Continued...
Day 2 of our Death Valley roadtrip had us visiting the famous Racetrack,
with rocks that move mysteriously across the mud playa, leaving tracks
in their wake. Ok, maybe not all that mysteriously - some wet, slick mud and
high wind conditions seem to explain it well enough,
but it's pretty cool nonetheless. Tom
and I had been there two years earlier but this would be Brian's first visit.
With Tom's Jeep we planned to drive up Lippincott Rd, one of the rougher
4x4 routes in the park, connecting Saline Valley with the Racetrack. Tom was
looking forward to having the opportunity to drive it because, as he's commented
on more than one occasion, "That's why I bought it." I wasn't particularly
looking forward to the drive since I seem to be somewhat of a wimp about
getting bounced around in a steel box, but I'll endure quite a bit of such
nonsense if it gets
me access to new peaks. On the agenda were a couple of unnamed summits on the
south and north sides of the Racetrack with a few bonus peaks thrown in to fill
up the day.
As it turned out, Lippincott wasn't as rough as we were expecting,
much to my liking and perhaps a little disappointing to Tom. From Saline Valley
Rd, Lippincott Rd forks off at the south end of the valley, the first three
miles a tame traverse across the desert floor on decent roadway. It then spends
the next four miles climbing 1,600ft up through one drainage and into a second
before emerging at the far southern end of Racetrack Valley.
The road was built back in the day to service the Lippincott Mine and others
in the Racetrack area, some of which were active as late as 1952, extracting
mostly lead, gold, and copper, none in very large quantities. Halfway up the
canyon there is welcoming you to Death Valley dating to
some time before the park's expansion in 1994. The road climbs impressively and
there are several good spots to get views looking on the road
just traveled. For the most part the road is still in and
can be negotiated by any high-clearance
vehicle. Only near the top are there sections with rough rock where 4-wheel
drive is needed. Once in Racetrack Valley we turned right and headed up to a
parking spot near the Lippincott Mine. Another party was parked at a fine
concrete pad area, with camp set up for an extended stay that included a
canopy, BBQ, several large coolers and an expensive telescope, among other
items.
Peak 5,473ft - Peak 5,060ft
With more than 800ft of prominence, the first of these had caught my attention
as a nice objective while in the area. It turned out to be a fine ridge climb
that we extended with a visit to the lower bonus peak. Tom was able to manuever
the Jeep to within 1.3mi of the summit, of the road spur
leading to a couple of mining prospects north of the summit and above the
Lippincott Mine. The was steep, leading to the more
enjoyable portion along the north-south trending with the
Racetrack easily visible behind us. Ahead of the others, I was able to spot and
then sneak up on of junior bighorn rams grazing on
of the summit. After watching them from a distance for a
short time behind a rock outcrop, they suddenly looked up in my direction. Not
far behind me, Tom had just popped up
in his bright blue shirt that caught their attention - off they went. Even
before Tom could join me a minute later to tell him what I was looking at,
they'd covered a quarter mile and were out of sight over the skyline - it was
the last we'd see of them. was a short distance south of the
false summit we were looking at in that direction and after just shy of an
hour's effort we were at the top. To no great surprise, Gordon and Barbara had
beaten us to the summit by some 37years, leaving a well-preserved
in a glass jar. Only three other individuals had signed it in
. Hunter Mtn can be seen high to , the
Inyo Mtns dominate the view and the much higher Peak 6,683ft lies
to . While we were lounging about the top under fine weather
conditions, I suggested we
could pay a visit to Peak 5,060ft on our way back, making a loop of the outing.
The others seemed happy to oblige me. We dropped off the east side of the
summit to
between the two peaks. The old 15' topo map shows an old
road or trail going across this saddle south towards Dodd Springs, but we saw
no sign of such route. We then climbed another 400ft, taking 15-20min from the
saddle to reach the second atop Peak 5,060ft. Though lower than
the
first, the views towards The Racetrack were far better.
Finding no cairn or register here, we continued north along the ridgeline,
eventually dropping to
to the west and then traversing back to
the Jeep. Before leaving, we took another half hour to explore the upper
of Lippincott Mine. These were impressive holes, a few
dropping , others blasted into the
mountainside. The Park Service
had spent some time and money to block these unsafe passages from the public
with steel mesh barriers, but it seems at least a few folks found them a
bother and cut their way around or through them. We ended up back at the Jeep
a second time around 11:30a where we packed up and .
