Home / Mojave Preserve and Desert bikepacking trips / Spring 2011: Mojave National Preserve and area bicycle camping / Day 5: Castle Peaks hike, New York Mountains, Mojave National Preserve 76
Perfect weather. First, I'll hike over to Indian Spring, hoping to find water so I can spend an extra day here. Then I'll hike around a few of the Castle Peaks pinnacles. I'll see no people today. 10.1 hiking miles and about 2300 feet of elevation gain.
Morning at Castle Peaks Road means I get to try out the deluxe facilities while listening to the quail; it works well!
I notice bird activity near my tent and locate a nearly invisible bird's nest in an elbow of this joshua tree at centre-right
I start today's hike by climbing up a hill and looking down at my tent in the little valley at the end of Castle Peaks Road
Someone has a nest here sheltered against a boulder on top of the hill above my tent
I pass a few brilliant Indian paintbrush plants as I further climb the hills above my tent
I'm now at one of the high points of this ridge in the Castle Peaks area, at about 5225 feet elevation
Good views over to the New York Mountains peaks from this Castle Peaks ridge
From this ridge, the only way is down, so I continue eastward down into the canyon below
To my surprise, I find a small stream in this unnamed Castle Peaks canyon
I climb up the next hill and down into a juniper-studded valley
I encounter a nice patch of Mojave asters on the way down into the valley below Castle Peaks
In this little valley below Castle Peaks, I reach an old closed road, a perfect trail after a bit of cross-country hiking
The cool rocks formations in the Castle Peaks area are endless; this one harbors a small natural arch
I crouch and walk through this little rock arch in the Castle Peaks area
On the other side of this Castle Peaks arch is a rock formation that looks like a tortoise, with its head extended
I climb over the next hill (a 75-foot rise), upon which I find a boulder with a tuft of cactus on its head
I find a few Gooding's verbenas blooming in the wash
Now that I'm in a smooth-bottomed wash in the Castle Peaks area, my hiking speed is picking up a little
In this Castle Peaks wash, I encounter my first stray balloon of the day, trapped in a desert sage bush
In this Castle Peaks wash is the most lush Desert four o'clock (Mirabilis multiflora) that I've seen so far on this trip
Six minutes after my first balloon discovery, I stumble across a second one in the same Castle Peaks wash
Hiking down this Castle Peaks wash is fun (it's a bit downhill), and then I reach this fairly recent barbed-wire fence
A nice juxtaposition of pink cactus flowers and orange desert mallows in this Castle Peaks wash
Yellow Eriophyllum wallacei flowers are scattered intermittently in this Castle Peaks wash
A few stretches of this Castle Peaks wash have a lot of thorny Catclaw acacia bushes to avoid
A few rather large Chia sages grow in this Castle Peaks wash
I climb out of the wash and crawl under the barbed-wire fence again, in order to continue hiking toward Indian Spring
Near the barbed-wire fence is the brightest blooming desert sage I've seen yet on this trip
I drop down into the next wash that my route randomly crosses
I continue hiking more or less along the barbed-wire fence
I climb over several low hills on my cross-country route toward Indian Spring
I notice a nice little "pineapple cactus" on my cross-country trek over the low hills
As I drop down into yet another wash, I realize I'm quite close to Taylor Spring (dry), where I hiked last year
I climb up another hill on the way to Indian Spring and recognize the valley of junipers and joshua trees in front of me
My cross-country hiking ends temporarily when I hit the old closed road to Indian Spring, which serves as a nice trail
As I approach Indian Spring, I notice a balloon fragment tangled in a catclaw bush
Well, here I am at Indian Spring, New York Mountains, Mojave National Preserve
Just like last year, bees are buzzing around the shallow water where it overflows from the Indian Spring trough
I leisurely filter 3 1.5-litre bottles of that greenish water from the Indian Spring tub and it tastes pretty good
I leave Indian Spring and start my way cross-country up to a saddle between two sets of pinnacles in the Castle Peaks
The climb up to this Castle Peaks saddle is about 500 feet elevation in about 3/4 mile from Indian Spring down below
I'm almost there; just a little further and I'll be on that saddle between the two Castle Peaks pinnacle `groups`
Great views back down into the valley behind me from this Castle Peaks saddle
Arrived! I sit here on the Castle Peaks saddle for a good 15 minutes, with pinnacles in front of me, and behind me
From the Castle Peaks saddle, I can zoom in across the valley and just barely make out the Searchlight area
As I plot the continuation of my hike, I look down into a secluded valley on the other (west) side of the Castle Peaks saddle
Instead of dropping down into the valley, I decide to skirt along this hill and hike over to the next Castle Peaks saddle
I get close to the slot in the hills and will hike up to the little pass between them at upper-right
Looking to the south, I'm now in the upper part of that small valley between two Castle Peaks pinnacle `groups`
I walk up a boulder-strewn drainage area toward that pass in the Castle Peaks
The views behind me, toward Walking Box Ranch Road to the south, are striking in the late-day sunlight
I reach this pass in the Castle Peaks and have an unexpected view to the north across the Ivanpah Valley
One short, steep hill and I'll be up at the next Castle Peaks pinnacles
To the west, I get a view I haven't seen before, with the New York Mountains peaks at upper-left
Phlox flowers on the north side of the Castle Peaks hills
My hike up to the pinnacles quickly gets a bit steep and slippery due to loose rock, so I veer to the right a little
I'm happy to reach the top of the hill; it's pretty steep here
This Castle Peaks set of pinnacles is just as awesome as the last one; the one in front of me is Dove Peak
Well, I guess I'll drop down into the valley between these Castle Peaks hills and start heading back to my campsite
I notice a natural arch in the Castle Peaks pinnacles as I start my way down the hill
A few nice rock outcrops dot the hike down the wash into the valley below the Castle Peaks
Oh, another little hole in the Castle Peaks rocks
I take a look behind me as I walk down the hill away from the Castle Peaks
A fallen joshua tree lays in this wash below the Castle Peaks
This pinnacle in the Castle Peaks is rather phallic
Oh, that barbed-wire fence; I forgot I might encounter this again
I'm now walking up a wash that I hiked down earlier today, but this time I'll go all the way to the crest ahead
The sandy wash radiates from the golden end-of-day sunlight
After another 20 minutes, I reach the top of the wash and locate the old Castle Peaks road
The old Castle Peaks road leaves the pinnacles area and dips down between rolling hills on the way back to my campsite
Some stretches of the old, closed Castle Peaks road are quite eroded
Erosion is so severe in a few spots on the old Castle Peaks road that the roadbed is almost unrecognizable
I reach the Wilderness boundary and exit onto the part of Castle Peaks Road that is still open to vehicles
Home for the night at the Castle Peaks trailhead
I don't get sunset between these hills near Castle Peaks, but I do see good sunset colors on the clouds
Elevation profile of Castle Peaks hiking route, Mojave National Preserve