A short walk with Guiness and Spaz

I was planning a much longer hike with Guiness but Spaz insisted on going so we walked around the Sun Valley Regional Park. Kinda cloudy and gray but still nice to get out.

Lower Mt Rose Trail Loop 2011-0828

From Lower Mt Rose Trail Loop 2011-0828

A beautiful hike on the lower Mount Rose Trail. Still plenty of wild flowers, mild temps and as always, incredible views.

The Mount Rose Summit Plaza parking lot was almost full, but we did not see very many people on the trail.

6 Mile Loop, with only 800+ elevation gain with option to continue on the Tahoe Rim Trail or the Mt Rose Summit Trail.
Getting There: Mt Rose trailhead is located at the Mt. Rose Summit Welcome Plaza on State Route 431 (17 miles west of U.S. 395). The trailhead is behind the restrooms.



View Mt Rose Summit Welcome Center in a larger map

Very naughty Spaz!

Woke up this morning, not to who I wanted to, but to my bad little girl who knows better!

I do not know how she gets up on the bed without waking me up; Every time she tries while I am awake she, tries to jump up, misses, grunts, groans, jumps, can't get her back legs up high enough, drops down to the floor, grunts and groans and tries, tries again.

Dreaming of The American Discovery Trail

Last week, I stumbled across a trail that travels through the state of Nevada, heck, travels across the entire United States; The American Discovery Trail.


The ADT is billed as "The American Discovery Trail stretches across more than 6,800 miles and 15 states. The ADT is the only coast-to-coast, non-motorized recreational trail. Linking communities, cities, parks and wilderness, the ADT allows people to hike, bike or ride horses for an afternoon or a cross-country adventure."


I found a few resources that are useful, including maps and blogs of hikers.


Just one more long-distance hiking trail to add to my long list of trails to dream about hiking.

Snowshoeing Donner Pass Lakes Loop 2010-0103

Our first outing of 2010 - The Donner Pass Lakes Loop.
A wonderful snowshoe trek with great views of Castle Peak, Donner Peak and Donner Lake, Mount Judah and Mount Lincoln.
This loop passes three lakes, Azalea Lake, Flora Lake and Angela Lake, snow covered granite walls and climbing Boreal Ridge a 360 degree view of the entire Donner Pass area.

DAVID ROBBINS: 'The Write Life': DEAD WEST 1

David Robbins aka David Thompson writer of the Wilderness Series is publishing an installment story on his blog:

DAVID ROBBINS: 'The Write Life': DEAD WEST 1

Mount Como in the Pine Nut Mountains

Just 2 hours south of Reno, 20 miles east of Genoa Nevada, the Pine Nut Mountains 

view map 

were a surprise to this hiker who is so used to dry dusty tree-less mountains. The Pine Nuts are thick with Juniper and Pinion, wild flowers and wild peach around this or that turn.

Our goal for this adventure in the Nevada "desert" was to climb Mount Como and find a great location to stay overnight. Thanks to waypoints found on SummitPost we drove to the base of Mount Como without any problems.

We found what we thought would be our campsite for the night and took off for our hike of Mount Como. There are two (or three) good approaches to the summit; from the north, up and along the ridge or from the south, up a dirt road then hoof it the last 800 feet or so at the end of the road. Since the campsite we found was closer to the south, that was the approach we took.

The climb up using the road was not difficult, if fact, we kept asking ourselves if the road was ever going to start climbing :)  It did, right as the road rose above the tree line, we really started gaining elevation.  

But the real climbing began at the end of the road.  That last 4/10 of a mile and 800 feet were steep, windy and rocky.

We kept looking over our shoulders at the very dark, nasty looking storm clouds to the east.  The night before we arrived there were storm warning, heavy lightning & thunder storms and we were hoping there would not be a repeat performance.

The higher we climbed the more spectacular the views; first to the south then the west opened up. Gradually the north came into view.  The storm clouds to the east seemed to be getting closer as the wind grew stronger with each step up. 

I looked down at my GPS, hoping against hope that it was right.  That what I was seeing ahead of me, 640 feet away, yet still 200 feet up was in fact the summit of Mount Como.

It was.  The summit was all rock.  The summit geo marker could not be found but two pointers to the marker were found.  The view north and south across the Pine Nuts were stunning.  To the west, dust or moisture in the air obscured the views of the Carson Range and the Sierra.  To the east - just black ominous storm clouds.

After taking in the sights, and signing the peak log our next task was to figure out which way to get back to camp.  We could clearly see the little valley 2600 feet down, several ravines leading down from the summit that were heavy with forest.  The north route was out of the question as it would add several miles to our journey, likewise, heading down the same way we came up is rarely our first choice.  After checking the topo maps, we decided on the best ravine to head down and took it.

The way was steep and full of vegetation but was taking us in the right direction - very quickly.

What took roughly 4 hours on the way up, only took 2 hours back down.

We reached the truck and quickly decided to move our camp to a location that looked much better during our hike up.

Other than the incredible hike up Mount Como the one fact that really stands out about the Pine Nut Mountains is just how incredibly quiet the forest is.  As we watched the sunset and the stars make their appearance one by one - the forest was very still;  no birds singing, no insects buzzing, no crickets chirping.  Just an eery silence.  As the last light of the day vanished to the west, I stopped breathing, listening intently for anything, any forest sound....to the left, was that a single cricket.  I'm still not sure, maybe it was there, maybe not.