Hayford Peak

The plan the entire trip was to hike to the top of Mt. Charleston just outside of Las Vegas. When the weather took a turn for the worst, it dumped a pile of snow on Mt. Charleston.

With the hike being close to 20 miles anyway, Dad and I decided to come up with another option. On Dad's list of peaks with prominence was Hayford Peak also just outside of Las Vegas. It was a little smaller being just under 10000 feet in elevation. We were hoping that the snow would not be a problem with the peak being lower. To get there, though, we had to take a long drive out through the desert. There were many, many miles of washboarded dirt roads before finally getting to the trailhead. We started the slow uphill hike up a canyon. It was rather wide with a trail that was leading us up to an old cabin. We had it to mostly to ourselves as we were out in such an obscure spot heading to a mountain that I would not have even known existed if it wasn't for Dad's list of prominent peaks. In face, I guess it is the 42nd most prominent peak in the lower 48. We were supposed to gain 4100 feet to get to the top, but it seemed like we were just slowly climbing, though a desert canyon can easily make you feel that way. The one group of people we did see talked of the trees that were up near the cabin and soon we were in those trees.

They were nice trees, but nothing irregular, just big pondos. Soon after a couple of miles, we were at the cabin. It was recently restored making it a very nice looking cabin for the location that it was in. From there, we lost the trail and lost our gradual climb. Luckily, though, we were able to lose most of the gear from our overnight packs as we were planning to stay out near the cabin. Our number one goal was to get high and find a ridge that would get us there. We could see a high mountain above us and were heading toward that.

Eventually, though, as we got higher, we realized that the one we were going to was a higher, though flatter one to the north of us. It seemed easy enough to take our ridge to another ridge that would lead us to the top. The climbing was easy with a lot of vertical, but nothing that would make someone nervous. In fact, I don't think Dad dropped the hiking pole the entire time. We were moving pretty good and making good time. Dad, especially considering that he is 61 and had already climbed two good sized peaks that week.

As we got to the final ridge, we got into a bit of snow, but it did not slow us down. With a final push, we reached the summit at a bit after 3:30pm. It was an anti-climatic summit with a view down into Vegas and the many miles of desert that surrounded it. There was a huge radio tower on top. There were also some crazy ice crusted trees that showed just where the freezing line was. We were glad we did not attempt Charleston as above 10000 would have been a lot more difficult.

I enjoyed the register as there were not very many entries but they went back to the 1960s even including the people who installed the giant radio tower. We spent a bit of time on top, but decided to head down after awhile. We disagreed about which ridge to take, but they shot us out where we needed to be eventually. When we got to the cabin, there was a big group of boy scouts setting up. We quickly decided to let them have the cabin. We went down the trail and there was another group setting up. We let them have that area as we were just hoping for some sleep. There were some people heading up also and when we finally found a place to camp, there was even another group going up. I had no idea that this cabin was so exciting, but it was going to be a happening place. Our small group, though, had to quickly make dinner, get camp set up and make it to bed after dark. In the morning, we were up early and were hiking down canyon in the chilly morning. We got back to the car in good time, but the slow drive on the road seemed to take forever. I was glad we were able to make it to the top of such a prominent peak and it was a good end to a full week off of work.