We left Reno on Friday evening immediately after work. Rich (Inspector Gadget) and I in his vehicle, while Bill (Diesel), Bill's daughter Crista (Wild Flower), and her best friend Veronica (Red Feather) drove out in Crista's SUV. The drive to Elko takes about four hours, and even though we left a few minutes after four, we didn't arrive at our campsite in Lamoille Canyon at the north end of the Rubies until nearly dark. We pitched our tents and got a good nights sleep, but not before a few well-spent minutes gazing up at the magnificent starry sky above. As we were in a pretty remote area, the sky was alive with stars and the Milky Way was clearly visible.
Rising early, we broke camp and decided to leave Crista's vehicle at the northern trail head, which was just a couple of miles away from our camp. We then packed all five of us and our packs into Rich's car and drove an hour or so to Harrison Pass and the southern trail head. While the little Rav4 gave it a might try, it just couldn't make it all the way up the Forest Service Road, and so we had to hike a couple of extra miles to the actual trail head from where we had to leave the our ride.
This part of the trail was fairly uneventful, but very hot, as we didn't get started until a little after nine. The trail did offer some great views though of the range, including Green Mountain, so named because of the lush grasses covering it. Reaching the trail head sign, we officially started our trip, and were soon greeted by a couple of gigantic Mormon crickets along the trail.
Through this part of the trail, the water sources were common as small streams dribbled over the path fairly frequently, though this would not be the case in the later parts of the trip. As we saw a couple of different signs indicating side trails, it became a joke to comment about finally reaching the trail head as we pointed to each of these signs in the distance. Crista especially appreciated the humor in this.
The southern end of Ruby Crest Trail is defined by wide green valleys, which of course we had to climb up one and descend into the next one. All through this section of trail, sheep herders (mostly Basque and Peruvians in the 1970's and 80's) had carved their initials and names on the small white aspen trees that are prevalent here. Over time, the trees have attempted to heal their scars, turning the site into a very rustic and ancient looking graffiti haven.
Eventually reaching the valley of the south fork of Smith Creek, we decided to make camp. Our mileage, including the extra two, was right around 10.5 for the day. Not a bad first day, after getting a late start. Having contacted the Forest Service and obtaining a fire permit prior to the trip, I knew we were okay building a fire here along the creek. While I dug out a fire pit and placed some small stones around it to enclose, Rich gathered some firewood. Meanwhile, the girls cleaned up at the creek, which we had excellent access to just a few yards away. We cooked some dinner, mostly dehydrated meals, took a couple of swigs of scotch and/or bourbon, and called it a night.
I slept reasonably well, but woke every time I needed to roll over. While my sleeping pad and bag are pretty high quality, it's still not as comfortable as my bed at home. I couldn't help, but think of my wife at home alone. I am so lucky to have partner that allows me to go on great adventures like this.
After rising the next morning, Bill told me the tale of his early morning encounter with a large buck, who he discovered while doing his daily morning bathroom duties in the nearby treeline. We prepared some breakfast and started to break camp. We were on the trail again by 7:30, which isn't great, but isn't terrible either.
We had originally intended the second day of the trek to be our longest one for pure mileage. The guide we were using (from an internet blog like this one) suggested doing the trip in four days instead of our three, and also recommended campsites. Night one, those early backpackers camped right where we did, but they had suggested the shores of the high alpine Overland Lake as the site for the second night's camp. Unfortunately, our timetable needed to be compressed into three days due to my limited vacation time. Our plan was to reach the lake by lunchtime, eat a hearty meal, refill our water supply, and then push on the next 10-12 miles necessary to reach the next water source.
As we started along our planned route, we discovered that it was much more difficult terrain than we had originally thought. The uphills were killer and there were so many of them. The views were tremendous, but we had to work for them. Eventually, we reached the crest overlooking Overland Lake. Bill anxious to drop a fishing line into the famed fishing hole, shouted and sprinted down several switchbacks, while the rest of his laughed and carefully made our way down. The fame of the fishing here was well deserved. I believe he caught 6 trout in 7 or 8 casts, but none were big enough to fillet into a nice meal. As the rest of us finally reached a nice boulder-laden area with good water access, we decided to take an extended break for lunch. After the tremendous effort necessary to get here, I think we all just took twenty or so minutes to relax in the shade.
After we caught our breath, we prepared some lunch and discussed our plans for the remainder of the day. We knew that this could potentially be our last available water for 10-12 miles and so that played into our decision. As the clock turned to 4 PM, we finally pushed on, thinking we would reach the next water shortly before dark.
