Expeditions:   Ravens Ridge -- Rio Santa Barbara -- Pecos Wilderness (Hamilton Mesa) -- Rio Chama -- Cave Creek.

Raven's Ridge, Three Days After the Forest Re-Opens (July 15, 2002)

Text and maps below
From the Ski Basin, 10,330'
take the Winsor Trail. meadow near beginning of Winsor Trail

gate to the Pecos Wilderness At the Wilderness Boundary, 10,800'
don't go through the gate.

Turn right, and
follow the fence.start of informal Raven's Ridge Trail

It's mostly aspen forest.aspen trees and dry forest litter

meadow just inside wilderness boundary fence After about 25 minutes, you come to an inviting meadow on the left. Be invited (you'll have to go through the fence.)

looking up towards viewpoint on small quartz knob Head through the trees, and edge left.Climb the little nubbin of hill, littered with snowy white quartz, 11,200'

and turn around:
Santa Fe Baldy.first view of Santa Fe Baldy

view towards Lake PeakLake Peak.

Retrace your steps back to the trail.looking down slope towards trail


In about 12 more minutes, you arrive
at 11,400' looking out over the Rio Nambe towards Lake Peak and Nambe Lake, view towards Nambe Lake's cirque below the ridgeline

towards Santa Fe Baldy and Puerto Nambe,Santa Fe Baldy, partly shadowed; La Vega in bright sun

and looking down into Rio Nambe. meadows along Rio Nambe seen from above

The clouds keep building, shifting, moving,Santa Fe Baldy and ridge beyond extending to the north, La Vega in center of frame

Santa Fe Baldy, Aspen Basin, shifting clouds and thunder rumbles.
Sun bright bright bright.

It's time to head back.looking north and west, towards the valley

looking north and west still; if it were a crisper day you could make out San Antonio Mountain on the horizon, at the Colorado border

'Raven's Ridge' seems to be a completely local-knowledge trail. Trail guides don't address it at all. Serious hikers starting from the Ski Basin are in any case always going further -- up Baldy, over to Lake Katherine. You can continue up the Ridge as far as Deception Peak, or even all the way to Lake Peak and turn it into a loop. From my perch on the outcrop overlooking the Nambe Basin, where I have been three times before, it appears that most people go up a ways, perhaps as far as Deception Peak, and either retrace their steps or go down a ski trail straight to the parking lot (short, fast, and ugly -- went that way returning from Lake Peak years ago, never again. Ski trails eat mountains.)

Maps
  • The only map that labels it 'Raven's Ridge' and shows a trail is Drake Mountain Maps' Map of the Mountains of Santa Fe. Which is copyrighted and I can't show it to you.
  • Fragment of the topo map, from Topozone. Hike begins at the end of the road near bottom right of image. The topo calls it Windsor Trail, by the way, but it's Winsor.
  • Santa Fe Baldy and Lake Peak in the USGS' Geographic Names Information Service database. Takes you to both DRG (digital raster graphic) topo maps and Orthophotoquads.
Update: June 15, 2004
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
mbobkoff@cybermesa.com
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