Avawatz turned out to be different than what I had
expected for a few reasons, starting with the drive in to the “trailhead”. The guidebook talks about what sounds to be
an easy-to-reach 2wd trailhead and a 4wd trailhead that is further in. The 2wd trailhead is at the base of the
mountains at what's called Mormon Springs.
The hike from there is around 13 miles rough trip and perhaps close to
4,000 feet of gain. Depending on how far
you can make it up the 4wd road section, the hike could be as short as six
miles round trip, with considerably less gain.
Well, apparently, things have changed since the guide book was
written. In fact, based on other reports
I have read, something must have changed in the past couple years. The 4wd road was gone. And, I mean gone, like obliterated, an
apparent victim of flash flooding, which left only a rutted out wash instead,
with no trace of the old road remaining.
Even the 2wd road was rougher than anticipated and one section stymied
me on two attempts in my 4wd 4runner. I
could have probably eventually made it through, even with my balding tires, but
I get nervous with stuff like that when I am solo, so I ended up parking about
a mile shy of the 2wd parking, making for a 15 mile day and roughly 5000' of
gain.
All this turned out to be advantageous when it came to
the photography, though. As I started
out for the peak in the morning, a little ways down in the desert was THE place
to be, as the sun came out for a beautiful sunrise light-show. The morning lighting was so moody and
colorful and the hillsides of Avawatz Mountains were also briefly lit up with wonderful,
pastel-like hues of color. After roughly
a mile of soaking in this amazing light, I entered the canyon leading into the
mountains. This timing was perfect
because the sky and lighting got pretty bleak once the sunrise was over. Although the canyon portion wasn’t the
mindless, easy stroll up a road I was expecting, it was still rather pleasant,
albeit a bit more tiring. Some parts of
the wash were a bit messy and rough, but many stretches were sandy and pleasant
enough. I love the feelings of these
desert canyons at times. They seem like
a magical place - focal points for the mysterious energy of the desert. Sometimes, I swear you can almost feel a timeless, serene energy reverberating off the canyon walls, especially so when they are glowing golden in a late afternoon light. What I guess was a raven, maybe a hawk, would occasionally fly by, squawking over me with that
classic sound you often hear in a movie with a desert scene. It's mysterious call would echo off the canyon walls. It reminded me
of that scene in the The Doors movie when Morrison wanders off in the desert, minus the hallucinations since I wasn’t on Peyote myself.
After a few miles in the canyon, I found myself at the small,
abandoned radio tower of sorts along the ridge.
Shortly before this spot, I was able to pick the old road back up where
it climbs out of the canyon putting a safe distance between itself and the flash
flooding below. From the tower, I
followed the road as it contoured around to the hillsides on the far side. I picked a semi-random spot to leave the road
and gain the ridgeline, but not before meeting the crux of the route. This consists of a steep hillside with white
cliffs, which was now towering in front of me. It mostly looked like it would be a bit tiring, but I could see obvious ways around the cliffs, so I
wasn’t too worried about them. In fact,
it wasn’t too bad overall. I just took
my time and next thing I knew I was on top and starting out along the ridgeline
to Avawatz. This portion was pretty long
too, but I had some amazing clouds to gaze at and occupy my mind as I strolled
along. The clouds looked surreal: popcorn shaped puffs, forming checkerboard like patterns off to the
horizon in both directions. I was lucky
to have these clouds spice up an otherwise bleak, gray sky. In addition, the timing of my arrival at the summit was rather fortuitous, in that all the clouds and bleak lighting I had since after sunrise, mostly
cleared up right after I got there, leaving me crisp, clear vistas with just
the right amount of clouds to spice up the view. Some of the remaining popcorn-puff clouds left a checkerboard like pattern of shadows across the desert floor to the East. I rested for some time, took photos, snacked
and soaked in the views as much as I could before starting down. Most of the hike back down was
uneventful. I enjoyed snapping photos of
the hillsides on the way down, which were now vibrant and colorful with the
bright, clear afternoon light. When I got
back to the car, I enjoyed a beer and relaxed in the back of the 4runner cooking
up some dinner – black bean soup with a can of chicken thrown in. A pretty tasty meal for a hungry hiker. After dinner I packed up all my stuff and
slowly made my way down the rough road and on to McCullough Mountain.
McCullough Mountain turned out to be almost exactly what
I expected and built up on my mind.
Right from the drive in, McCullough felt a bit familiar, despite never having
the pleasure of meeting this mountain in person before. There was roughly eight miles of dirt road to
get to the start of the hike near Pine Springs.
