The Continental Divide and Great Sand Dunes National Park

 The Continental Divide and Great Sand Dunes National Park

May 3^rd and 4^th, 2023

Leaving Mancos, we traveled eastward, stopping at the Pastorius Reservoir for a few hours of birding.  Our onward route took us over Wolf Creek Pass at 10,800 feet.  This was the Continental Divide.  My understanding was that all water east of the Divide ran to the Mississippi.  However, I’m starting to doubt that assumption.  After a long decent from the pretty scary pass (lots of snow and cascading water), we came to a flat region that stretched for about 60 miles.  (There was plenty of evidence of farming on a grand scale.) The eastern edge of this plateau was bounded by some very tall, snow-capped mountains.  Somehow I don’t think any water from this plateau is flowing over those 14,000 ft peaks!

Our drive ended at Zapata Falls campground.  This area is managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).  The campsites are tucked into the foothills of the mountains in a pinyon-juniper forest.  To the east, the views are of towering peaks, to the west the vast plain and the snow-capped mountains of the divide.  The only downside is no drinking water! Thankfully our jerry can was fairly full. 

After setting up the tent, we walked up to the Zapata Falls. Perhaps I should say that Mike walked up to the falls.  This waterfall is in a canyon of sorts and amazingly enough there was thick ice underfoot.  At some point I could peak around the rock and see the base of the frozen waterfall, I wasn’t brave enough to walk on the slick ice up to the base! Underneath the ice you could hear the creek flowing.  At some point this ice bridge will collapse, thankfully not while we were up there. 

After a chilly night with rain and wind, we set off to Great Sand Dunes National Park.  It’s quite hard to describe these massive dunes that rise up on the other side of a stream.  The highest areas are about 600 ft.  There are some 30,000 acres of dunes.  The dunes result from sand being blown by the prevailing westerly winds and getting trapped against the mountains.  Streams from the mountains wash back sand onto the plains which is then blown back onto the dunes in an endless cycle. It’s truly amazing looking.  Many people climb the dunes but walking on that soft sand is difficult, so we didn’t go all the way up. Wading back across the stream, we got into an area of “quick sand”.  We were sinking fast—I hadn’t pictured that as a possibility.  It’s just another thing for the worry box! We had an early dinner with a view to going back into the park for sunset photos.   

Gloria 

An alternative method of birding the Pastorius resrvoir

Zapata Falls. This image was created using High Dynamic Range (HDR) techniques, where multiple exposures of the same image are merged to make the most of light and dark areas. This was needed because it was bright near the opening of the chasm and dark within. I decided to return this evening in the dark to re-shoot the shot using flashlights. The water was flowing much faster and there were holes visible in the ice. Just as I was working the first shot, not far into the chasm, there was an incredible crash. My guess is a large part of the waterfall ice collapsed ... I retreated rapidly!

Clouds roll in from the plains at sunset on the first night. We got a few sprinkles but there was fresh snow higher up the mountain

It proved to be an incredible, but short lived sunset

Sunset on the first evening

Moonlight over the ~14,000 foot peak behind us.

Gloria relaxing at our campsite at 9,000 ft on the second afternoon

The amazing sand dunes 

The scale is hard to appreciate

Perhaps my favorite shot - the dunes in B&W - shot from an overlook up a mountain to the east. If you look carefully you can see three people (dots) about a quarter of the way up, just left of center