Mount Tallac is one of the classic and popular hikes in the Tahoe area. It is well known for the spectacular view of Fallen Leaf Lake, Lake Tahoe, two small Alpine Lakes and the Desolation Wilderness. The standard route from the trailhead is about a 10 mile round trip with an elevation gain of about 3300 ft. Don't expect to be...

A friend was visiting from the mountain-less part of this country and expressed the wish to accompany me on one of my Sierra Nevada hikes. Whenever someone asks me if they can come hiking with me I say yes, but hardly ever does it happen that someone actually comes along. My choice for this hike was Ralston Peak from Camp...

The general setup was more or less the same as last week, not too much time for an extended hike so something with little ramp-up time was needed. Since I also didn't have time to prepare any new hikes I just decided to go back to Pyramid Peak once again. In order to make sure I would reach my goal on this day, I didn't only start...

California's weather is currently influenced by a so-called "blocking high" off the Atlantic coast which brought us nice warm and sunny T-Shirt days down in the valley for almost all of December so far (and it doesn't look like it will change any time soon). Unfortunately this prevents the winter storms from rolling in and the...

After my failed attempt to climb Tells Peak last week I did my home work, studied what went wrong and why I didn't find the Highland Trail. After checking the different topo maps on caltopo.com, I realized that the US-Topo Map which I had with my (and was on my GPS) was outdated and contained an old version of the Highland Trail....

The first time I saw the Horsetail Falls, I wasn't all that impressed. Due to the drought then and the late season, the waterfall had nothing but a tiny bit of water trickling down from the Desolation Valley. The current situation with record amounts of melting snow should give the falls a much more impressive character. In...

Maggie's South Peak is a very popular hiking destinations in the Tahoe area. It is an easy marked path from Inspiration Point (a view point at Emerald Bay) to the top. During the summer months hundreds if not thousands of people visit this peak every year which offers a nice view to Lake Tahoe. During the winter, the peak is in...

Since I missed the true summit of Jakes Peak here, I wanted to go back and give it another try. This time I was aware and conscious of where to "find" the true summit. However, the very top of Jakes Peak remains unvisited by 360, this time I didn't quite succeed, because the technical difficulties for the last few meters to the...

Pyramid Peak was the first peak I visited after moving to California, almost 3 years ago. Looking for some more workout with quite some altitude gain, I decided to go back and pay it another visit. This time I decided to walk up via Rocky Canyon (my way down the last time) and check out the north ridge for my way down and later...

Update October 23, 2020 see below* June 24, 2016: During my hike last week I saw a mountain which caught my attention. To my surprise, after consulting the USGS topo map, I found out that it didn't have a name on any map, even though it is quite a prominent peak with a topographical prominence to its neighbor (Mount Agassiz)...

Ralston Peak is a popular mountain in the Desolation Wilderness which is typically and often climbed from the trailhead close to Highway 50 near Camp Sacramento. However, my goal was to climb it via East Ridge from Echo Lake and also bag Becker Peak and Talking Mountain on the way up. For my way down I planned to take the...

My announcement to come back to Fallen Leaf Lake and climb Angora Peak and Indian Rock didn't take very long to happen. I hiked up to Angora Peak from the south end of Fallen Leaf Lake, via hiking path and later the not very distinct northeast ridge, followed the connecting ridge to Indian Rock and Echo Peak and dropped down to...

My Swiss hiking projects typically didn't have the same starting and end point, because I was almost exclusively traveling with public transportation and I would often choose to end my hike at a different train station or bus stop than the beginning of my hike. Here in California public transportation is basically non-existent, in...

Left the car at the pullout on the north side of Hwy 89, past the (still gated) Spring Creek Rd, and walked to the end of Spring Creek Rd. Couldn't find an obvious trail, and turned back when after half an hour of bushwacking a view up along the winter route showed nothing but more of the same, and not a speck of snow. Next, I...

Dicks and Jacks Peak have caught my attention on many of my hikes in the Tahoe area already. These two mountains are both quite high (almost 10K ft) and stick out. You see them from many other peaks in the area. However, a day hike to these two peaks is about 14 miles long with an altitude gain of more than 4000 ft, no matter from...

After my first outing after moving to California to Pyramid Peak, I already new I would come back and revisit the Crystal Range in the Desolation Wilderness. The view from Pyramid Peak to Mount Agassiz and Mount Price (here) sparked my interest. Friends who visited from Switzerland wanted to go and do some scrambling in the...

After Alpin_Rise arrived in California, we (obviously) started talking about potential goals for a hike. His 3 wishes for this weeks Wednesday outing were: 1. to get some scrambling in, 2. not too much of an altitude difference and 3. if possible some snow for sliding down the mountain. Still being a California novice myself, the...

Mount Tallac is a favorite destination for Tahoe’s backcountry ski crowd and it's also popular with boarders. According to some sources it's actually rated one of the "top 10" backcountry skiing destinations in the US. My plan to get to the top via N-Ridge (which used to be the standard) and ski down the NE bowl had to be...

When I left the house in the morning my plan was to do a ski tour to Ralston Peak. However, on site the avalanche conditions on the Northern slopes of Ralston Peak seemed unsafe. Therefore, I decided to visit Echo Peak instead. The danger for avalanches was predicted to be "Moderate", but after I saw a small avalanche, it didn't...

On my hike down from Freel Peak two weeks ago, I met two locals from the Tahoe region and asked them about back country skiing in this area. They recommended the west side of Lake Tahoe and its mountains there. After some research I found Rubicon Peak to be a good starting point for my Sierra Nevada ski adventures. It's not too...