This next middle section of the Ruby Crest Trail skirts a couple of magnificent peaks and crosses a few small creeks, one of which has a beautiful black slate waterfall just over the trail. We took advantage of this and re-capped our water bottles and bladders. After a number of switchbacks, the weather turned against us and it started to drizzle, slowing our progress even more. Though we were without any water source, we decided to camp on a small saddle near King's Peak. We had been conserving water and believed we could make it to water early the next morning. Total mileage for the day was approximately 10.5 miles.
We set up our tents and began bedding down for the night, after a quick meal. I got unlucky and chose a spot for my tent with a number of prickly plans underneath and so had to do some weed-whacking before going to sleep. As these mild storms rolled in, we were greeted by a beautiful rainbow in the distance to the east. What a sight to see!!!
Awake at about 5:15 in the morning, we were greeted by the echoing chatter of coyotes in the valley to the west. It really was an amazing way to wake up. We quickly broke camp and started our way up to what I had, at the time, believed to be Wine's Peak, the tallest peak on the trail itself, but upon our return, I discovered my mistake. Still, we took a few moments to relish our victory for having made it this far. The peak offered amazing views to the southeast and north east.
Had my map-reading been correct, we should have only had another 3 or 4 miles to water, but little did we know at the time that I was mistaken about Wine's Peak. As we followed the sweeping saddle between this unknown peak and the next, we were in awe of Long Valley, directly to our west. More to the point though, our water was starting to run low. We climbed peak after peak, traversed saddle after saddle, and eventually ran into some of the first people we had seen on the trail.
As we looked in awe at Ruby Dome and the other 11k+ peaks in the distance, a nice couple pointed out North Furlong Creek in the distance. They explained that they were day-hiking from the lake supplied by this creek. Anxious to scout it out, I told the rest of my party that I was going to increase my pace a bit and find our water source.
The trail dipped down into a lush little forest through a series of switchbacks. Though, as I crossed dry creek-bed after dry creek-bed, I began to get a little concerned that our water source may have dried up in this terrible drought. I eventually reached the intersection of the North Furlong Lake Trail and our Ruby Crest Trail. At this point, I decided to wait for my team in order to decide what to do next. After some discussion, we decided to push on to the next lake on the map, but the same couple we had seen early suddenly showed up and pointed us to a section of the creek that had running water. Apparently, the creek flows under ground for quite a ways until reaching that point. It became quite the joke, of which I was the butt, when the couple agreed to yell at us when they reached water along the North Furlong Trail. We had expected it to be a few minutes before we heard them, but it was actually less than one. Everyone looked at me and gave me a a well-deserved laugh.
Bill, Crista, Veronica, and I filled our water supply, while we let an exhausted Rich relax a bit. That's not to say that we were all tired, but Rich seemed a little worse off than the rest of us. After eating some jerky, nuts, and other assorted snack foods for lunch at this stop, we decided to push on. As this was our last day on the trail, we still had many miles to go.
In addition to helping us find water, the couple had told us that we only had two more rises to get over in order to get back to Lamoille Canyon. The first proved to be fairly easy and dropped us out into a large beautifully green and lush meadow. As we passed through this area though, the lightest of drizzles started again. It took us some time to clear this area and make to the next and probably largest lake directly on the trail, Favre Lake.
Here we encountered a few campers who told us we simply had to make it over the next rise and it was all downhill from there. What they didn't tell us was how difficult that rise would be. It took us a long while to reach Liberty Lake and beyond, which finally lead to the pass overlooking the our destination, the northern trail head.
By this time, the drizzle had picked up and we put our rain gear on. We had originally thought this last bit to be only a mile or two, but as we made our way down switchback after switchback we eventually reached another sign indicating that it was two miles more to the parking lot. Wow! What a disappointment that was. We were all aching and in pain, and by this point simply wanted to finish strong. That must have been the absolute longest two miles ever as we passed over we rock, walked across several fashioned bridges, and finally, finally, finally reached Crista's truck. We all gave a barbaric yawp in recognition of our long journey and our victory over these pristine mountains.
In total, we traversed 36 miles of backpacking heaven from the morning of July 26th through the early evening of July 28th. We were exhausted, we were sore, we were hungry, but we had just accomplished something that none of us would ever forget! Way to go team!!!
Oh, and by the way . . . they gave me the trail name 'Trail Boss'.
