Wilderness Wanderlust
At the spry age of 20 million years old, the mountains of the Columbine Hondo Wilderness are some of the youngest mountain ranges on earth. Like many of the sky islands of the southwest, a wide variety of vegetation calls this wilderness home. Lower elevations of the wilderness (around 7,800ft) contain ponderosas and pinon pines. Middle elevations house conifers. High elevations see an abundance of spruce-fur before giving away to alpine tundra.
The Columbine Hondo Wilderness has many peaks over 12,000ft making the Columbine Hondo Wilderness a great place to escape the profound heatwave we have been experiencing here in the Southwest. . As such, my fellow adventurer, Dylan, and myself decided to explore the wilderness by backpacking for three days.
We started at San Cristobal trailhead, progressed to Lobo Peak, then Gold Hill, crossed over to Wheeler Peak Wilderness to summit the highest peak in NM, and finished the hike at the Taos Ski Basin. The trail was challenging - especially day one which was about 16 miles and about 6,000ft of climbing. But, we had the wilderness mostly to ourselves (except for our stop at Goose Lake which was mind blowingly busy with ATVs, families on vacation, fishers, and all sorts of riff-raff) and the mountain flowers were bursting with vibrant eye candy.
I had a great time capturing photos. I am excited to share my bunch with you all - please enjoy!
(Clicking on the photos provides a larger image)
