A short and sweet backpack over Music Pass and into upper Sand Creek can set you up for access to the numerous 13ers that surround this basin. In fact, there are 10 accessible summits that could all be climbed in as little as 3 - 4 days depending on your pace and endurance.
From the upper trailhead parking, hike 1.35 miles on Trail #1337 to the summit of Music Pass at just below 11,400 ft. The trail starts out through forest where in early summer you may still find, patches of snow, snowbanks and resulting muddy spots. As the trail approaches the pass, it climbs more steeply and ascends out of the forest. At the top of the pass, you'll enjoy an expansive and very impressive view of the upper Sand Creek Basin and all the surrounding 13ers. Once you cross the pass, you'll be entering the "Great Sand Dunes National Preserve."
Once you've soaked in the view, follow the good trail as it drops NW into the Sand Creek drainage. There's a large meadow that extends for over a mile mostly on the east side of the creek. At the upper end of that meadow, just before the trail enters the forest, there are good campsites at approximately these coordinates: N 37° 56' 06.97" W 105° 31' 20.53" Elev. 11,060 ft. This location can serve as an excellent base camp if you don't want to move your campsite. It's 2.6 miles to here with no more than 750 feet of gain, some of which you lose. As trail #1337 drops into this meadow, it will intersect trail #743 coming in from the San Luis Valley side. So in a little over an hour, you can be in a great wilderness location and setting up your tent. Don't be surprised however, if you're sharing this location with some other groups. This seems to be a popular destination, especially weekends and long weekends.
If you desire a campsite closer to your peaks of choice, then there is also good camping at both Lower and Upper Sand Creek Lakes. We have camped at the lower lake and found several good campsites on the east side of the lake and on the north side of the outlet. To get there, you'll need to cross Sand Creek near where the trail enters the forest. There may be more than one trail in this area and crossing the creek can be difficult in runoff conditions. Once across, the trail heads NW along the creek for a ways before branching and turning SW and winding its way to the lower lake over a distance of about one mile and 430 feet of gain.
The main Sand Creek trail also continues up valley to Upper Sand Creek Lake which can serve as a good camp location for accessing Milwaukee and Pico Aislado. This trail may or may not go as indicated on the USGS topo map. When we climbed here in 1995, that summer followed on the heels of a heavy snow winter and most everything above 11,000 feet in this valley was still covered in snow. To gain Upper Sand Creek Lake will add 1.55 miles of hiking and another 700 feet of gain.
There is camping as described above at 11,060 ft. at the upper NW end of the long meadow and at both Lower and Upper Sand Creek Lakes.