it is flanked by three other fourteeners, Little Bear Peak, Mount Lindsey, and Ellingwood Point^[1]. Other well-known peaks are the fourteeners of the Crestone group: Kit Carson Mountain, Crestone Peak, Crestone Needle, and Humboldt Peak. Two sub-peaks of Kit Carson Mountain, Challenger Point and Columbia Point, are named in memory of the crews of the Space Shuttle Challenger and the Space Shuttle Columbia. The range is also home to many high peaks in the 13,000 to 14,000 foot (3,900-4,300 m) range. See the Sangre de Cristo Mountains article for other noteworthy summits in the greater range.

[edit] History and economy

In 1719 the Spanish explorer Antonio Valverde y Cosio named the Sangre de Cristo ("Blood of Christ") mountains after being impressed by the reddish hue of the snowy peaks at sunrise, alpenglow. Today tourism is the main economic activity.

[edit] Geology

The Sangre de Cristos are fault-block mountains with major fault lines running along both the east and west sides of the mountains and, in places, cutting through the range. The mountains were pushed up about 27 million years ago, pretty much as one large mass of rock.

The Sangre de Cristo Range rising above the Great Sand Dunes National Park

On the west side is the San Luis Valley with the Rio Grande Rift running down the middle. On the southeast side is the Raton Basin, a quiet but still active volcanic field. On the northeast side are the Wet Mountains and the Front Range, areas of Precambrian igneous and metamorphic rocks formed during the Colorado Orogeny some 1.7 billion years ago and then uplifted more recently during the Laramide orogeny.

The Blanca Massif is also Precambrian rock, while most of the rest of the Sangres is composed of younger Permian-Pennsylvanian (about 250-million-year old) rock, a mix of sedimentary conglomerates, shales, and igneous intrusions. These sedimentary rocks originated as sediment eroded from the Ancestral Rocky Mountains.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

^ Ellingwood Point is not always counted as an official fourteener, as it has a high saddle connecting it with Blanca Peak, and hence a low topographic prominence.