Telescope Peak From Shorty's Well

[Cabin96]

Hiked from Shorty's Well to Telescope Peak on April 5th and thought hikers in this forum would find it a similar adventure to C2C.

http://www.icorva.com/index.php/2013-03 ... scope-peak

[zippetydude]

That's an excellent trip report and it looks to be a great adventure! You make me want to give that one a try maybe this time next year. Thank for a cool post.

z

[Ed]

Congratulations! I did it in 1977. Too old to repeat it, I have to content myself with the Skyline Trail now, finishing at the tram station. Lovely pictures, but I didn't see a picture at the spring around the end of the road, which I thought was amazing. After reading your description, I realized that you took a somewhat different route advised by a ranger.

We did it on Sunday, had to drive back to LA that night to be there Monday morning. The drive back turned out to be the worst of it. Towards the end, around dawn, we were spelling each other at the wheel every half hour, and still fighting to stay awake. Not the way to do it, driving back the day after, as you did, is highly recommended. Not sure why we did on Sunday rather than Saturday.

[smiles]

Wow! And I thought C2C was pretty much as hard as it gets. You just gave me something else to do! Thanks for a great report.

[HH8]

Hiked from Shorty's Well to Telescope Peak on April 5th and thought hikers in this forum would find it a similar adventure to C2C.

http://www.icorva.com/index.php/2013-03 ... scope-peak

Excellent TR, with GPS track, gear list, and mention of rejected options

[plockwoo]

My wife and I just did this hike last weekend. We did the full round trip C2C2C last November, so we thought a full round trip from the bottom of Death Valley to the top of Telescope would be similar. The stats are similar -- Telescope rises 11,300 feet over 15 miles from Shorty's Well.

We live in Pennsylvania, so we don't get many chances to take 10,000 plus dayhikes. This seemed like another hike worth flying cross-country for -- and it was, but it's a lot harder than C2C.

The lack of a trail for the most difficult stretch puts it on another level. I thought there would be use trails even though there is no maintained trail, but apparently it's just not that popular. The only "trails" that we found were made by bighorn sheep (we followed their hoofprints), and they don't seem to mind steep tracks. Some of the cross country section is easy walking through a wooded area, but there are two memorable scrambles up steep scree slopes, each about 1500 feet in gain.

Coming down in the dark also taught me that I'm going to have to abandon my anti-tech bias and belatedly join the GPS crowd. Route finding was pretty easy in the daylight, but really difficult at night. We followed our footprints in the snow, but when the snow ran out, we starting meandering off route. It sounds simple -- follow the ridgeline -- but it's not that easy in a forest at night. Headlamps actually make it worse because you lose perspective and only see what's right in front of you. Because we didn't take a straight line, we were slower on the return than on the way up. In the end, it took us 24 hours to do the full round trip. Using a car shuttle and taking the trail down would make this an easier trip, but I don't regret hiking down. That's what made it a true adventure.

This hike had an incredibly remote feel. Not only did we not see another person, but there was almost no sound -- only the occasional birdcall. It's not a trip to undertake lightly, but I'd strongly recommend it to those comfortable with off trail hiking.

[Ed]

Congratulations! Yes, far more of a wilderness experience than Skyline / C2C. Very impressive that you returned the same way, though frankly I think anybody doing that is crazy! I'm mystified by the talk of two 1500' scree slopes. And no mention of the spring. Obviously, there is more than one way to do this route. The one we took in 1977, where the real climbing begins above the spring, sounds better to me. Unless there has been some substantial change in topography.

[Cabin96]

Congrats plockwoo, that is a huge accomplishment. Could not imagine coming down as well in the same day!

[plockwoo]

Ed, we found the spring at the top of the canyon.

The directions we had were to hike to the spring, then turn right and go up the steep northern slope of the canyon. The spring was probably higher up the canyon this year than normal due to the drought. We couldn't head up right from the water because it was too cliffy, so we went back down the canyon a quarter mile or so to find a passable route up and out. The slope north of the spring was the first big scree slope.

The second big scree slope is just below the intersection with the Telescope Peak trail. That one was a snow/scree slope last weekend. Between these two really steep sections, there was a forest/plateau area that rose much more gently.

[Ed]

plockwoo,

Certainly a different route. My recollection - bear in mind I'm talking about 1977, there could be some memory problems - is that we ascended a ridge above the spring, and to the left before turning right and following the ridge. And that we hit the summit ridge on the other side of the trail down to Mahogany Flats. There was certainly a long steep slope on the final haul to the summit ridge, but much of it had vegetation over relatively firm ground. Definitely not a scree slope, until perhaps near the end.

In any case, congratulations again to both of you, must have been quite an adventure coming down the same way in the dark.