This was already my third attempt to get to the top of Tinker Knob. Even though there are no real technical difficulties to get to the highest point of Tinker Knob, I managed to miss this goal twice already. One attempt failed last December when I started at Goose Meadows Campground (on 89). The idea was to walk up the ridge on...

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...

Originally Vauacht and I had planned to pay a visit to Mount Lyell and Mount Mclure on this weekend. However, several constraints were not fulfilled (in particular the fact that an overnight stay of any kind at the Tuolumne Meadows is not really feasible any more after October 15) and therefore these plans had to be put to its...

After my "long" hike to Freel Peak a little less than a year ago, I knew I "had" to come back to also bag the close-by Jobs Peak and Jobs Sister. In addition I also still wanted to try the southern access to the 3 highest CA mountains around Lake Tahoe from Horse Meadow. When I saw the report from the "Mountainhiker" to...

An altitude of 4000m is not really something which is important in a country where people measure the height of the mountains in feet. Who cares if a mountain is more or less than 13123.36 feet? According to this list California has 123 peaks with a prominence >300 feet, which are above 4000m, more than the Alps. And who wants...

My fitness has somewhat suffered since I moved to California (I sit in cars too often ;-). So for my first hiking day on this extended WE near Bishop, I put something not too strenuous on my want-to-climb list. It should also help to acclimatise to the altitude for the main course on the next day. Today I wanted to climb Hurd Peak...

The Californian friend X. was interested to do a hike with me which included some scrambling in the Sierra Nevada. Since she didn't have any experience in "interesting" and only little in "regular" hiking I planned something which wouldn't be too difficult but offered the possibility to get a feeling of how some hands on the rock...

Originally I wanted to climb the Black Buttes on my way back from Old Man Mountain, about a month ago. However, on that day I ran out of time and had to skip these interesting looking peaks. During the summer, a dirt road - which is not too bad, even for low clearance cars - takes you rather close to the summits of the Black...

My plan on this day was to climb Sawmill Ridge and Robinson Peak, they are both north of Twin Lakes (Mono County). I chose these peaks due to the fact, that they have steep south facing flanks, where the little snow which the Sierra got this season should have melted away again in order to allow the ascent without any 'snow-toys'....

As Delta showed not too long ago the Mono Lake Basin is definitely worth a visit if you happen to be in California. It was on my to-do list even before I moved here. As a "local" it is now "just around the corner" (for US standards only!). On this weekend I combined the trip to Mono Lake with a hike to the nearby Robinson Peak and...

When I drove to Carson Pass for this adventure, I knew I would be back soon again. Not only because I liked my snowshoe hike a lot then, but also because I saw many other potential and interesting goals in this area. The view of Thunder Mountain and in fact the whole ridge northeast of Silver Lake made such a good impression to me...

After yet another month of mountain abstinence, I planned to conquer the county high point of El Dorado today: Freel Peak (3318m / 10,886 ft) an easy T2-3 hike. Since the two peaks Jobs Sister and Jobs Peak are relatively close neighbors to Freel Peak, I had planned to also visit them on this day. However, due to the fact that the...