Sangre De Cristos 

The Blood of Christ Mountains

The Sangre de Cristo Mountains is located in central southern Colorado and stretches down into New Mexico. It is considered the longest fault-block mountain range in the world, and is home to New Mexico’s highest peak Wheeler Peak. The part of this mountain range shown in this gallery in Colorado is referred to as the Sangre De Cristo Range and is the heart of the greater Sangre De Cristo Mountains. This straight and narrow fault-block mountain range rises abruptly 7000 vertical feet from the San Luis Valley to the west and the Wet Mountain Valley to the east. The Sangre de Cristo range, one of Colorado's fault-block ranges, geologically similar to the Tetons. The Gore Range is one of the other fault-block ranges. At 15 million years old, it is one of the youngest mountain ranges in Colorado (along with the Gore Range). The range is generally split up into 3 different mountain groupings called massifs, The Culebra massif to the southern end, the Blanca Massif in the middle and the Crestone massif to the north. Each massif is marked by at least 1 fourteener. Culebra massif contains only Culebra Peak at 14,047 ft (4,282 m), the Blanca massif contains Blanca Peak, Little Bear Peak, Ellingwood Point and Mt. Lindsey. The Crestone Massif contains Crestone Peak, Crestone Needle, Kit Carson Peak and Challenger Point, the Blanca and Crestone massifs also contain numerous jagged 13ers. Blanca Peak at 14,370 feet is Colorado’s 4th highest peak.

The Great Sand Dunes National Park is at the base of the Crestones