Walsenburg—Westcliffe—Texas Creek (Junction US 50) ; 85 miles, State 69.

Graded or graveled road throughout. Limited accommodations.     

This route traverses a region once the stronghold of the Ute, whose trails crisscrossed mountains and valleys where game was abundant and sheltered parks provided excellent winter camp grounds. Spanish explorers followed these trails into the wilderness to build forts and search for treasure. This is a country of ever-changing mountain and river vistas, with high forests of spruce and pine, and numerous clear streams well-stocked with trout.

In WALSENBURG, 0 miles (6,200 alt., 5,503 pop.) (see Tour 12c), State 69 branches northwest from US 160 (see Tour 11) and passes through extensive bituminous coal fields.

BADITO, 18 miles (6,387 alt., 12 pop.), on the Huerfano River, is at the entrance to the Huerfano Valley.

Left from Badito on a dirt road paralleling Oak Creek, to the crumbling ruin of an old SPANISH FORT, 7 miles. The faint triangular outline of the walls crowns a hill overlooking Oak Creek and commands a good view of the valley where the old Taos Trail wound from Badito south to Sangre de Cristo Pass. The fort was built between 1819-20 at the order of Don Facundo Melagres, Spanish Governor of New Mexico, to guard the pass against American invasion. An encounter occurred a few months after the fort was constructed, when six members of the garrison were killed by an attacking party of white men reputedly disguised as Indians. The fort was abandoned after a treaty with the United States fixed the boundary along the Arkansas River.

State 69 crosses rough hilly country, skirting the southern edge of the Wet Mountains. The most prominent peak in this range is GREENHORN MOUNTAIN (12,334 alt.), named for the Comanche chieftain, Cuerno Verde (see Tour 12c).

FARISITA, 21.2 miles (6,700 alt., 300 pop.), was once known as Talpa, but the postmaster, John Farris, renamed it for his daughter, Jeanette, called "La Farisita" (the little Farris lady) by the Mexican inhabitants. FORT TALPA, an adobe outpost established by the Spaniards about 1820, still stands next to the general store.

A morada (meeting house) of Los Hermanos Penitentes, or the Penitent Brothers, appears (L) among the trees across the river. While many members of this cult, all men, live in the Huerfano Valley, there is no general organization of supreme authority, each local society being independent. The chief officer, hermano mayor (elder brother), has absolute authority, and as a rule holds office for life.

Their grim practices, brought to New Mexico in 1598 by Don Juan de Onate, spread rapidly, although practiced secretly through fear of excommunication. In 1886 the Catholic Church attempted to abolish the flagellation ceremonies, but they still survive, a somber mixture of Christianity and Indian paganism.

During Holy Week their Passion Play is enacted up and down the Huerfano Valley, as in many other Southern Colorado communities, much as it was in the sixteenth century. The secret ceremonies start in the morada, where the freshly whitewashed adobe walls, it is said, are often splotched with blood after the flagellation rites have been concluded. Witnesses have testified that the brothers kneel before a sangrador (blood-letter), who gouges crosses on their bare backs with a piece of jagged glass. These wounds are kept open and bleeding, often by rubbing salt into them, until Easter. The Penitent Brothers whip themselves all Holy Thursday afternoon and night, chanting dismally as lashes of soapweed swish through the air.

Before dawn on Good Friday twelve chanting marchers leave the morada to the accompaniment of a wailing pito (flute) and march toward a secret Calvario in some mountain fastness; here the final ritual is enacted. Outsiders are not permitted to witness these proceedings; often deputy sheriffs are enlisted to insure privacy. Leading the procession are two men bearing lanterns to guide the bare, frozen, and bleeding feet of a brother clothed in flapping cotton drawers, with a black bag resembling a hangman's cap over his head. He stumbles along blindly, lashing his naked back and shoulders with a soapweed whip.

Behind him, similarly dressed, follows the Cristo elected to play the role because of his godly life. He staggers along under a huge wooden cross often five times his own weight. Trailing the Cristo, the other brothers continue to lash themselves with razor-sharp soap-weed and cactus whips. Men have been known to tie the skull of a cow to a rope hooked with barbs into the muscles of their back, and drag the burden over the steep hills until the hooks are torn free.

Upon reaching the Calvario the procession halts. The Cristo is tied with ropes to the cross he has been carrying; the cross is then raised by attendants wearing headbands of thorns. Until half a century ago the man was nailed to the cross, but this is no longer done. Throughout this day-long ceremony the brothers continue to lash themselves until in pain or religious fervor they fall exhausted, or deliberately throw themselves into beds of cacti to increase their sufferings in penance for their sins.

At dusk the haggard and tortured brothers return to the morada, where others of the faith are waiting. As psalms are sung, the twelve candles burning on the altar are extinguished until only one remains lighted. The amatrada, a noise-making machine made with a flat piece of wood that rotates against a toothed wheel, is set in motion; chains are dragged across the floor and rattled; the pito shrills loudly in this pandemonium, which is a command to the dead to arise. Abruptly there is silence as the hermano mayor lifts his arms and chants a prayer for the dead. Singing is resumed, and the candles, one by one, are relighted. The brothers then kneel in a last prayer, and the grim ceremonies are concluded for another year.

