Poncha Pass
Poncha Pass is the main entrance into the San Luis Valley
from the north. It is for today's paved US285, and - once
upon a time - it was for de Anza chasing Comanches as well
as the Denver Rio Grande Railway. This is a passage
between two magnificent, wide valleys, passing foothills
of the Sangre de Cristo Range and the northern most
Sawatch Range. The most lasting impression of a ride
across the pass is probably obtained riding from north to
south, while descending into the San Luis Valley. The
Sangre de Cristo Range has some unique characteristics for
a Colorado mountain range. These mountains not only
contain groups of rugged, glaciated peaks but also
alluvial fans, characteristic of dessert ranges further
south. These large fan shaped landforms at the mouth of
canyons are water deposited sand and rocks, which
accumulate in a gentle slope, instead of being washed out
of the valley, as would be the case in a wetter climate.
Consequnetly the road descends into the valley, like an
arrow aiming straght between large, gentle, fan shaped
landforms, leading up to a linear range.

click on profile for more detail
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1. (mile00,7982ft) START-FINISH SOUTH
: Villa Grove, Hayden Pass
dirt road joins from right.
2. (mile14,9010ft) TOP: Poncha Pass
3. (mile16,8439ft) Marshall
Pass dirt road joins from left
4. (mile21,7480ft) START-FINISH NORTH : Poncha
Springs
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Approaches
From South. When approaching the pass from the
wide San Luis Valley, the thought of a curving pass road seems
very remote. There are no road bends to be found anywhere (see
picture below). The far mountain range in the first picture is
the Sawatch Range. That range is hidden from the cyclist's
view, once he's higher up on the pass. There are a few curves
near the top, but nothing resembling a switchback, and
nothing that approaches a serious climbing workout.
From North. This is the higher of the two
approaches. The road curves gently between sage covered hills.
The high peaks of the Sangre de Cristos do not come into view
until descending the other side.
Tours
Dayrides. Poncha Pass lends itself as convenient
return route to the starting point for a number of MTB pass
rides. Mountain bikers who are not afraid of pavement can
combine Poncha Pass with Hayden Pass
for a long circle ride. It measured 63 miles (m1:87.06.13).
Part of the northern Poncha Pass approach can also be cycled
when riding the Marshall Pass,
Pahlone Pass circle from the
east side.
Week Long (Very) Large Group Tour (<Monarch
Pass|Co131
summit(u) State Bridge - Wolcott>): As of 2005 the pass
has been crossed by mega crowds of "Ride the
Rockies" during 91 94 96 00 and 02. The day's ride always
covered Alamosa to Salida, except once when it was Salida to
Alamosa.
History
de Anza(Ute
Pass>): Poncha Pass storms into the pages of
frontier history when de Anza pursued Comanche Indian in 1779.
But just like him, the story too is going to take a while to
get there.
Juan Bautista de Anza, governor of Spanish New Mexico, had
already proved himself as frontiersman and trailblazer. In
1774 he established a trail between Central Mexico and the
isolated outposts of the Spanish empire in California. That
trail passed through Mexico, Central Arizona and over San
Carlos Pass in California.
In 1777, one year after the rambling Escalante expedition
had meandered through the four corners area, Charles the
3rd of Spain appointed de Anza governor of New Mexico. A
particular task of his was to subdue the Comanches, who had
taken over much of the old Apache country. While Comanches
were described as terrorists by the Spanish, relations with
the sedentary Ute Indians were much better. They served as
guides to the Spanish.
In August of 1779, several hundreds of Comanches were
reported to assemble in San Luis Valley - that's how it
finally began - the discovery of the northern most passes of
the Spanish empire on this continent. Previous Indian raids
had ended with the Spaniards chasing north over Raton
Pass and freying out into the upper Arkansas on the
plains. De Anza fought the Comanches by heading north into San
Luis Valley crossing the current New Mexico Colorado border.