This road was in considerably better condition than the road to Avawatz and the miles went by quickly. There were still some rough spots, but at least I could get above 10 mph quite often, unlike with Avawatz where I felt like my speedometer was on zero most of the time. I took a few
night sky photos on the way in, but between it not being the season for Milky
Way photos and the moon being out I had a hard time getting a nice photograph
of our galaxy. Still though, I did get
one, or two, of the dirt road and Joshua trees with a nice star-covered
sky. With it already being dark and my long hike
earlier in the day, I retired to the back of the 4Runner for a good night’s
sleep shortly after I arrived.
It was awfully cold when I started the hike to McCullough
the next morning. It was the kind of
cold where I felt like I had to keep moving just to avoid going hypothermic. I tried to stop and take a few photos of the
morning light as the sun began to rise, but my fingers were stinging and going numb
almost instantly, accompanied by rather intense shivering. All this initially made photography a particularly
unpleasant activity, resulting in only a couple photos of marginal
quality. But, once that sun started to
rise, it warmed up really, really fast and next thing I knew I was removing a
few layers.
McCullough has a reputation of being a navigation, or orienteering,
challenge and right from the start I could tell it would live up to this
reputation. It’s not even real obvious
you are hiking into actual mountains in the beginning, let alone having a visible
summit, or high point, you can aim for. Initially, McCullough
is hidden behind an intervening ridgeline covered in many similar looking hill
tops, or high points. Really, it looks
like you’re just hiking into a jumble of bushy, desert hillsides, with all
directions looking the same. There are many
washes to choose from and no real clear high point of reference that makes one
more appealing to take than the other, in so far as being sure it’s taking you
in a direction towards the actual highpoint of the range. A topo map and compass would make all this
easier, but even that would be challenging.
Luckily, I cheated and downloaded a pre-planned route I came up with into
my GPS and mindlessly followed that to the top.
Although, having my GPS fail on me more than once before when I needed
it, I was at least smart enough to vigilantly make note of my surroundings in
case I had to hike back without any electronic assistance.
Overall, the hike was very pleasant, much of which
involved hiking up sandy tree-lined washes while being bathed in the warm,
golden early-morning sunlight and listening to birds chirp some morning
song. Apparently, the mountain is extremely
popular with cows, as there were cattle tracks all over often forming a clear herd
path. At first, I thought of the old saying,
“follow the cows home”, in the event that my GPS actually did die, but it soon
became clear cows had been up and down every canyon I came across, leaving
there tracks unhelpful in choosing which way to go. Maybe all the tracks were a result of them
getting lost in this maze of pine, creosote and sage. It didn't take long to get to the summit and I think I was on top before 9AM, enjoying the
views off into every direction. I could
see Las Vegas peeking out behind some intervening hillsides. It sure looked tiny from my comparatively lofty
vantage point. I could also see the
massive solar power plant near state-line.
Not too long into my stay I heard some cows that were making quite a
racket down in the canyon I had just hiked up. On my way down, I noticed that it looked like
a family consisting of an adult female, two calves and an ever-watchful bull that
let me know I better steer (no pun-intended) clear as he let out some loud bellows that echoed
across the canyon. When I finally made eye-contact with him, he reminded me of
a neighbor’s dog back home who would always give the obligatory warning barks, but
you could tell by the look in his eye and the energy he gave off that he was
relaxed with no real desire to come after you. He just had to do what a guard dog is supposed
to do, that is, bark at strangers. Likewise with this Bull. But I kept to the far side of the canyon to
be safe, which suddenly didn’t seem as wide as it did before. Maybe I made more of a big deal out of this
than I needed to, but tank-sized animals with large horns making loud bellowing
noises always make me a little nervous.
I had a nice lunch along the crest of the intervening
ridgeline that was about halfway between my car and the summit. However, I wasn’t sitting quite where I
thought I was sitting. Turns out that section
of ridgeline looked just like a saddle I still needed to cross over to get into
the correct wash that heads back to my car.
So, even with the GPS in hand, I still managed to not traverse over to
the saddle like I should have, instead dropping down too early and heading down
the entirely wrong canyon! Luckily I
caught my mistake after not too long, but it still left me with an extra couple
hundred feet of hillside I had to now climb back up, so I could cross back over into
the correct canyon. Consulting a topo map later on, I noticed
the canyon I took by accident would have taken me pretty far from
my car if I had not caught my error. I
would have found myself standing at the foothills of the McCullough Mountain
range with over a mile of intervening ridgelines and washes between me and my car and wondering where the hell I was. But, luckily that didn’t happen and I arrived
back at my car for a celebratory beer to toast off a couple of nice, adventurous
days in the desert.