Anyone who looks at a satellite map of the mountains north of Santa Fe quickly notices a nearly perfect loop of brownish gray area. This is one of the largest areas in New Mexico of above treeline terrain. It contains nine of the 29 New Mexico 12,000 footers. They are all inside the northern half of the Pecos Wilderness.
This is an open-course loop to summit all nine peaks in any order. The nine peaks are:
Truchas Peak 13,102’
N Truchas Peak 13,024’
Chimayosas Peak 12,841’
Jicarita Peak 12,835’
Sheepshead Peak 12,696’
Santa Barbara Peak 12,640’
Trouble Benchmark 12,622’
Barbara/Little Chimayosas Peak 12,515’
Trampas Peak 12,170’
The clock starts and ends at the trailhead. You can start from any trailhead, but you need to finish at the same trailhead from which you started. The most logical trailheads to use are probably:
Santa Barbara
Trampas
San Leandro
Rio Quemado
Alamitos
This is a serious undertaking. Do research ahead of time. There is very little water on the eastern half of the route. Much of this route is off trail/scrambling. Where trails supposedly exist they are often in very poor condition. Depending on the route chosen there may be some 3rd/4th class scrambling. Be alert for lightning as roughly 70% of this route is above treeline.
