Backpacking in the Holy Cross Wilderness, Colorado

Jul 18

We had a terrific time backpacking over Fourth of July weekend last year so we decided to go on another trip this year. We still had not backpacked in the Sangre de Cristo range, and I had an elaborate plan for a beautiful backpacking spot with some nearby 13ers we could scramble. As Mother Nature would have it, the weather forecast for the long weekend was looking very wet in the Sangres so the day before we were supposed to head out, we changed our trip plan to one that stayed a little closer to home where the weather looked more favorable.

Our plan was to do a ~30 mile trip over three days in the Holy Cross Wilderness. We set out from the Half Moon/Fall Creek Trailhead in Minturn on Saturday morning. Our plan that day was to make it past Lake Constantine, up and over Fall Creek Pass, and camp somewhere below tree line as we approached Hunky Dory Lake. The forecast for the entire weekend had a decent probability of thunderstorms each afternoon so we knew we would want to get camp set up by mid afternoon each day. We stopped for a quick snack at Lake Constantine (for more on Lake Constantine, check out this blog post) and continued towards the pass.

As we got above tree line, we ran into several sections with snow that we had to traverse across. Thankfully, they were all pretty easy to walk through. We had thought snow would be our biggest obstacle, but the marshy terrain towards the top of the pass ended up giving us the most problems. After I ended up getting both feet totally wet in the marsh, we decided to hike the next 3/4 of a mile in crocs. I’m glad we didn’t end up running into anyone because we probably would have gotten a few looks. As we approached the top of the pass, the clouds were starting to get darker so we didn’t linger at the top of the pass for long and started our descent towards the Seven Sisters Lakes. This part of the hike was new to me and the lakes were each incredibly beautiful. I was wishing it was later in the summer when thunderstorms are less likely, and it would have been safer to camp above tree line. I’ll have to save that trip for another time because unfortunately on this day there was an 80% chance of an afternoon thunderstorm so we continued towards tree line.

We hadn’t seen many people that day so we decided to try our luck at camping at Hunky Dory Lake. When we got there, we were the only ones there and decided to set up camp. We thought we might get lucky and be the only ones at the lake on the holiday weekend, but we ended up having no such luck and a group of ~10 people with 4 barking dogs made camp uncomfortably close to us. At this point, there was nothing we could do as a big thunderstorm rolled in overhead, and we were happy to sit in our tent and wait it out. The lighting struck so close to our tent a few times that the thunder afterwards shook the whole ground around us. I always enjoy listening to a big storm from the comfort of my tent, but it’s always nice to be able to tell that the storm has moved far enough away that you are no longer in danger. After the storm we tried our luck at fishing and caught quite a few extremely small trout. While small, it was still fun nonetheless. After dinner we headed to be pretty early as we had two full days of hiking ahead of us.

The next morning we had breakfast and packed up camp and continued our trek towards Fancy Lake. On the way, we passed Holy Cross City which was pretty neat to see and we stopped to take a few pictures. When we arrived at Fancy Lake, we were surprised we were the only ones there and stopped for a snack. We did end up seeing one day hiker, but that was it, which was surprising considering the popularity of the lake. We continued our hike towards Fancy Pass and were a bit surprised when we got to the last 500 feet of vert of the pass and discovered it was still covered in snow. We did not bring any traction, but after looking at the snowfield, decided we would be fine “boot packing” up the face in just our trail running sneakers. This part felt like a no fall zone because there would have been no way to stop yourself and your 30-40 lbs backpack from sliding all the way to the bottom if you did fall. Thankfully, I’m no stranger to hiking in snow, and we made it to the top of the pass without any incidents. We did worry that the other side of the pass, where we’d have to descend, would also have snow, but since we hadn’t seen any snow on any west-facing slopes the entire trip, we figured there was a good chance the other side would be mostly melted. Thankfully, this turned out to be the case minus a few short 50 ft snowfields.

Looking up the snowfield on Fancy Pass that we had to boot pack up

We passed Treasure Vault Lake and headed down into the Cross Creek drainage. We ended up setting up camp for the evening at one of the lakes in that area and this night we did get lucky and had no one else near our campsite. We ran into only one other individual that afternoon and we aren’t even sure he camped at the same lake as us. It felt like we had the lake to ourselves. Again, we made sure to set up our tent right away in case a storm came through and then tried our luck at fishing. The fish at this lake were bigger than the ones in Hunky Dory. I had a bunch of fun fishing until dinner time. We had another early evening as we were waking up early to start the trek back to the car.

The next morning we hiked down the Cross Creek drainage to the Cross Creek Trailhead. We didn’t see anyone for the first 2/3 of the day. When we got within 3 miles of the trailhead, we came upon quite a few groups of people. I’m not sure what makes the first few miles of this trail so popular as there are plenty of other hikes with better views for the same distance in the area, but perhaps people like something about the hike that I don’t understand. Anyway, I digress. We finished up the hike by mid afternoon and headed home; both of us ready for a real meal.

Overall, it was a fantastic weekend. The weather ended up cooperating for the most part and views along the entire duration of the route were exceptionally pretty. Our route ended up being 29 miles with 4100 feet of vert. From this trip I discovered quite a few places I’d like to go back to at some point and makes me look forward to our next Holy Cross Wilderness adventure.