climbergirl blog

Walter & I welcomed the first day of Winter by ascending Mt. Jenkins. We left the car (@~5400ft) around 9:30am and got to the summit (nearly 8,000ft) around noon. Not bad for a leisurely pace including a couple stops for snacks and shedding layers.

As I’m getting over a cold, I brought all my warm layers, and it was nice until around 11am, when the sun finally took the chill out of the air. After awhile, I wished I had a t-shirt with me, but I accidently left it at home.

Along the hike, we saw signs of wildlife, bird & rabbit prints in the snow. And, even contrails from a very large aircraft! Walter was brave enough to enter an old mineshaft, but I opted to stay outside since I figured there might be wildlife in there!

At the top, we enjoyed our lunch accompanied by his Pinot Noir (& Dove chocolates) and my MacCallen scotch. We watched the clouds roll in, and tried to spot some of the Sierra Peaks we know so well. Owens was right in front of us, so that was easy. But, spotting Olancha, Langley, Cirque, and Whitney was much more challenging.

The hike back down was almost harder than going up. It was steep, and with the snow covering the scree, it was a bit tricky. We made it back around 2pm, a fantastic way to start the winter. I was WORN out! I’m happy that I felt better today-but the energy is just not available. In fact, I might just take a nap now.

Overall, hiking Mt. Jenkins is a fun trip. It will be more challenging as the winter progresses. With more snow, the steep approach might yield some tricky snow shoeing. It may be possible to glissade down?!? Which could be fun…or not.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 21st, 2006 at 9:52 pm and is filed under Mountaineering. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.