bpope’s blog

My good buddy Matty B had a dream.  His dream had nothing to do with civil rights or equality, though I’m sure he values those things very highly.  His dream was to drive to the base of a little-visited mountain range in Nevada, get out of the car, and hike to the top.  How did he get this brilliant and inspired idea? He was staring out a plane window on a flight home from Stanford, saw the snow capped peaks and became captivated him.  How long ago was that?  4 years.  This summer, we made that dream become reality.

On Friday afternoon, Matty B picked me up and we started driving east.  We picked up Nancy at a BART station and the crew was complete.  We crashed the night in a hotel in Fallon, NV and got to the trail by 9 the following morning. Google maps was really useful here, showing which dirt road would take us to the valley of our choosing (the Florence Canyon).

Google earth image of our route. Day 1 in green, Day 2 in red

USGS topo of our route. Day 1 in red, Day 2 in green.

Our hike started on a dirt road, then we peeled off and followed a creek for a little ways before heading up to the ridgeline.  After we gained the ridge, we ate some lunch before continuing on our way.  Hiking cross-country yielded some absolutely amazing views and interesting, varied terrain.  Unfortunately, the only “wildlife” we saw on our first day were some cows out to pasture, but there were some pretty interesting plants like flowering cacti.

Being in the wilderness, Matty B got all caveman on us.

The coolest part of the first day was the summit ridge.  From the direction we approached, we were treated to a knife edge ridge; sharp rocks and fun scrambling (if you wanted to, it would be easy to avoid this ridge, but where’s the fun in that?).  Unfortunately the summit wasn’t deserted.  Within the past couple of years (judging by images from SummitPost) some kind of cell tower or radio repeater powered by a large set of solar panels/batteries had been placed there.

Um, yeah...we conquered the mountain.

The next day, we headed down another ridge in search of a new adventure.  Before setting out, though, we played a little bit of catch with the frisbee we had brought (we are all frisbee players, so it kinda makes sense).  (Unfortunately, all my pictures after that point got deleted, though I’m not exactly sure how.)  The way down was substantially more fun than the way up, and not only because we didn’t have to walk uphill.  As we crested one ridge, Matty B and I caught sight of a buck as it darted down the mountainside.  The next ridge we crossed involved some interesting traversing around a rocky summit before heading steeply downhill through a talus field.  Good stuff!

Stellar summit ridge.

Eventually we got back to road, and Nancy and I were ready to head straight to the car. Matty B, however, wasn’t done adventuring.  He was curious what was around the bend in the road.  Turns out, Matty B’s adventure sense was right on: it was an abandoned mine (that I later noticed on the USGS map).  It looked not too old, and reasonably stable so we strapped on our headlamps and headed in.  Smart move, I know.  We ventured down the tunnel a good 60 yards until it took a right turn.  From there on, it was pitch black and Nancy and I headed forward another 50-60 yards or so.  There, the floor dropped away sharply and a huge seam opened up in the rock.  At that point, we figured it would be a good idea to turn around.

Having finally fulfilled our adventure quota, and Matty B’s dream, we headed back to San Francisco happy.  That is, until we saw Sand Mountain.  Having driven most of the way up in the dark, we missed the scenery, and this thing was awesome.  The high fees and impending rain kept us from climbing it, but seriously, how many sand dunes (1) are that huge and (2) can sing?

In any case, I’m looking forward to the next crazy idea that Matty B comes up with.  If it’s anything like the first, it’ll be fun.

As always, check out the galleries or full flickr set for more/different pictures.

Further information: SummitPost has a page on how to get there.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 28th, 2009 at 6:00 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.