Day six of the desert road trip saw our merry band reduced by one. Sean and Jen
had headed back to LA after the previous day's finish while Adam had shown up
unexpectedly in the evening, leaving us with five for today's adventure. I had
originally planned for us to tackle Hackberry Mtn,
another P1K further east, but this
was going to be a lot of driving for Tom and Laura who were heading home after
today. Leaving Hackberry for a future time, we settled on a couple of range
highpoints, also P1Ks, with much less extra driving. We were up by sunrise at
our campground at Hole-in-the-Wall, the sun nicely lighting up
Barber Peak above us to the west, the sun soon 
peeking out
from around the side of the Woods Mtns
to the east. We had some packing up to do and did not get out of there too early
but that seemed to matter little - it was really cold that night and we didn't
mind the extra time to warm up. When all was ready, our caravan headed out
south, past 
the entrance to the closed Mitchell Caverns, south to
I-40 and then further south to the National Trails Hwy (old Route 66) where
we parked about five miles NW of the Piute Mountains HP.
By myself I would have started the hike from here, but with a couple of high
clearance vehicles we drove a mile and a half further along a rough dirt road.
We didn't make it as far as allowed, but the road appeared to be washed out
beyond the abilities of our two vehicles. 
Starting off around 8:30a,
our route initially followed 
an old road that is now inside the
Wilderness boundary and no longer open to vehicles. This made things a piece of
cake for a few miles though the road eventually ended upstream of the same wash
we parked at. We settled into the dry wash and continued hiking upstream,
finding a few interesting items along the way such as 
a partial spine
of a larger mammal, probably a cow. The wash narrowed to provide a bit of
easy scrambling and by 10a we were 
climbing out and onto
an adjacent ridge to start gaining altitude as we neared our summit. At the top
of this ridge, about a mile from the highpoint, we came upon a good
burro trail that we could follow along the connecting ridgeline to
the top. The burros had left their usual 
poop piles to mark their
territory but we didn't mind, seeing as they'd taken the time to make such nice
trails for us.
We arrived at the top of what we thought was the highpoint only to spot a
slightly higher one a few minutes 
to the southeast. Off we went, not
bothering to look behind us where we would have seen an
even higher point a few minutes in 
the opposite direction.
Adam, 
Karl and I had all made the same mistake (the other
two were just following me) and had gone to the SE summit before the error was
noticed. Laura's slower pace paid dividends here. When we spotted her on the
middle summit, we were able to wave her back to the correct highpoint where
she arrived just before us, a bit under two hours for the five mile
hike.
There were two registers at the summit, an older one from Smakto/Shelberg
in 1979 (Smatko's second ascent) and a second one
from 2000 placed by Carey/Hanna (
Gordon & Barbara were
there three days later). Almost every name in the dozen
entries were recognizable highpointers, mostly the Angeles and San Diego
Sierra Club folks. We passed the register around as we
sat at the summit to take in 
the views. It was a very nice
day by now, little wind with cool temps
fueling our laziness. Ever the guy with the electric prod, I gave us about 25
minutes before getting the cattle drive moving once again.
Once started, our return took less than an hour and a half. We found
the 
burro trails actually lead all the way back to the old road,
making for a faster, more efficient route. It was just after noon when we
got back to the cars. We drove back out to our other vehicles on
Route 66 and said goodbye to Karl and Laura who were heading home. Tom was
leaving us today as well but had a shorter drive, so he hung out with Adam and
I for the Ship Mtns HP. We drove southwest on Route 66 to the town of
Chambless (not much of a town any more, just a few scattered
residents) where we left a couple of cars and piled into Tom's Element for a 9
mile drive south through Cadiz, across the railroad tracks and along
a pipeline road to get us as close to the Ship Mountains as we could
manage (directions courtesy Zdon). We were only two and a half miles
northwest of the highpoint which we figured would be a breeze. It was not.
Though the Piute Mountains trek was twice the distance, it was a far more
enjoyable hike. The Ship Mountains seemed determined to deplete whatever stores
of good vibes we had built up during the morning. The
initial part has a low but
steady gradient as we hiked across the broad outlet to the canyon we were aiming
for. Eons of flash floods had molded a convoluted stream channel system that
seemed to have no rhyme or reason other than to confound us with ups and downs
that seemed unnecessary but also unavoidable. They weren't all that bad, but
it seemed to drag on for more than the two miles it took. Our party of three
split up at various points, trying different variations to see if better
conditions could be found between channels, in them, or some other combination.
Nothing stood at as the obviously better way to cross this volcanic mess. It
just had to be suffered through.
Once we reached the mouth of the canyon our hopes for improved conditions were
similarly dashed. Boulders, brush and more boulders filled 
the canyon
for much of the next half mile. We had planned to follow the canyon to its head
at a saddle just north of the highpoint, but frustration with the boulders
finally got me to latch onto the adjacent ridge on my right and start up it.
Some 
class 3 at the bottom had been the impetus, but it didn't last
long and it was very quickly your standard class 2 volcanic
ridge climb, about 
1000ft worth. It wasn't until 3p that
we reached 
the summit, nearly two hours into it. Half the distance
but the same time as the Piute Mtns hike. In addition to a
1935 benchmark, the summit held a register left 
in 1991 by
Dave Jurasevich. 
Older scraps dated to 1975, including a 1979
Smatko/Shelberg entry. Like us, they had climbed both Piute and Ship on the same
day. Most of the register entries were the usual collection of desert
peakbaggers and highpointers.
We didn't stay five minutes on the summit. It was already 3:15p and with little
more than an hour of sunlight remaining, we didn't want to be negotiating the
boulder fields by headlamp. Our 
descent route was virtually
indentical as we didn't feel adventurous enough to be trying a different way
back, ugly as it was. At least it was an ugly we were familiar with. The return
went much smoother, gravity making all the difference. Even the relatively
flat part across the broader creek channel seemed to have fewer ups
and downs. The sun turned 
the hills from golden 
to orange
as it started 
to set around 4:30p. We still had 20 minutes to
get 
back to the car, but it was easily managed without headlamps.
Tom had a few cold beers waiting for us. Ahh.... The 
Mojave Red label
seemed fitting. After we'd enjoyed our beverage we drove back out to Chambliss
and our other cars where Adam and I bade Tom goodbye.
At least his drive would only take about three
hours to get him home to Palos Verde. Adam and I made plans on where to meet
for the night near Twentynine Palms, after which he started off while I took a
few moments for a quick rinse with a rather cool shower. Brrr. We met up again
several hours later off the sandy Gold Park Road south of town. Adam had driven
around Twentynine Palms looking for internet access to no success. He wanted to
check in and see
how some of his camera gear was selling on Ebay. The next morning we'd drive
south towards the park for a go at Twentynine Palms Mtn, but for now it was
time for sleep...
Continued...