Blanca Peak (

Navajo The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American people of the Southwestern United States. With more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the Navajo Nation is the largest fe ...

: ) is the fourth highest summit of the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

and the U.S. state of

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the ...

. The

ultra-prominent An ultra-prominent peak, or Ultra for short, is a mountain summit with a topographic prominence of or more; it is also called a P1500. The prominence of a peak is the minimum height of climb to the summit on any route from a higher peak, or ...

peak is the highest summit of the Sierra Blanca Massif, the

Sangre de Cristo Range , country= United States , subdivision1= Colorado , subdivision2_type= Counties , subdivision2= , parent= Sangre de Cristo Mountains, Rocky Mountains , borders_on= , geology= , age= , orogeny= Fault-block mountains , area_mi2= ...

, and the

Sangre de Cristo Mountains The Sangre de Cristo Mountains ( Spanish for " Blood of Christ") are the southernmost subrange of the Rocky Mountains. They are located in southern Colorado and northern New Mexico in the United States. The mountains run from Poncha Pass in South- ...

. The

fourteener In the mountaineering parlance of the Western United States, a fourteener is a mountain peak with an elevation of at least . The 96 fourteeners in the United States are all west of the Mississippi River. Colorado has the most (53) of any single ...

is located north by east ( bearing 9°) of the Town of Blanca, on the

drainage divide A drainage divide, water divide, ridgeline, watershed, water parting or height of land is elevated terrain that separates neighboring drainage basins. On rugged land, the divide lies along topographical ridges, and may be in the form of a singl ...

separating Rio Grande National Forest and

Alamosa County Alamosa County is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado. As of the 2020 census, the population was 16,376. The county seat is Alamosa. The county name is the Spanish language word for a " grove of cottonwood trees." History Alamos ...

from the Sangre de Cristo Land Grant and

Costilla County Costilla County (Spanish for "rib") is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado. As of the 2020 census, the population was 3,499. The county seat is San Luis, the oldest continuously occupied town in Colorado. History On July 8, 1694 ...

. The summit is the

highest point A list of highest points typically contains the name, elevation, and location of the highest point in each of a set of geographical regions. Such a list is important in the sport of highpointing. A partial list of highpoint lists is below: World ...

of both counties and the entire

drainage basin A drainage basin is an area of land where all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

of the

Rio Grande The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The length of the Rio G ...

. Below the steep North Face of Blanca Peak two live Glaciers once developed, until extinction sometime after 1903. North & South Blanca Glaciers were located at 37° 35N.,longitude 105° 28W. Blanca Peak is higher than any point in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

east of its

longitude Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east– west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek let ...

.The elevation of Blanca Peak includes an adjustment of +1.754 m (+5.75 ft) from NGVD 29 to NAVD 88. The Blanca Peak Tripoint of

Alamosa Alamosa is a home rule municipality and the county seat of Alamosa County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 9,806 at the 2020 United States Census. The city is the commercial center of the San Luis Valley in south-central Colora ...

, Costilla, and Huerfano counties is located on the same

approximately northeast by north ( bearing 30°) of the Blanca Peak summit at the boundary of the

San Isabel National Forest San Isabel National Forest is located in central Colorado. The forest contains 19 of the state's 53 fourteeners, peaks over high, including Mount Elbert, the highest point in Colorado. It is one of eleven national forests in the state of Colo ...

. The Blanca Peak Tripoint is the

in Huerfano County.

Geography

Blanca Peak is located at the southern end of the

, a subrange of the more extensive

, and is the highest peak in both ranges. It lies approximately

east-northeast The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each ...

of the town of

. Approximately to the north-northwest is Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve. Blanca Peak is notable not only for its absolute height, but also for its great local relief and dominant position at the end of the range, rising high above the

San Luis Valley The San Luis Valley is a region in south-central Colorado with a small portion overlapping into New Mexico. The valley is approximately long and wide, extending from the Continental Divide on the northwest rim into New Mexico on the south. It c ...

to the west. For example, it rises nearly over the edge of the San Luis Valley in only .Blanca Peak on TopoQuest
/ref> Blanca is also the third most

topographically prominent In topography, prominence (also referred to as autonomous height, relative height, and shoulder drop in US English, and drop or relative height in British English) measures the height of a mountain or hill's summit relative to the lowest conto ...

peak in Colorado; it is separated from the higher peaks in the Sawatch Range by relatively low

Poncha Pass Poncha Pass (9,010 ft/2,745 m) is a mountain pass in South-Central Colorado ( USA). It lies between the San Luis Valley to the south and the valley of the Arkansas River to the north, and is one of the lowest mountain passes in the state. ...

at . Blanca Peak heads up three major creeks. Holbrook Creek is on the west, flowing from a basin including Crater Lake, Blue Lakes, and Como Lake. An extremely challenging

four wheel drive Four-wheel drive, also called 4×4 ("four by four") or 4WD, refers to a two-axled vehicle drivetrain capable of providing torque to all of its wheels simultaneously. It may be full-time or on-demand, and is typically linked via a transfer cas ...

