Luther-Fay Trail (Douglas County, Nevada)

 

The plan was to hike up Mt. Tallac today with Deanna's Meetup group, but with high winds predicted on the ridge-tops around Lake Tahoe, the decision was made to move today's hike to the Luther-Fay Trail just east of Minden, NV. Surprisingly, I had never heard of this trail, which is unusual since I tend to research all of the nearby trails. That said, the adventure of a new trail with the good folks in this group is always a good time.

After carpooling to the trail head, the fifteen of us started up the network of trails, but luckily there is ample signage, a couple of maps along the way, and all of the trails pretty much rejoin before heading up the final part of the canyon. As always with this group, we make pretty good time. The trail is easy at first, but soon starts some sections of steep uphill across pulverized granite. The company is always good though and makes up for it. 

While the group as a whole are all strong hikers, I tend to be among the front of the pack on most trips. In this case, I had to do a bit of trail finding as we moved up a small ridge almost four miles into the trail. The trail somewhat abruptly ends here. While a fellow-hiker and I await the rest of the group catching up, we take in some of the magnificent views of this canyon just ahead of us and below the towering Freel Peak, the tallest peak in the Tahoe Basin. At 10,886' it towers over everything else nearby and the canyon between our current location and the peak itself is full of color at this time of year.

As the rest of the group catches up, we do some rock scrambling a bit further up the canyon and eventually decide to stop for a quick break. While we wait, I snap a few more pictures of the magnificent color pallet spread out before us in this canyon. As the melt of a recent snowfall pours over small waterfalls at the base of the canyon, we watch the moon set behind the high ridge above us.

After our short rest, we head back to the trail head. The trail down is much easier, as downhill on pulverized granite always is. We make it back in about half of the time it took us to get to the top of the canyon. Total distance covered was just over 8.7 miles and the group decides to cap it off with a meal and a beer at Red's Old 395 Grill in Carson City.