First Peak, Sheep Mts, NV

Pics by Harlan W S
April 28, 2022

This was another COVID "unfinished business" peak. I thought of going farther, but it was a bit warm and the connections looked a bit dicey. Purcell calls this class 2 by the south ridge; that is true if you are willing to drop up to 100' at times to climb around obstacles. If you try to climb over the gendarme, it is technical. If you take the valley east of the ridge, and ascend to the ridge just after the gendarme, it is class 2 at worst.

The Mormon Wells Road is quite good to the parking spot, OK for a vehicle with 6"+ of clearance; I found an easy area to pull off the road to park.

Route map	Context	View from just above parking area
There are definitely optional scrambling spots on ridge.	This sure didn't seem class 2, but I could have gone east and avoided it.	The gendrame is just right of the G. At first I thought I could walk L around it, but there is a hidden drop at L.
	View S to gendarme. I did a sketchy traverse on the east side (L).	Gass peak from summit.
Lost Yucca to NNE.	Terrain W of Lost Yucca	Sports bra drawn in for modesty.
Originally, I thought of dropping L off eastern peaklet. It looked pretty steep and cliffy.		Main peak from eastern peaklet.
View to Madre range on descent.	View of higher Spring Mts on descent.	I'm looking back W at the gendarme. For return I simply dropped into the valley from the N side of gendarme.
View back from parking.