Juniper Peak Traverse (Red Rock, West of Las Vegas NV)

Harlan W. Stockman
Saturday, May 07, 2005

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The GPS trace. Distance was ~6 miles. The southern ascent route is "normal"; the northern descent route was a bit iffy, since we didn't really know the way, and came across very sporadic cairns.

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Early in the trip, looking WSW. A key is here.

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Desert 4 O'Clocks.

 

 

 

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Larkspur.

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Beavertail cactus flowers.

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View East, as Pierre chugs up past some AYC flowers in Juniper Canyon.

 

 

 

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Hyacinth. (Bouquet, not Bucket!)

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Another hyacinth.

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Climber east of Rainbow Wall.

 

 

 

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View south into Juniper Canyon.

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View ESE toward southern Las Vegas.

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Pierre emerges from Sipapu.

 

 

 

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Standard shot of Pierre rebuilding the cairn.

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Look at me! Bridge Mt (left) and Bridge Point (right) are in the background.

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I jumped so fast, I compressed time and made the shot blurry. Pierre was almost knocked over by the time-compression waves.

 

 

 

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Look at me! Returning to earth.

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Almost down by Pine Creek, view ESE. When you come to the top of a huge dryfall just before Pine Cr., don't despair; traverse west along this ramp.

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Making our way back to Pine Creek. We kept crawling through brush, hoping to spot the rare Red Rock Dog Tick, but we saw none of those particular arachnids.

 

 

 

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Heading E in Pine Creek, past redbuds. ("Why are they called Redbuds?" Pierre asked, "They are purple." I explained, "We're Americans, we just do things like that unilaterally.")

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Water was still flowing, but there were a lot of algae-laden pools. This is going to be a nasty mosquito season for Red Rock.

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I have no idea what these are. My index finger provides scale.

 

 

 

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Globe Mallows.

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More Mallows with red arthropods.

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Prickly Pear and arthropods.

 

 

 

Utah_penst

Utah Penstemon (Firecrackers).