Bob Burd's Trip Reports

Continued...

We had camped on BLM lands behind Whiskey Pete's Casino in Primm. Rather than hike in the nearby Clark Range as planned, we decided to head to the Lucy Gray Mountains east of Primm. I had climbed Adalac BM, the range HP and a P1K, back in 2019. This time, I was interested in the unnamed summits in the north half of the range that we could do in a 6.5mi loop. Our driving route from Primm took us over Beer Bottle Pass (a fun bit of jeeping) and to the east side of the range where we could most easily access the summits. The driving requires high-clearance, but 4WD is not needed. There is a telecom tower situated near the middle of the four peaks of interest with a good road leading to it. We decided to take advantage of this road and climb the four peaks individually, making for an easier day. Tom would go on from Calada Peak to climb Adalac BM while I went back and moved the Jeep to the bonus peak's east side where he would descend to meet me. Afterwards, we paid a visit to Beer Bottle Peak on our way back through the pass.

Peak 4,875ft

Besides the regular BLM roads, there are dozens of motorcycle and ATV tracks throughout the area. Some of these roads, including that through Beer Bottle Pass, had been recently graded for a SNORE race this coming weekend. We used some of these to approach Peak 4,875ft from the northeast, getting to a fenceline within half a mile of the summit. There is no Wilderness here, so not sure what the fence is for - perhaps cattle grazing? The rock is a mix of broken volcanic varieties as is most of the range, some of it better than others.

The slope we climbed was all class 2, but a bit loose and not all that great. We spent about 20min to reach

the summit, leaving

a register since we found none. We

returned much the same way, about an hour for the roundtrip.

Peak 5,193ft

We drove most of the way up the tower road, stopping when we were

west of Peak 5,193ft, about 1/3mi away. We ascended the

West Ridge, finding it somewhat blocky, and made a traversing

descent on the Northwest Slopes for the return which we found a better route. We left

a register at

the summit and spent just under 45min on the outing.

Peak 4,320ft

This was the lowest, least prominent, and most difficult of the day's peaks (which isn't saying much on an easy day). It is located on the west side of the range, connected to

the tower installation via a ridgeline. Our starting point at the tower was 400ft higher than the summit.

The ridge has some class 3 scrambling where

the blocks can be quite large, and other sections that are

easy or

annoying (more sidehilling on the north side of the ridge than we'd have liked). This one would take us a full two hours

getting us there and

back though the distance each way was little more than a mile.

Calada Peak

We climbed this one starting from the tower installation as well.

A motorcycle track works nicely as a trail to get one to

the base of the peak's North Ridge. The ridge starts gradually, but grows steep quickly. Some lingering snow left the ground and my boots wet, making the rocks a bit slippery. I traversed more to the left in the upper half to get onto the sunnier, less snowy facets. We had a pretty good pace going up, but Tom

easily beat me by a good 10 minutes. This summit had a register left by Adam Walker

in 2020, calling the summit "Calada Peak" (that's Adalac backwards). Tom

left me to continue south to Adalac BM via a connecting ridgeline with a steep drop of nearly 600ft as one leaves Calada Peak. I returned at a more casual pace via much

the same route and then drove the Jeep around to

the meeting spot. It was a bit of extra work for Tom and I would have nearly an hour to wait for his return.

Beer Bottle Peak

This is the northernmost summit in the Lucy Gray Mtns, just north of Beer Bottle Pass. Tracy Foutz had visited the summit in 2014, and likely bestowed the name when he added it to the PB database. We drove back to Beer Bottle Pass and parked on the highest spur road servicing one of the transmission towers.

From there it's a moderately

steep climb of 650ft over the course of a quarter mile, taking us 20min to reach

the summit. Good views of Ivanpah Valley to the west where Primm and Jean are located, and the Jean Lake drainage to the east (seems this wide valley deserves a name, too). We

finished up back at the Jeep by 4:15p, ready to call it a day. Tom needed to pick up Iris at the Las Vegas airport, afterwhich we would reconvene with Tom Becht for dinner off the Craig Rd exit NE of town. I would eat way too much at Viva Zapata's, suffering with a bloated stomach until long after I went to bed that night...