Collegiate Peaks Overlook

Incredibly unbelievable views from the Collegiate Peaks Overlook near Buena Vista. After seeing this, my traveling companions and I were wondering "just what makes Pike's Peak so special?" This is like six Pike's Peaks! Photos do a poor job of showing just how gorgeous this location is. See evidence of glacial activity, alluvial fans, and a grayish spot at the base of Mt. Princeton...




How did these vast mountain ranges get here? Geologists are still puzzled because this mountain range occurs so far from a subduction zone. It all started with volcanic activity 300 million years ago. The volcanoes rose out of the shallow sea off the coast of Laurentia. Over the next few hundred million years, collisions on the western coast of the North American craton most likely resulted in an unusually flat angled subducting slab that forced the Rockies upward through layers of ancient Pennsylvanian and Permian sedimentary remnants.