Peak 4,740ft - Peak 5,201ft
The higher of these is a P1K and the main reason I was interested in a return
to Racetrack Valley. Located about 2.7mi north of Ubehebe Peak (also a P1K),
we hadn't enough time on that first visit to tag this unnamed summit while in
the area with an agenda that was already overbooked. As we were driving north
towards it, Tom noticed some
on its southeast aspect that looked
like they would make for a good descent route. So we flipped the plan around
to accommodate this, choosing to head to the bonus peak first, then the P1K,
and finally the sandy descent. Without any turnouts in the vicinity, Tom
high on one side of the roadway to allow other vehicles to pass and
off we went across the desert flats to the west. Near the start we noticed
a high number of old, rusted fuel cans and discarded food tins. They weren't
piled about like a typical trash dump site, but rather spread about the desert
floor almost as though someone was setting up for target practice - only there
were no bullet holes indicating such use. After about 3/4mi we began ascending
the somewhat loose limestone slopes, after
climbing about 600ft. We then followed west for another
1/3mi to reach the summit of Peak 4,740ft around 1p. The peak provides good
views of Saline Valley to , Ubehebe Peak to ,
and a rather impressive side of Peak 5,201ft to . The
colorful limestone stripes adorning the mountainside suggested it
would be a good climb.
After spending about 20min at the summit, we started down, Brian and Tom
choosing to return along the ridgeline we'd ascended to reach the deep saddle
between the two summits while I chose a more direct route off Peak 4,740ft.
Though loose, the limestone provided more traction than other rock types and I
had little trouble dropping down the steep gully I had chosen before traversing
over to the saddle. Tom and Brian were only a minute behind me in reaching
the saddle, so neither route proved to have an obvious advantage. The three of
us then ascended 1,100ft over the course of a mile up Peak 5,201ft's
. It was as good a route as we could have hoped without the
looser slopes
we'd found on the first summit, neatly bypassing the sandy slopes to the west.
It took an hour to get from one summit to the next where we found a register
left by Sue & Vic Henney in 2014. Knowing they had reached the summit years
earlier, we for John Vitz and Bob Sumner before adding
. Anticipating a fun descent, off the
summit and down
he'd eyed several hours earlier. We found the sand broken into two sections,
an upper slope followed by some broken rock, then a longer lower sand section.
Not able to see from above, we had to guess at its
location and missed it somewhat. Tom led us down
just south of the sand
slope we'd eyed from below, but it had enough sand in it to be quite interesting
on its own and it made for a descent nearly as fast as the more direct route
would have been. More walking along the desert flats at the end got us
not long before 3p.
The Grandstand
On our drive back south we stopped at the Racetrack to visit the Grandstand and
the famous moving rocks. The Grandstand is aptly named as the only formation
sticking above the otherwise smooth surface of The Racetrack, looking much like
its namesake at a racing venue. The highpoint is 30-40ft in height, a stiff
class 3 slab climb from the west. We followed
that had arrived
shortly before us on their way to check out the formation. The playa was hard
and dry and safe for walking. One can't help but note the foot, wheel and yes,
even ,
that had been left by those who chose to come out in
wet conditions. We to of the Grandstand
before continuing the fun of the formation on
to the Jeep. We
stopped a second time at the south end of the Racetrack to check out the
which are more plentiful on this side. We found a number
of which we , pondered and
discussed before heading back over in the Jeep.
Peak 4,500ft
On our way back through Saline Valley I was keeping an eye out for another
bonus peak to fill out the day. We'd already started on our beers and changed
out of our boots but I had yet to give up the cause. I found a good candidate
just east of Saline Valley Rd at the far southern end of the valley, but it
took some effort to convince Tom (Brian was far easier to enroll in additional
adventuring). It wasn't until we discovered the road makes a fortuitous turn
on the backside of the feature to get within half a mile that Tom relented.
There is a spur road leading to a couple of nice backcountry
that we
used to get as close as possible on the peak's south side. We changed back into
boots, locked up the Jeep and set off up the boulder-strewn slopes, reminiscent
of the Cockscomb Range in Joshua Tree NP. Our hour-long detour turned out to
be well worth the time and effort as we had both some
and the opportunity to see that let us
for 10-15min before they disappeared for good.
was the largest of several giant
boulders adorning the summit, though it offered no special views.
It would be once again nearly 7p by the time we returned to our campsite at
6,000ft found at the junction with the Hunter Mtn Rd. We spent the third and
last night here, once again heading off to bed before 9p - these long days had
us all tired and ready for a long sleep...
Continued...