GARDNER CONE (L), 23.3 miles, an old landmark, is recognizable by its squat shape and prismatic coloring. To the north (R) the hills are dark with groves of pinon pine. This conifer differs from others of the species in that its seeds are large and edible; the gathering and marketing of pinon nuts provides a regular source of income for the Spanish-American folk of this district. The pungent smell of burning pinon wood comes from the chimneys of the small adobe houses that dot the slopes.

GARDNER, 28 miles (7,002 alt., 125 pop.), typical of the old Southwest, retains the spirit of the frontier; many of its business buildings and houses are of adobe. Gardner, named for Herbert Gardner, a farmer instrumental in introducing cantaloupe into the Rocky Ford region (see Tour 9a), is the chief outfitting point for excursions into the Sangre de Cristo Range to the south and west. This is one of the few sections of Colorado where Spanish holidays are celebrated almost as they were one hundred years ago. Among the festivals are El Dia Santiago (St. James' Day) and El Dia de Santa Ana (St. Ann's Day). St. James' Day, better known as Gallo (Sp. cock) Day, is celebrated on July 25; the day is devoted to rodeo and racing events, the night to dancing. In former years a cock was buried in the sand, with only his head showing; riders galloped by, leaning from their saddles, as they attempted the difficult feat of plucking the bird from the sand by his head. A gunny sack is now substituted for the rooster, although the old practice survives in some small villages. St. Ann's Day is celebrated on July 26 by the women; open house is held throughout the community, and women go on horseback to visit their friends.

Left from Gardner on State 150 is MALACHITE, 6 miles (7,600 alt., 18 pop.);

Right from Malachite 1 miles on a dirt road to TOM SHARP'S POST, a log trading station built in 1870. It contains the table and chairs used by Sharp in entertaining his friend Ouray, chief of the Uncompahgre Ute (see Tour 11D). Sharp, born in Hannibal, Missouri, served in the Confederate Army and later came West as a prospector and railroad worker. Later, he settled near Gardner, constructed the trading post, and built a large red adobe house, still standing west of the post, furnishing it with goods brought by ox teams from Missouri. Sharp, who died in 1929, was among the first to bring thoroughbred horses into the West. His place was long known as Buzzard Roost Ranch because a large number of these birds roosted in the cotton-woods along the stream. An old Ute Indian trail, which can still be followed on horseback over the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, ran through Sharp's ranch, thence to Badito and Greenhorn Mountain.

Southwest of Malachite on State 150 is REDWING, 8 miles (7,800 alt., 223 pop.), and a dude ranch, HACIENDA DEL MONTE (rooms and meals), 10 miles, at the gateway to the HUERFANO PARK REGION, a mountain-rimmed valley known to the Indians as "the land where the grass is always green." In this forested area are numerous deer, elk, mountain sheep, beaver, and game fowl, and more than 15 miles of excellent fishing streams.

West of Gardner, State 69 follows winding Big Muddy Creek through wild and broken country to the top of PROMONTORY DIVIDE (9,000 alt.), 47 miles, separating the upper drainage basins of the Huerfano and Arkansas Rivers, affording a view (L) of the SANGRE DE CRISTO MOUNTAINS (Sp. Blood of Christ), named, so one story goes, by the Spanish explorer Valverde. One morning he broke camp in the Purgatoire Valley just as the sun was rising, led his band over a small hill, suddenly reined in his horse, and bowed his head in wonder at the prospect before him. Every snow-capped peak was bathed in a deep red glow against a bank of dark clouds. From Valverde's lips burst a fervent "Sangre de Cristo!" The Sangre de Cristo Mountains, extending in an unbroken chain from Salida southward to Santa Fe, N. M., are among the youngest mountains in the Rockies. Many of the great upthrusts have never been named or measured; eight rise more than 14,000 feet.

Directly west of Promontory Divide are the lofty peaks known as the CRESTONE NEEDLES, a group of almost unscalable points that challenge skilled climbers. Only foot and pack trails penetrate this region, which is being developed by the Forest Service as one of the great recreational areas of the State. Fishing is good in the many lakes and streams, and game is plentiful. In the valleys numerous stock ranches still range their herds much as they did when this was frontier country. Here the Ute clashed with their hereditary enemies, the Comanche, and adventurous Spanish soldiers and monks sought the gold of legendary mines in the hills. In January 1807, Zebulon Pike and his small party almost lost their lives in the snow fields on the high elevations when crossing Medano Pass into the San Luis Valley, where they were later captured by the Spanish. French and American trappers, the Mountain Men, followed mountain trails here to trap beaver. Silver Cliff, Rosita, Querida, and other mining towns of the region, many now vanished, contributed a colorful chapter to Colorado history when silver was king.