As he pursued the Comanches north, de Anza made his first
big geographical discovery. The river he followed, the Rio
Grande, did not originate thousands of miles to the north, and
definitely not at the north pole as was suspected. It veered
to the west into the high San Juan Mountains. But his long
Comanche chase route kept him closer to the valley floors. In
today's geographical terms it could be described like this :
After the Rio Grande settlements of Monte Vista and Del Norte
the route heads north across La Garita Creek, through the
Cochetopa hills. Here the confusing topography provides many
challenges to reconstruct the route, as any bicyclist who ever
tried to cross the nearby Moon Pass can testify. The ususal
everpresent landmarks of the Sangre de Cristos on one side and
the San Juans on the other are not visible from the maze of
ravines cut in these hills. Heading north along the chase
route, the Cochetopa Hills are bisected by a large sagey
valley. Through it flows Saguage Creek, and it lead the chase
back into the San Luis Valley.
From here the route becomes easier to follow on a bicycle.
Head north on towards the only obvious gap in the mountains,
straight up the northern end of the San Luis Valley over
Poncha Pass. Now we're back at the beginning of the story. De
Anza finally crossed Poncha Pass. Up to this point the chase
route had stayed in sage country. Poncha Pass too, is a far
cry from alpine. But now the Comanches headed for real
mountains, up across the northern edge of the Mosquito Range
over Cameron Mountain, towards a flank of Pike's Peak, the
area surrounding the little town of Guffey. The chase
continued over a variant of Ute Pass.
In all probability the name "Poncha", meaning
mild or gap, is also due to de Anza. Many years later,
in 1874 a member of the Hayden Survey, Franklin Rhoda, used
the name "Puncho", which doesn't mean anything
except perhaps that Rhoda did not speak spanish. Another
remote possiblity is that Poncha is derived from "Poncoa",
the name of an Indian tribe.
Otto Mears Passes (Marshall
Pass>): Otto Mear's story is the prototypical american
imigrant capitalist success story. A jewish orphan, born in
the Ural steppe of Russia, orphaned at the age of two, he
arrived in San Francisico to be received by an uncle who never
materialized. Working his way up from news paper delivery boy,
he found himself a merchant and indian trader in the town of
Saguache in the 1860s. Building a toll road over Poncha Pass
was a natural extension of Otto's first line of business,
which was supplying miners in Oro City from his store in
Saguache. Poncha Pass was Otto's first toll road. It was the
first of many to come. With the help of John Laurence it was
officialy chartered in 1870. This was not the first attempt to
operate a toll road on the pass. Official charters from 1861
and 1865 did not result in successfull operations. But it was
the start of Otto Mear's pass empire.

Gunnison Rail Survey (<Medano
Pass|Marshall Pass>):
Poncha Pass was explored for use by a possible first
transcontinental railroad by the Gunnison expedition in 1853.
The group examined the pass from San Luis Valley. The verdict
was favorable: "the best watered, grassy valley, with
wood convenient for fuel that we have seen on this
section". They proceeded to name the present area of
Villa Grove after their field astronomer Homan. The name Homan
Park is still on today's maps. The expediton crossed the pass
from San Luis Valley into the Arkansas valley, describing Marshall
Pass along the way. In the Arkansas Valley, they noted
several indian paths to the Wet Mountains and the Hardscrabble
area, then returned back over Poncha pass to San Luis Valley.
Captain Gunnison would later be tragically killed by Indians
in Utah while still on this expedition. But an attempted name
change to honour the fallen Gunnison by naming Poncha Pass
after him did not stick.
Railroads (<Tennessee
Pass|Marshall Pass>):
The Denver Rio Grande Railway crossed Poncha Pass from the
Arkansas valley in 1881 to do business with mines in the upper
San Luis Valley. But the railroad's real objective was Marshall
Pass, and the ore traffic from Gunnison. Lucky for the
railroad, the inital approach from Salida also served the line
over Marshall Pass. In 1890,
the DRG narrow gauge tracks in the San Luis Valley were even
extended from Villa Grove to Alamosa to carry yet more silver
ore, arriving in wagons from Creede. But rails in the San Luis
Valley was a short lived phenomenon. Nothing remains today,
except perhaps a name given to the sleepy town town of Moffat,
who was a different boss of a different railroad altogether.
Unlike the DRG main line through the Arkansas valley, the
Marshall Pass route remained narrow gauge until operations
ended in 1952. The rail were salvaged three years later.
Modern Highways (<Trail
Ridge Road Passes|Marshall
Pass>): In 1914 the road was finished with a hard
gravel surface to suit the coming automobile boom. Between the
two world wars Poncho Pass became part of a touristic route
called "the Tenderfoot Trail", between Salida and
the San Luis Valley.
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