Thursday June 13 2024

Thursday June 13

When camping at Lathrop SP, the Spanish Peaks dominate the horizon to the south. On a clear morning, they seem so close that you could reach out and touch them. Today, we decided to get a real close look and do a hike up in the Spanish Peaks. Lucky for us, there are some incredible roads that take you a good way up the mountain. The peaks top out at 13,500 feet and the Cordova Pass sits at 11,248 feet and is where we drove the truck to! It took awhile on gravel forestry roads winding up the mountain. At the pass there is a lovely wilderness campground and parking for a few vehicles. The weather was perfect, and it was noticeably cooler up there. There were two main trails from the parking, one that led to the 13-thousand-foot summit and the other to a an amazing overlook, that really took no effort but yielded a huge reward; fabulous vistas over a stunning landscape – couldn’t have been nicer.

Drove back down to the town of La Veta, a quaint town at the base of the Spanish Peaks where we made a stop at coffee shop and had drinks and lunch, delicious.

Back at camp we went for a walk along the Hogs Back Nature Trail loop – it was still very hot but the sun was lower in the sky so not too intense. The trail climbed to a ridge that ran parallel to the campground and provided a great view of the whole park and beyond to the Spanish Peaks.

Quiet dinner and evening back at camp.

West Spanish Peak

Mountain meadow

Wildflowers

Cuchara Mountain Ski area

Meadow girl

Interesting volcanic rock features

Looking west to high ground

Nice easy trail to overlook