North of Promontory Divide State 69 descends into Wet Mountain Valley, drained by Grape Creek, which flows into the Arkansas River near Salida. Most of the place names of this region are English, for the Spanish did not colonize the valley to any extent. The country differs from that along the Big Muddy; productive farms extend from the highway to the base of the mountains; luxuriant stands of alfalfa and fields of lettuce, celery, and potatoes, for which the valley is noted, surround well-kept houses flanked with barns and silo.

At 58 miles is the junction with a dirt road.

Left on this road through the San Isabel National Forest to the HENDRICK RANCH, 7 miles, nearest automobile approach to Marble Mountain (see below) and its mysterious caves in the heart of the Sangre de Cristo Range.

West of the ranch (inquire here for directions and guides) a trail ascends 4 miles through a canyon to the MARBLE MOUNTAIN CAVES. In the marble formation are embedded numerous prehistoric plant and animal fossils, including those of the crinoid, a sea lily that moved about in pursuit of its food.

Seven caves have been discovered in this vicinity—among others, the BRIDAL CAVE, 300 feet deep; WOODMAN CAVE, 68 feet deep and shaped like a gallon jug; and MARBLE CAVE, never fully explored. The Forest Service has done little to publicize or develop the caverns, and warns against exploration without competent guides. Old Spanish legends refer to the Marble Cave as La caverna del Oro (the cave of gold) and have it that the Conquistadores entered it from another opening on the western or San Luis side of the range and worked rich mines in its depths. According to another tale, the fabulously rich Three Steps Mine of the Spanish was near the cave.

The blast of wind from the mouth of Marble Cave is very cold and so strong that it will extinguish a lantern or even a carbide light if unprotected by a reflector. A large Maltese cross is painted on a large rock at the entrance.

The cave was discovered in 1920 by Forest Ranger Paul Gilbert, who thus describes it: "I first heard of Marble Cave in 1919 from a Mexican woman who at the time was 105 years of age—she died at the age of 110. The woman stated that the Spanish obtained gold from it, that if one were to descend to a sufficient depth, a set of oak doors would be found, which forced open, would disclose a tunnel leading to the source of the gold. She said that when she was a child her people used to take a blanket, wrap it around a heavy stone, and throw it down the shaft. In a short time the blanket would be blown back, minus the rock, by the strong winds that come from the hole." Following the woman's directions, Gilbert found Marble Cave the next spring. The cavern is rather a volcanic fissure than a cave. It is entered by a vent; at 90 feet is a circular shaft 20 feet in diameter. Gilbert failed to interest anyone in further exploration until 1929, when a party of ten from the Colorado Mountain Club and Ranger Truman of Westcliffe undertook the most extensive exploration yet made.

The party descended far down the shaft without finding bottom. At 70 feet, on a small offset, they discovered the remains of a crude ladder that scientists in the party judged to be at least 200 years old. At approximately 300 feet was found a hand-forged hammer, believed to be of seventeenth century manufacture. Two of the party made their way down the shaft to a depth of some 500 feet, at which level, according to Gilbert, "the hole was little more than a cold and muddy shaft-like cave with dangerous loose rock in the walls. Upon returning from the Marble Cave, the party discovered, some thousand feet below on the side of the mountain, the remains of an old log and stone fort, the purpose of which is a matter of conjecture."

North of the junction State 69 traverses a farming region originally developed by German colonists. In 1870, after a committee appointed by a group of Germans living in Chicago had selected Wet Mountain Valley as a site for colonization, several hundred settlers came here to take up homesteads on a cooperative basis, each member paying $250 into the general fund. Most of the newcomers were artisans and laborers, not farmers; they knew nothing of irrigation or of growing conditions at this altitude. Early crops were failures, money and supplies ran low, and finally the group broke up. Many drifted away to Pueblo, Canon City, and Denver. Those who remained, however, prospered in time, and today the valley is one of the richest agricultural districts in the State. In 1870 a number of Mormon families from Utah settled on Taylor Creek, a tributary of the Grape, adjacent to the land taken up by the Germans.

WESTCLIFFE, 61 miles (7,800 alt., 335 pop.), was founded in 1885 by Dr. J. W. Bell, a large landowner, who named it for his birthplace, Westcliffe-on-the-Sea, England. The town is a base for hunting and fishing parties. The white frame HOPE EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN CHURCH here was built by German colonists in 1872.

At 62 miles is the junction with a dirt road.

Right on this road to the DEWEESE RESERVOIR (boating, fishing), 6.3 miles, an artificial lake fed by Grape Creek and its principal tributaries.

North of the junction the highway pursues an up-and-down course across hills spotted with pinon and cedar. Passing HILLSDALE, 73.6 miles (7,473 alt., 40 pop.), State 69 follows Texas Creek to TEXAS CREEK, 85 miles (6,198 alt., 20 pop.) (see Tour 9b), at the junction with US 50 (see Tour 9).