Mount Price and Agassiz - Crystal Range re-visited

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 Sierra. Their wish was "something like the Mattstogg SW Ridge". Even though I didn't really know how hard it would be to climb Mount Price's NNW ridge (because I didn't do all of my homework), it turned out to be the perfect mix of scrambling, climbing and hiking in a beautiful scenery in the Desolation Wilderness for all of us, even a tad harder than the Mattstogg SW Ridge.

We start our hike at the Twin Lakes trail head at the northeast end of Wrights Lake and try to follow the path towards Twin Lakes. At some point we miss a right turn but only notice about 15 minutes later - the trails are not extremely well marked here and it's actually quite hard to follow them. Anyway, the terrain is not very demanding and the bushes aren't to thick so we take a closer look at our map and walk towards Twin Lakes cross-country. Shortly before Twin Lakes we actually get back onto the trail.

Twin Lakes looks like a mirror today and we can't get enough of it and of course take numerous pictures. We then follow the path towards Island Lake, where we leave the trail (or where it ends?). Along the south end  of the lake we head towards the lowest point in the Mount Price NNW ridge, pretty much east of Island Lake. The walk up there is easy but due to lots of loose rock and scree kind of exhausting. Once we reach it we try to follow the crest line as good as possible. The first "mini-summit" is around 9440 feet, a very distinct needle. It would require to climb at least a IV probably even more in order to get to its top. Even though some of us try to climb it anyway, we have to bypass it on the east side. After this we then follow the ridge pretty religiously. Sometimes we find rather exposed sections, sometimes it's just a walk-up, sometimes an easy climb, sometime rather demanding - very entertaining. The climbs are up to the third degree, but can mostly also be bypassed on the east side if needed.

The view from the summit is amazing, especially down to the very nice Lake Aloha, but also along the Crystal Range to Pyramid Peak. The ascent from Island Lake to the top took us quite some time, probably 2 1/2h, so we take a break and enjoy the scenery before we walk over to Mount Agassiz. We do that slightly west of the ridge to avoid some thick bushes. The final climb to the top of the summit block of Mount Agassiz is probably easiest from NW and requires a few easy class 3 moves with some exposure. There's also a possibility from South which is slightly more demanding.

Originally we had planned to continue along the ridge all the way to Pyramid Peak, but we realize that we slowly run out of time to do so. Instead we climb down Mount Agassiz into a notch south of the peak and down the east ridge for a few hundred yards, but then descend in the south flank to an altitude of approximately 9200 feet. We traverse to a point west of the lowest point between Mount Agassiz and Pyramid Peak. The remaining time (we are being picked up at the Lyons Creek Trail Head) does not allow us to also visit Pyramid Peak any more, so we have to head down from this point already. However, one of us wants to quickly try the climb up to the ridge from here (class 3), just for fun.

The hike back to the Lyons Creek Trail Head is somewhat tedious, because the way down to Lake Sylvia is very unpleasant: loose rock, scree, rubble - nothing to write home about - and the 5 miles hike from Lake Sylvia along the marked path to the trail head is kind of long after a strenuous outing like this. Anyway we all enjoyed the wonderful day in the Desolation Wilderness, in particular the scramble up the NNW ridge of Mount Price!