Sawtooth Peak 12,343′ and Needham Mountain 12,540′
Sierra Nevada
Total Time: 9:00
Distance: 13.2 miles
Elevation Gain: 6500′
Crux: Class 3
Trailhead: Monarch Lakes TH, trash and pit toilets, limited services in nearby Mineral City
About six years ago, when Holly lived in Fresno for a year, I decided to try and make the long drive to Mineral King for the day. Heading south in the only car I had ever owned since high school, a 2001 Honda CRV, I drove through Visalia and into the town of Three Rivers. As I made the turn off to the 25 miles of winding, often one lane road into Mineral King, my previously trusty car sputtered and came to a stop. Luckily, I was not too far into the drive and was able to hitch hike into Three Rivers and call for an expensive tow truck back to Visalia. It would be my first cars’ last trip into the mountains, and I have not tried to get back to Mineral King since. Until this summer. Well acclimatized from the John Muir Trail, I wanted a chance to introduce myself to this area that had alluded me previously. Although there are plenty of difficult options for long day hikes in Mineral King, I wanted to have some reasonable objective given my difficulties on my first attempt in. So after looking through the maps, I decided on an ascent of Sawtooth Peak and Needham Mountain, two peaks not far from the trail head, but with decent elevation gain. I awoke extremely early and headed south, passing the spot where my car had died on my first visit with thankfully no auto issues on the return trip. There were afternoon storms in the area, and the ground was still wet from rain tonight before, leading to a fantastic partially cloudy sunrise over Sawtooth Peak and the Mineral King area as I drove in. The trail head was nearly full despite it being midweek, many of the cars wrapped in tarps due to the notorious marmots in the area known to chew on the underside of cars. Someone had told me that this occurs typically in the earlier part of the season and by mid to late August, I needn’t to worry about the hungry rodents. Besides, what was the liklihood I would have car trouble twice?
So after checking my gear, I started up the trail towards Sawtooth Pass. There is a known shortcut to Sawtooth Pass heading to Glacier Pass just to the west following an old mining trail. I had the turn off marked on my map, however it was quite easy to find. A sign pointed up toward Sawtooth Pass and behind it to the left was a fairly well-defined trail. Someone had carved by hand into the sign “Hells Trail”- sounded promising.
I started up the trail, briefly losing it in the brush, then finding it again as it cut east across talus slopes. As the trail climbed into the creek basin that drained The Monarch lakes above, it became less well-defined on the rock slabs and scree. At this point I cut straight up slope, crossing over the occasional thin use trail but more or less making my own way up to Glacier Pass.
I had ascended over 3000 feet in under two hours when I hit the pass and I was pleased with my time for the day despite my grogginess from the early start. From Glacier Pass to the north I could see Mount Eison and Mount Lippincott, as well as the nearby Kaweahs, my first time seeing them so closely. My route from Glacier Pass was to continue to the east on an ascending traverse towards Sawtooth Pass. The trail briefly switch backed up loose scree, then cut across boulders on thin use trails to the nearby pass.
Sawtooth Peak was now directly above, the west ridge looking quite impressive and narrow. The north face was a sheer cliff and I imagine it holds some good rock climbing potential for those willing to make the arduous approach. Leaving the pass I scrambled along boulders staying near the crest as much as possible in order to scramble on the most solid rock, dropping to the south whenever the exposure became too great or climbing too difficult. There was one small false summit that I needed to traverse around, but the climb to the top was overall straightforward on solid class 2-3 most of the way. The highest point is a fin shaped summit block which I was able to surmount on the east side with some stemming and a couple well-positioned footholds. The thin block was far too narrow to rest on comfortably, so I took a break on the west side of the summit block and signed into the register.
The peak was quite popular, one of the easier 12,000′ peaks, particularly on the west side of the Sierra and seeing ascents nearly every day of the summer. I was the first of the day although multiple parties had been up the day previously. It was still morning, only about 10 AM, but there were already large storm clouds building over the nearby Kahweahs. There was a strong chance of afternoon thunder storms and my goal was to be up and over the pass west of Amphitheater Lake before any storms rolled in for the day. With that in mind, I started down the southeast slabs of Sawtooth to start my traverse over to Needham mountain.
