It was the start of my birthday desert roadtrip, a 13-day romp through the
tri-state area of CA/NV/AZ. Various folks would be joining me during the trip
at different times, though this morning I was on my own. I had driven out the
day before to camp west of US95 near Homer Mtn. I was up early to do this and
a few other peaks before joining my pal Eric in Boulder City, NV.
Homer Mountain
This is a standalone mountain found west of the Dead Mtns and US95 in eastern
San Bernardino County. It has just over 800ft of prominence and has been visited
by the likes of Smakto, MacLeod and Lilley. I followed a utility road to the
of the mountain, leaving me with about 2.5mi of hiking
each way to the summit. I started on foot soon after sunrise, following
that eventually narrowed, with a few easy
before starting my . The slopes I
followed were all class 2, approaching the summit in a roundabout way from
and southwest. It took about 1.5hrs to reach
where spread out on a clear, crisp December morning in
. I had hoped to find an old register from one of the
Sierra Club folks, but that seems to have disappeared. Adam Walker had
a year earlier, and I was the only other apparent visitor
since then. There was a generic USGS with no name imprinted.
On the descent, I took a more direct route off the summit,
and south, then down a ridgeline just north of the
ascent gully I'd used. I eventually ended up in the and
followed that by 9:30a. During the descent, I spied
on the
northeast side of the summit that one could drive even closer. I had seen this
in the satellite view previously, but it seemed a much longer drive on lesser
roads. Others might want to explore this option.
Newberry Mountains
Back on US95, I headed north into Clark County, NV, and then east on
.
This is the popular road used to access the DPS summit of Spirit
Mtn. I was after a small collection of peaks around Christmas Tree Pass
that are found in Purcell's
Rambles & Scrambles. These are exceedingly
minor summits that I might be embarassed to subject others too, so now seemed
like a good time. North Peak and Little Peak both have telecom installations,
most easily reached by the service road that forks off Christmas Tree Pass Rd.
The high-clearance road is in decent shape, but gated about three miles below
the summits. Others have reported starting their hike from here. I got out to
examine the gate and was happy to find the padlock unlatched. It was simple
enough to detach it and open the gate, allowing me to drive to both summits. I
visited first, with its stunning view of Spirit Mtn to
, across Christmas Tree Pass. There are several points vying
for highpoint, so I visited both before driving over to Little Peak. Like North
Peak, it has , including cellular service, explaining
why cell reception is so good up here. The more interesting summit is unnamed
Peak 4,921ft, a near-P1K about a mile to . This one is
not found in Purcell's book, but it was to this that I next turned my
attention.
I drove partway back down the service road, noting a white truck making its way
up, about a mile down the road from me. I parked just off the road northeast of
Peak 4,921ft's summit and up the steep slope before the
truck had a chance to cross my path. I watched it without
stopping, so likely just a technician heading up to do some work, not a
security guy on patrol. The climb to Peak 4,921ft is short but steep, with
loose rock in places. I worked around several to keep
things at class 2 and make my way to in less than 30min. Good
i from the rocky summit. A register had been left here
, with only a few visitors, including a LVMC party in 2017 led
by Kevin Humes with his famous green ink. The technician was still working up
on Little Peak when I returned to the Jeep just after noon.
was still wide open when I passed through a few minutes later, so I left it for
the technician to deal with (or not) upon his return.
Promontory Point
Back on US95 once again, I drove north to Boulder City to meet up with Eric at
the Starbucks there. He had originally planned to arrive around 5p, but an
early start from Albuquerque had him in town only a short while after my
arrival. With a few hours of daylight remaining, we set out for a 5mi hike in
the Lake Mead NRA, just north of Hoover Dam. Promontory Point is the highpoint
of the pennisula jutting into the lake. We parked at
and set out around 2:15p. This isn't the easiest starting point for Promontory
Point. That location is probably the Hoover Dam Visitor Center which has closer
access via the Historic Railroad Trail, but we didn't know this at the time. We
the stone wall at the overlook and made our way
towards another summit we were interested in,
(Peak 1880 on PB), which was on our way. No trail via the
route we used, but it was standard class 2 with a few bits of
, going over a few intermediate points before reaching
in about 35min. There was and
overlooking Lake Mead and the Hemenway Harbor to the north. We
made a short off the east side of the summit to
continue towards Promontory Point, joining the route described by Candace
Skalet that goes around . We didn't find the
described use trail until we were returning, but it isn't really necessary. We
went around of the ridgeline,
to visit the PB-only J-Hill on our way. This is a minor point with
and of the Hoover Dam and Bridge, better
than the one obtained from Promontory Point. Another 30min saw us to the higher
. This higher summit has better views looking into
, and around the NRA surrounding the lake. There is
here, too, along with a busy register dating
, most of the names recognizable among the usual suspects.
It was getting late and a bit chilly - the blue skies of the morning had been
replaced with increasing overcast and a change of weather. We beat
back along the route we'd used from the fenceline, finding the use trail (or
rather, pieces of it) that would take us down to the Railroad Trail. This made
for a much easier return to the Lakeview Overlook, no headlamp needed on the
wide, flat trail even as it grew dark. It was nearly 5:30p by the time we
to the overlook and the Jeep, ours the last vehicle remaining in the
usually busy lot. We drove back to Boulder City where we found dinner and a
place to camp for the night. It wasn't one of our better finds, so I'll not
reveal its location - suffice to say that the neighborhood dogs knew we were
there as it wasn't quite far enough out of town...
Continued...