SummitPost - San Juan Range Diagram -- Photos, Diagrams & Topos

ARE THE SAN JUANS ONE OR MANY RANGES?

Much discussion has taken place and continues concerning the complex and multi-ranged San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado. To help with location refrences, climbers will discuss the San Juans by specifically referring to a range found within this complex mountain system. It's no wonder people have wondered about this when so many ranges can exist in the area, running in every direction imagineable.

But the area is often referred to as the San Juans for the sake of simplicity. But it's more than that. All but one range, the La Platas by Durango, area are connected together, either by a pass or by an alpine plateau, which this diagram illustrates. Arrows between range names indicate these connections. Green boxes indicate ranges partially or totally encompassed by a wilderness area.

When SP2's taxonomy was being discussed by the members, the layouts of most ranges were clear cut enough to determine the parameters to be discussed for a given range on an SP range page. Not so with the San Juans. Had the San Juans been incorrectly broken up into multiple ranges, disagreements and confusion would have ensued and further delayed a development of the San Juan Range page for SP.

When the Rockies group discussed these matters, to make a long story short, they said "Yeah-Give the San Juan page to Aaron!" I humbly accepted the charge, a considerable undertaking to say the least. Some would say I'm a sucker. Whatever the case, I hope the end results please my fellow SP members, particularly the Rockies Group. My thanks to them for their faith in me.

More information about the complex San Juan Mountains can be found in the San Juan Range Appendix B, part of the formidable San Juan Range Page project heaped upon me by me trusting SP peers.

The diagram was developed in the Corel 8 Graphics Program and coverted to jpeg for submission to SP by Aaron Johnson