We love the Wet Valley for the views we get of both the Wet Mountains (the cabin is at 8600' in the Wet Mts) and the Sangre de Cristo Mountain range to the west. During the spring, the views are of lush green grasses and leaves. The summer brings afternoon thunderstorms over the Sangres and through the valley, and we often sit on the porch and watch the lightning as it passes by. The fall turns the valley golden as the ranches bring in the hay, and the aspens that fill the mountainsides turn yellow beneath the snow-capped peaks. In the winter we get snows that only occasionally are heavy at the cabin, but are massive further up the two mountain ranges to the east and west.
The Wet Valley is sparsely populated, and mostly cattle ranches. You will occasionally see the local Amish families taking their horse-drawn buggies into town to purchase items or sell their home-made items at the Farmers Market on Wednesday. The town of Westcliffe has a cute downtown section with lots of specialty stores, mining, railroad and ranching history and a summer rodeo that is a lot of fun to watch. The town still has an Independence Day parade that reminds me of those I saw as a child; where every man takes off his cowboy hat as the flag goes by. We wanted our children, world travelers due to our many overseas postings, to know what small-town America really looks like, and Westcliffe is a perfect example of that.
This area is one of the last remaining parts of Colorado that has not changed very much in the last 100 years. You can look at pictures of Westcliffe from the mining days of the early 1900s, and you'll see the same buildings on Main Street then as you see today. If you have an interest in viewing the night sky in all it's glory, this is the valley to do it in. In March of 2015, Westcliffe was designated a Dark Sky Community, the ninth such community in the world to be awarded that designation by the International Dark Sky Association.