Although ideally I would not lose too much elevation on the traverse, there were a number of blocky false summits along the way and I decided it would be easiest to utilize the loose sand slopes and drop down to avoid the false summits rather than try and stay high and traverse each one. This worked well, although I still cut back up too early and needed to traverse one or two final intermediate peaks before reaching the top of Needham.
The scrambling up Needham was a bit tougher than Sawtooth, and I needed to circle around the east and north side of the final summit blocks to find a weakness to the high point. The summit block on Needham was just as small as Sawtooth, although there were better steps to scramble up to tag the top. As soon as I touched the highest rock I was immediately swarmed by flying ants and quickly dropped off to one of the flatter boulders to enjoy my lunch, ironically a ham sandwich (not planned). It was about 12:30 PM and the clouds that had formed above the Kaweahs had turned into rain, although they hung above the larger peaks leaving me in sunshine. Some more storm clouds were also forming to the east over the Mount Whitney area.
After eating my lunch and enjoying the views I made an traversing descent back to the west, utilizing the loose scree to quickly drop to Amphitheater Lake to reach the pass to get back to the trail head. As I descended, the clouds overhead grew darker and darker and I quickly realized that the storm that was over the Kaweahs was blooming and was heading my way. I now seriously risked getting caught in a thunderstorm. My new goal was to get up and over the pass before the lightning started. I passed by the lake, deciding not to fill water in the interest of time.
I was probably less than 40 feet from the top of the pass when the first thunder struck and the rain started down hard. The pass, rated at class 3 would be sketchy in the rain and downright dangerous with active thunder and lightning. I ducked under some overhanging boulders for shelter and waited it out for about 30 minutes for the lightning to move off into the distance, with some cracks of thunder seeming to happen directly overhead.
When I finally had a gap in the thunder strikes I made my move to get over the pass. Shooting up the wet class 3 as quickly as I could, I dropped down the slabs on the other side to Upper Monarch Lake. I was glad with my decision to hunker down, the west side of the pass being near completely void of cover and mostly exposed slabs. The threat of rain seemed to be over and I continued past the upper lake to a small damn to make my way to the lower lake.
A decent use trail led me down series of slabs and ledges where I quickly reached the lower lake and saw the first backpackers I had seen all morning, quickly setting up their tent before the next round of rain started. I filtered water at the outlet of the lake, knowing I would soon be back in tree line and safe (or so I thought) from the elements. The normal trail, longer compared to my shortcut ascent that morning, gently switched back through the trees towards the trail head. I was roughly at the junction going towards Crystal Lake when the rain started again, this time quickly changing into small pieces of hail.
At first I was amused by this, and continued hiking through it without stopping, trying to catch the small balls of ice in my hand and on my tongue. But after a half a mile, the hail changed from small pebbles to large painful marbles and I needed to duck under a tree with my pack held above my head from the onslaught. The hail, now accompanied by thunder and lightning was torrential and it’s soon looked like I was hiking in a snowstorm rather than a mid August day.
I slowly hiked down within the trees and my pack over my head the entire time, hoping the hell would ease by the time I reach the treeless area below and last mile to the car. Thanks in part to my slower pace during the hail storm, this timing worked out well with sunshine peeking through the clouds just as I passed the sign where I had turned off that morning. I was completely drenched and my shoes were sopping wet, so I made an effort to finish the last mile and a half of the hike as quickly as possible to get into dry clothes. I passed several backpackers on the way out, also thoroughly soaked with the added bonus of carrying a water logged pack. I reached my car at about 4 PM, losing about an hour due to the afternoon thunderstorm between ducking under the rock and slowing my pace from the hail. I hopped in the car headed towards home, grabbing dinner in Three Rivers before arriving to my house at about 8 PM.