San Luis Valley

Leaving Ouray, my destination is the Orient Land Trust in the San Luis Valley which is between the San Juan and the Sangre de Cristo.  Both moutain ranges boast of at least a half a dozen peaks about 14,000 feet. I will camp out up slope on the Sangre de Cristo mountains at around 8,600' at Valley View Hot Springs which sits at the trail head of a trail that leads to the Orient Mine and a bat cave. The cave is the home to around 250,000 Mexican free tailed bats.

The San Luis Valley was the northern most outpost of sixteenth century Spain. If you remember your American history, you'll recall that the Spanish established the first non-native settlements in the Americas almost a century before the Jamestown colony in 1607 and before the Pilgrims at Plymouth Bay in 1620. In fact, the first non-native settlers on mainland North America were African slaves left in South Carolina in 1526 by Spaniards who abandoned a settlement attempt.

The Navajo Indians believe that the first man and first woman came up from the underworld in this valley. They also believe that it is the place where life enters and leaves this world.

The Ute Indians also lived here and when first encountering the Spanish in 1598, referred to their horses as 'magic dogs.' The Ute's routinely used dogs to pull their belongings. They successfully kept out 'settlers' until 1851.


Looking at the Sangre de Cristo mountains.

The base of the mountains lies about 7 miles away. Behind me are the San Juan mountains.

I took this from the base of the Sangre de Cristo mountains looking across the valley to the San Juan mountains.

When I arrive at Valley View, they tell me a mother Black Bear and her cub are roaming around getting into the trash. The bear was relocated from the Colorado Springs are to Bonanza, Co which is about 50 miles north of this location. Colorado Department of Wildlife people show up and set traps to relocate the bears yet again.

I hike to the bat cave in the evening. About a 2 mile taking about 1.5 hours round trip.

Later that night, as I am asleep in my tent, the cub gets trapped in the bear trap which is a large steel cage. The mother is not happy and I hear her running around my tent. I get up as daylight dawns and walk down near the cage to have a look.

To the right of the bear behind the bushes is the trapped cub. Prior to this the mother bear was shot with rubber bullets. This usually drives most bears away but it hasn't worked on this one. To make a long story short, the bear was later shot and killed the next night. The rangers attempted to dart it four times, but this just made it more agitated.