Continued...
Day 2 in the Turtle Mtns had us camped at the BLM's Lisa Dawn campground at the
base of .
Tom and I had had so much fun the previous day in
the same area (one of the best desert days ever) that we added an unplanned
second day to tackle some of the other peaks in the area. This part of the range
is both scenic and challenging due to the rugged nature of the terrain. A mix
of volcanic and conglomerate rock have combined with erosive forces to form
spires, pinnacles and peaks ringed with cliffs. Some of these are clearly
out of our league, but there are plenty that offer challenges that keep one
guessing as to whether they can climbed right up to the end. Today's efforts
were the leftovers from yesterday, but as we found, nearly as fun and a fine
day's effort.
Peak 2,483ft - Lost Arch Mine Peak - Peak 3,120ft
These three peaks lie along the northern part of the crest we had spent most
of the day on yesterday. Adam Walker had climbed the first two of these a year
earlier, so we had some beta and did not consider them difficult. The third
was an unknown, showing no acents and appearing to offer some challenges. We
decided to hike them in the order we did so that we could observe Peak 3,120ft
from the top of Lost Arch Mine Peak to help assess our route options. From our
campsite, we headed WSW across of Lost Arch Mine
Peak, utilizing that goes to Mohawk Spring on the
northwest side of the peak. Before reaching the spring, we left the trail to
to Peak 2,483ft, dropping down to between
the two peaks before the South Slopes of Peak 2,483ft, all
class 2. There are to the peak separated by a high saddle.
We had originally guessed that the southern summit was highest, but this proved
not to be the case. A quicker way to reach the highpoint would have been to
climb the east side of the saddle directly from the campground. Still, it took
less than 45min to reach Peak 2,483ft via our route, getting us
by 7:30a. We found left by
Adam in 2019 in a glass jar, to which I added our names. Like the previous day,
I would do register duty for both of us to keep from sharing things between us,
part of our social distancing routine for the trip.
We descended southwest off the summit, aiming for the low,
connecting it to Lost Arch Mine Peak. Just west of
the second peak is the impressive , an officially named
summit with vertical walls on all sides. If this weren't deterrent enough, above
this was a second set of cliffs that make the feature virtually impregnable. We
passed along of the feature on its northeast side where I
tested some of the conglomerate rocks to find that I
could pull out several of the rocks without too much effort. I later contacted
Tim O'Connor in Lake Havasu City to see if he had climbed this one. He knew of
it, but had not climbed it, so it's possible it's one of those rare unclimbed
desert summits. Our route along Mexican Hat led to the saddle with Lost Arch
Mine Peak from which we to via the same
route used by Adam, another class 2 effort. We did not find a register here from
Adam like on the previous peak, so we of our own to which we
added his name at the top.
We now had a good view of Peak 3,120ft another mile to the southeast. There
seemed to be several possible routes, but a small cliffband in the uppermost
reaches left us questioning the last 40-50ft to the top. It would require
closer inspection. We off Lost Arch Mine, then headed
south into the drainage on the west side of the crest where we found easy travel
in a pleasant little valley sprinkled with and other flowers.
As expected,
most of the climb up the west side of Peak 3,120ft was straightforward, leading
to the last bit of difficulty. I examined several class 4-ish options before
choosing on of these to carefully surmount a 15-foot section of the cliff. After
careful deliberation of , Tom balked at both options and
resigned himself to miss the summit of this one. After continuing the last short
distance to the summit, I noticed looked to offer an
easier alternative. I called down to Tom to point this out, then downclimbed
to make sure I knew what I was conjecturing about. It did
indeed prove to be an easier way, no more than stiff class 3 and without the
exposure the other two options had threatened us with. And so shortly before
10a we were both at , highly satisfied with the
outcome. There is a fine view of yesterday's Kelbaholt to
along with many of the other rugged features that pepper the
area. After leaving another register here, we reversed our route off the north
end and down the west side, eventually returning to camp through the gap with
Lost Arch Mine Peak. We had expected to pick up the BLM Trail we'd heard that
circles Mexican Hat from the campground, but only for the
last quarter mile or so .
Peak 3,054ft
Our next effort was several miles to the southeast. A rough jeep road follows
along the northeast edge of the Turtle Mtns Wilderness, allowing closer access
to this and the next summit. Peak 3,054ft is also difficult-looking, with
high cliffs on all the sides we could examine as we drove by it. We parked about
half a mile from the summit on without having yet seen
any feasible route up it. The only chance we had was to find something up the
southwest side that we had not been able to see. We hiked up the drainage on
the south side of the summit towards a saddle with higher portions of the range.
During most of this we were studying the cliffs above us, but nothing looked
reasonable as a way up. It wasn't until we rounded a bend and could see the
southwest side that a surprisingly presented itself, rising
high into the rocky cliffs above. This was almost exactly what we were looking
for. We ascended this class 2 slope for about 300ft until it began to narrow and
increase to class 3. At its narrowest point we passed through
and quickly reached the top of the West Ridge. The
northeast side dropped precipitously and itself was
unclimbable. But a crux on the right side of the ridge
led higher. We stayed on the south side of the ridge, using
, traversing right and , then
more to , more easily than we had
expected. This was the
most satisfying peak of the day. We took a short break here, enjoyed our views
of the Turtle Mtns to and south, the Chemehuevi Valley to the
north and . Our would go back essentially the same
was as we did not find any viable alternates from our ascent route. It was 2p
by the time we ,
leaving us with much of the afternoon still remaining.
Peak 2,276ft
This was the easiest summit of the day, a short quarter mile hike up from the
road via slopes on , all . We took
all of 20min to reach and less than 15min on the return. We
left another before returning to .
Peak 2,480ft
We spent the next 40min driving the rough 4WD road back out the way we'd come
and I think we both enjoyed the motorized fun almost as much as the hikes. We
at a point half a mile southwest of Peak 2,480ft, our last
summit of the day. Most of this was a straightforward ,
but again there was a ring of cliffs near the summit. We used a somewhat exposed
in the cliff on the west side that proved to be
completely unnecessary. After we found the easy
walk-off route on the north side. We had simply to
continue up to the left at the base of the cliffs on our ascent and we'd have
easily found it. It was 4:30p by the time we to the jeeps,
still with
several hours of daylight, but by now we had exhausted our supply of summits and
ourselves, too. We visited (or what remains of
it) and the
before heading out of the Turtle Mtns. We decided to head to
Needles for Thai food and gas before driving into the nearby Sacramento Mtns
where we would spend the next day playing around. We would sleep quite well,
satisfied with two very fine days in the Turtle Mountains...
Continued...