Hiking the Nipple. Again.
This past Saturday we tried hiking to The Nipple, an artfully named peak in the Carson Pass area, again. I say again because we set out on this hike 5 weeks earlier. We had a mixed experience the first time. The views were amazing but the wind was fierce. We turned back well short of the peak.
I'm not the kind of person to let a hiking thing go. When I decide I want to hike somewhere because it's beautiful, and temporary conditions like weather force me to turn around without enjoying the full measure of it, I'm going to want to try again. So we tried again this past weekend, hoping that the wind wouldn't be as fierce.
Well, I had a little more than hope about the weather.... While there's no forecast directly for "Will this mountain ridge over 9,000' have pummeling wind?" I can make educated guesses about wind conditions from checking a few days of temperature and precipitation. Saturday looked like it would be a clear, steady day, so we did our Friday Night Halfway in Jackson, stopped at Silver Lake on the way up, and began our hike at Lost Lake.
The first leg of the hike was familiar, ascending the ridge as it rose up from Lost Lake. The landscape seemed slight more barren this weekend than 5 weeks earlier, as the wildflowers of Alpine Spring turns rapidly to Alpine Summer and then to Alpine Autumn.
We rounded the bend above Blue Lake, 1,000' below us, and climbed ever higher into the mountains. This about as far as Hawk went 5 weeks earlier (her spot in the photo above). I continued as far up as that shelf below and to the right of the peak near the center. That peak, BTW, is not The Nipple. The Nipple is farther away, on the right side of the photo. You can see the summit sticking up like a nub. Yes, that's apparently how it got named.
The wind was mild the whole hike, though it did get slightly stronger as we hiked later in to the afternoon. Heavier clouds started to build up over the high elevations, too. This photo (last of the set, above) shows a view from just below The Nipple looking back down over Lost Lake. The ridge to the left is that imposing looking scarp in the center of the previous picture. To the right of Lost Lake is a cliff. Yes, the lake is right at the edge of a cliff! That's part of the Carson Pass. And that peak in the distance, near the center (left/right) of the picture is Mount Round Top, elev. approx. 10,500'. Just the other side of it are Winnemucca Lake and Round Top Lake. We've hiked those lakes several times in the past. In fact, they were our "Plan B" for today in case the wind was howling as we drove over the Forestdale Divide just below Round Top.
Speaking of the Forestdale Divide, I've got some wheeling pics and video to share from Saturday, too, along with a few more photos from this hike. Stay tuned!
I'm not the kind of person to let a hiking thing go. When I decide I want to hike somewhere because it's beautiful, and temporary conditions like weather force me to turn around without enjoying the full measure of it, I'm going to want to try again. So we tried again this past weekend, hoping that the wind wouldn't be as fierce.
Well, I had a little more than hope about the weather.... While there's no forecast directly for "Will this mountain ridge over 9,000' have pummeling wind?" I can make educated guesses about wind conditions from checking a few days of temperature and precipitation. Saturday looked like it would be a clear, steady day, so we did our Friday Night Halfway in Jackson, stopped at Silver Lake on the way up, and began our hike at Lost Lake.
The first leg of the hike was familiar, ascending the ridge as it rose up from Lost Lake. The landscape seemed slight more barren this weekend than 5 weeks earlier, as the wildflowers of Alpine Spring turns rapidly to Alpine Summer and then to Alpine Autumn.
We rounded the bend above Blue Lake, 1,000' below us, and climbed ever higher into the mountains. This about as far as Hawk went 5 weeks earlier (her spot in the photo above). I continued as far up as that shelf below and to the right of the peak near the center. That peak, BTW, is not The Nipple. The Nipple is farther away, on the right side of the photo. You can see the summit sticking up like a nub. Yes, that's apparently how it got named.
The wind was mild the whole hike, though it did get slightly stronger as we hiked later in to the afternoon. Heavier clouds started to build up over the high elevations, too. This photo (last of the set, above) shows a view from just below The Nipple looking back down over Lost Lake. The ridge to the left is that imposing looking scarp in the center of the previous picture. To the right of Lost Lake is a cliff. Yes, the lake is right at the edge of a cliff! That's part of the Carson Pass. And that peak in the distance, near the center (left/right) of the picture is Mount Round Top, elev. approx. 10,500'. Just the other side of it are Winnemucca Lake and Round Top Lake. We've hiked those lakes several times in the past. In fact, they were our "Plan B" for today in case the wind was howling as we drove over the Forestdale Divide just below Round Top.
Speaking of the Forestdale Divide, I've got some wheeling pics and video to share from Saturday, too, along with a few more photos from this hike. Stay tuned!