3/15/15

I had to go to Las Vegas for a corporate retreat weekend. I really hate Las Vegas.  But I really love the desert surrounding Las Vegas.  I managed to sneak in a very quick sunrise trip to Valley of Fire State Park, and took a late flight home so I had time to meet up with Rockin’ and Dan in the Mojave National Preserve.

I drove in the dark to arrive in Valley of Fire just in time for sunrise. I had just enough time to visit the Fire Wave before having to turn around and head back for a company meeting. This area was beautiful and definitely warrants further exploration….next time!

 

I had planned to meet Rockin and Dan in Mojave National Preserve to climb Clark Mountain, the high point in the Preserve.  Based on my quick internet research, it looked like a fun off-trail route with some scrambling along a saddle between the summit and an eastern peak.  It also looked like a convenient place for us to meet up – Rockin and Dan would camp there Saturday night, and I would meet them early Sunday morning.  Despite reading several comments about the trailhead being difficult to access due to a mining operation just off I-15, I trusted the GPS tracks I’d found showing the route from the highway.  I got a call from Rockin late Saturday night informing me that the GPS track did not match up to the roads at all, and we were going to need to come up with a plan B.  After a few more hours of driving around, lost on dead-end, deeply rutted dirt roads with lots of no trespassing signs, and a stop by a mine security officer, Rockin and Dan made it out alive and with a new plan to camp on Cima Road near Teutonia Peak.  Thank God for smartphones and flexible hiking partners!

 

We started out with a hike up Teutonia Peak trail – which doesn’t actually go all the way to Teutonia Peak, just the summit ridge.  After the trail ends, it’s a Class 3 scramble (or harder, depending on how you go).  We had very limited beta, so it took some trial and error until we found a feasible route.  It was fun to get off trail to a little climbed peak.

 

Back at the Teutonia Peak trailhead, we turned around and headed the opposite direction to climb Kessler Peak.  There is no trail to this peak, and it’s not really significant in any way, but it was conveniently located!  It was another short hike, ~3.5 miles round trip with ~1200′ gain, but going cross country, with every step careful to avoid cacti and pokey things is more tiring than trail walking.

 

 

 

We barely scratched the surface of the Mojave Preserve and some day I’ll have to go back and check out more of it.  I had just enough time to drive through Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area and be annoyed by all the heavily perfumed tourists hanging out their car windows with iPads before catching my flight back to Portland.  Red Rocks is another area that would be nice to have more time to explore.

 

http://caltopo.com/m/0P1QApproximate routes of our hikes in Mojave