road accesses Como Lake , and provides the most common access to Blanca Peak. Most vehicles stop at an elevation of between and on this road. The Como Lake Road is a designated Alamosa County Road and runs to the edge of the

Sangre de Cristo Wilderness The Sangre de Cristo Wilderness is a long and narrow wilderness area covering of the Sangre de Cristo Range centered about Saguache and Custer counties, Colorado. Smaller areas are located in Fremont, Alamosa, and Huerfano counties. The wilde ...

just short of Blue Lakes. The Como Lake Road is rated as the most challenging 4WD road in Colorado. The

Huerfano River Huerfano River is a tributary of the Arkansas River in Pueblo and Huerfano counties in Colorado, United States.U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed March 31, 2011 Descr ...

flows from the north side of Blanca Peak. A road, starting out as a two-wheel drive road, then becoming a four-wheel drive road (less challenging than the Como Lake Road), provides access to the technical climbing on the North Face of Blanca Peak. Blanca Creek drains Blanca Basin under the south slopes of the peak, and Little Ute Creek descends from the Winchell Lakes on the southeast side. However these are not used to access the peak due to private property. Three other fourteeners are nearby:

Mount Lindsey Mount Lindsey is a high mountain summit on the Sierra Blanca Massif in the Sangre de Cristo Range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The fourteener is located in the Sangre de Cristo Land Grant, north ( bearing 358°) of the community of ...

to the east,

Ellingwood Point Ellingwood Point is a high mountain summit in the Sangre de Cristo Range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The fourteener is located on the Sierra Blanca Massif, north by east ( bearing 7°) of the Town of Blanca, Colorado, United ...

to the north and

Little Bear Peak Little Bear Peak is a high mountain summit in the Sangre de Cristo Range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The fourteener is located on the Sierra Blanca Massif, north by east ( bearing 6°) of the Town of Blanca, Colorado, United ...

to the southwest. Ellingwood Point is connected to Blanca by a short, high ridge, and is often climbed in conjunction with Blanca. Little Bear also has a high connecting ridge to Blanca, but it is a

technical Technical may refer to: * Technical (vehicle), an improvised fighting vehicle * Technical analysis, a discipline for forecasting the future direction of prices through the study of past market data * Technical drawing, showing how something is co ...

traverse, only recommended for highly experienced parties.Louis W. Dawson II, ''Dawson's Guide to Colorado's Fourteeners, Volume 2'', Blue Clover Press, 1996, Smith Reservoir

Geology

The granite that makes up the Blanca massif is

pre-Cambrian The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of the ...

in age, dated at approximately 1.8 billion years old. The major part of the

Wet Mountains The Wet Mountains are a small mountain range in southern Colorado, named for the amount of snow they receive in the winter as compared to the dried Great Plains to the east. They are a sub-range of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, in the southern R ...

to the east and the

Front Range The Front Range is a mountain range of the Southern Rocky Mountains of North America located in the central portion of the U.S. State of Colorado, and southeastern portion of the U.S. State of Wyoming. It is the first mountain range encountered ...

to the northeast are also pre-Cambrian, also about 1.8 billion years old. In contrast, the

to the north and the

Culebra Range ) , country= United States , subdivision1_type= States , subdivision1= , parent= Rocky Mountains , geology= , orogeny= , area_mi2= 17193 , range_coordinates= , length_mi= 242 , length_orientation= north-south , width_mi= 120 , w ...

to the south are

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last period of the Paleo ...

rock between 250 and 300 million years old.

History

Blanca Peak is known to the

Navajo people The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a Native American people of the Southwestern United States. With more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the Navajo Nation is the largest federally recognized tribe in the United ...

as the Sacred Mountain of the East: 'Robert S. McPherson, ''Sacred Land, Sacred View: Navajo perceptions of the Four Corners Region'',

Brigham Young University Brigham Young University (BYU, sometimes referred to colloquially as The Y) is a private research university in Provo, Utah. It was founded in 1875 by religious leader Brigham Young and is sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-d ...

, . (or ''Tsisnaasjiní''Lapahie.com
), the Dawn or White Shell Mountain. The mountain is considered to be the eastern boundary of the Dinetah, the traditional Navajo homeland. It is associated with the color white, and is said to be covered in daylight and dawn and fastened to the ground with lightning. It is gendered male. Summitpost notes that "the first recorded ascent of Blanca by the Wheeler Survey was recorded on August 14, 1874, but to their surprise they found evidence of a stone structure possibly built by

Ute Indians Ute () are the Indigenous people of the Ute tribe and culture among the Indigenous peoples of the Great Basin. They had lived in sovereignty in the regions of present-day Utah and Colorado in the Southwestern United States for many centuries unt ...

or wandering

Spaniards Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex history, including a number of different languages, both ...

Historical names

*Blanca Peak *Mount Blanca *Sierra Blanca Peak *Sierra Blanca *Sisnaajiní

References

External links