Ina Coolbrith was a celeberated American poet, writer and librarian who came
to California in 1851 at the age of 10 in a wagon train with her family.
The train was led by scout Jim Beckwourth for whom Beckwourth Pass in the
Northern Sierra was named. The Coolbrith family settled in the Bay Area where
she grew up and lived out her life. Mt. Ina Coolbrith, south of Beckwourth Pass
and east of Sierra Valley, was named for her sometime after her
death in 1928. When I asked Kristine if she wanted to join me for some
peakbagging in the area, I sent her a list of likely targets and it was Ina
Coolbrith that grabbed her attention. The peak is only about 20mi NW of Reno,
just inside the CA border. The area is a patchwork of Plumas NF, private, and
BLM wildlife lands. A few years ago I had tried to access the area from
Loyalton in Sierra Valley, but found the road gated and closed to traffic. I
told Kristine to meet me at the Hallelujah Junction Wildlife Area off US395 to
the east at 7a, not really knowing if we would be able to drive in that way.
Online info showed the wildlife area closed Feb-Jun, but there was no mention
on whether one could drive outside those months. Worst case, we'd have an
eight mile walk from US395. I was hoping for the driving option because there
were two other summits in the area that I was interested in as well and hoped
to be able to do all three in the same day. It worked out almost as well as we
might
have hoped. Kristine had arrived early and already ascertained that the gates
were unlocked. We would have time for all three plus a bonus one we found at
the end of the day. Temperatures were decidedly cold - 20F when I arrived at
our meeting spot. Though it would warm some as the sun came out, it was windy
much of the day, keeping us bundled up from the chill and driving us from the
summits almost as soon as we'd arrive. It was the coldest day of the year for
either of us, hands down.
Mt. Ina Coolbrith
We left Kristine's vehicle off US395 and used the jeep for driving the sometimes
rough roads around the area. An advantage for me was that I got to stay snug and
warm in the jeep while Kristine got out to one gate at a time,
closing it behind me, a total of three gates in all before we had gotten through
the wildlife area. Our route took us west into Evans
Canyon where we crossed a creek on a little-used track to head up to the saddle
between Ina Coolbrith and Haskell. Not sure if 4WD is needed, but high-clearance
is a must and sections of the roadways are brushy. We drove higher from the
saddle but didn't get as far as the topo map would leave you to believe
possible. The road pretty much ended without fanfare, leaving me just enough
room to turnaround. We were about 2mi from our summit and would start from
there.
The going is steep right out of the gate, up with no
warm-up for the legs. After climbing about 1,200ft, the
as we reached that can be followed to the summit, still
more than a mile away. The of the ridge were more forested
and less brushy than the
ridge itself, and we often preferred that side to allow easier progress. We
spent almost an hour and a half making our way to the summit where we arrived
shortly after 10a. A register we found there had been left by
a Sierra
Club party from the Great Basin chapter based in Reno. A few other parties
with names I recognized had visited in the same year. Despite fires burning in
the state, the air quality was quite good and we could see for many miles
, the and well
. There was also
from 1931 left by the US Coast & Geodetic Survey. was
pretty much along the same route with some minor variations in the lower
half that we though would be more direct. It ended up being pretty brushy and
offered no advantage at all over the ascent route.
Haskell Peak
at the jeep, we drove the short distance back down to the saddle
with
Haskell Peak and started from there, a distance of only a mile to the summit.
There was almost 1,000ft of gain over that distance, but it was
than and it would take us
less than half an hour to follow to .
We found a cairn but no register there, leaving one of before
heading back down the same route.
Peak 7,654ft
This P1K lies to the southeast of Ina Coolbrith, across Evans Canyon. In
hindsight, it would probably have been better to start from the north in Evans
Canyon, a distance of about 1.5mi each way. Instead, we spent time driving
up Evans and Dark Canyons, following hardly-used tracks to get us higher on
the west side of the unnamed peak. The topo map shows roads getting within
half a mile from, and 1,000ft below the summit, but we hit a dead-end where
the roads are no longer maintained, even by hunters who occasionally visit the
area. Our hiking route started with a crossing of the trickle of a creek in
Dark Canyon. It's pretty steep going down and and would be
quite a difficulty in Spring. We then made our way east across
to found on
the southwest side of the peak. There was a large, stately pine growing in the
middle of the meadow and we wondered
what kept early loggers from cutting it down. Perhaps left to provide shade
for the cattle that have grazed here? Kristine's face lit up as she made a
beeline for the tree, stating it was just begging to be climbed. And so she
did. Well, to be fair , but my ascent was only partial and
soley for the purpose of documenting . Five
minutes later we had played out the tree and continued towards our peak.
Somewhere in the forest near the base of the peak I paused to take off my
fleece and quickly lost track of Kristine. I thought she might have stopped for
a potty break but couldn't tell if she was ahead or behind me as I continued
upslope. The route from the SW side grows quite steep, a bit loose and
sometimes brushy, overall not a very pleasant way to go. I found Kristine
peering over from the summit area, wondering what had become of me. Evidently
there was no potty break and she made quick time getting to .
A register here had been placed by a 10-person party , with
many recognizeable
names from the Reno area, including Rich Wilson, Ron Moe, John Ide, Sharon
Marie Wilcox and Sue & Vic Henney, another contingent of the Great Basin
Peaks Section. We found a better descent route to the north of our ascent,
mostly forested with decent footing and little brush. Back down in the meadow
we were surprised to see a group of four motorcyclists cruising the trails.
One of them stopped to
briefly, but we never did figure out how
they got to the road they were traveling, the very one we were trying to use
ourselves. They were even more surprised to see the pair of us on foot, not
knowing that we had a jeep stashed away on one of the roads they had yet to
explore.
Peak 7,580ft
It was after 3:30p by the time we to the jeep and we probably
should
have called it a day. I mentioned another bonus peak not far away and Kristine
more or less shrugged and offered, "Well, we might as well.." We reparked the
jeep a short distance to the north and started out heading west, about a mile to
the summit with 1,400ft of gain. It began well enough with forest cover,
but soon became more open, where we noticed the wind had
picked up markedly from earlier in the day. By the time we had climbed up to
, we were battered by a fierce, bitterly cold wind
that sent
us scurrying off the leeward side of the summit to get out of the full brunt
of it. We took , left , then beat a
hasty retreat off the summit by dropping to into what we
hoped would be the protective shelter of the canyon. It was indeed less windy
there, but we found the brush as heavy as we'd found all day. We briefly lost
track of each other as we jostled our different ways through the stuff. Just
when we thought we were treading a previously untrodden route, we came across a
USFS in the midst of the brush. When we
to the jeep just before 5:30p, the sun had
already set and it was quickly growing colder, now below freezing. We
both agreed that we could have done without that last summit, but it was still
a pretty good day. I drove us back out to US395 where we parted ways, Kristine
heading home while I found a Starbucks to warm up in on the outskirts of
Reno. More fun in store for tomorrow...