SF2T- Day 4
On the trail by 6:05 to tackle the 1,500 feet of elevation gain in the first 2 miles of trail today. Moving up through dead and dying bark beetle-infested trees is sad. When Cappuccino and I had hiked up here 20 years ago, this was a vibrant forest. Now it is mostly dead or nearly dead forest. After the first mile, the forest changes to aspens, which appear to be healthy and doing great.
After two miles, the trail leveled out, and we rolled along through mixed forest and meadows, moving slowly through 10,000 feet. We walked a mile through the 2013 Jaroso fire burn scar with significant numbers of deadfall across the trail. So we had to do a lot of climbing over, under, and around downed trees.
Ultimately, our goal had been to get to Pecos Baldy Lake, but we arrived before noon and felt pretty good. Since the weather was holding, we decided to press on another 5-ish miles up along Trail Riders Ridge. At 11,800 ft. This nearly treeless ridge has top-of-the-world views of the surrounding mountains.
Another long, steep climb took us up on the ridge where it was blowing a gale. With sunny, blue skies, we had a great, if windy, walk with stunning 360-degree views. After a couple of miles, we dropped down into the forest and made our way to Truchas Lake. Perched in a cirque near 12,000 feet, it lies between North and Middle Truchas peaks. All in all, we walked 13 miles and climbed over 4,500 feet today.
“Perched in a cirque near 12,000 feet,” I don’t know what a cirque is. A bowl-shape along the trail? Of course, the big horn sheep are the pick of the litter of your images. Did they just check you and Cap out? Were there young-uns that would make moms leery of interlopers? Tell me more about what hiking at 10K does to your pace and focus. 13 miles at this altitude is some decent mileage, especially for you two – young at heart.
A cirque is the bowl shaped “valley” left at the upper end of a glacier after it has melted. Usually found high in the mountains where glaciers first form. Like a natural amphitheater. The bowl shape often has a lake associated with it. See Google for pictures and more explanation.
The bighorn sheep were just hanging out as we walked by. There is one big ram with the massive fully curled horns and several ewes with the slightly curved small horns. Did not see any kids. They paid almost no attention to us.
Hiking at 10K to 12K feet is above treeline there and gives awesome views as you might note from the pics. It was blowing hard up there, but the weather was good otherwise. We were watching the clouds and did not linger up too for too long. The Trail Rider Ridge is a couple mile stretch and is really exposed. Usually crossed in the morning due to frequent afternoons thunderstorms. We took a bit of a chance crossing in the early afternoon, but the good weather held. Yes, 13 miles at that altitude was a good day for us!