Two Tips East, Truckee Range, January 31, 2015 - [39°42'44.77"N] [119°10'13.53"W] - Elevation 7076'

As the end of January approached, my hiking buddy, Steve K. and I realized that if we were going to improve upon 2014's adventures, we had better get going.  About two weeks ago, we picked a local peak, not big by any means, Two Tips East at an elevation of 7075 feet and only about a 60 minute drive from Reno; the 943rd highest peak in Nevada and the 14,089th highest in the USA.  We really did not have any "peak" expectations but rather a 4-5 hour walk in the desert to stretch our legs;  our last outing was August 14 when we traversed from the Mt. Rose summit trail head across the ridge from Mt. Rose to Snowflower Peak and then down into Thomas Creek Canyon: a 14 mile day.

Summit photo with what looks like rolling hills to the top but that was far from the case - very steep valleys lie on the other side of every rise you see. 

With a "walk in the desert" goal, Two Tips East was a great target and was supported by a utility access road servicing the power lines traveling north.  The plan (which as you know never, never executes as planned) was to drive basically up that utility road to within about 4 miles of the summit and go for a walk.

We took exit 48 off I80, the last Fernley exit and headed north under the freeway past the now history, Truck Inn and the new Terribles Truck Stop; last chance for water and supplies.  We then drove about 2 miles up the dirt road and found that we would have to park well short of our intended location.  The road was simply torn up and just 1 mile further up the road from where we parked, the road was completely washed out by about a 15' wide, 10 foot deep wash.  We were on the utility road so what the heck, we will just walk a bit further but on a dirt road.

We got out of the Runner, now lifted 4 inches to better handle the extremes we put it through and began our "walk" at 815am; fueled by a great breakfast at the Wigwam Restaurant, Casino and Indian Museum in the heart of Fernley.  A planned 10 mile winter warm up hike.

As we began, it certainly did not look that far but about 2 miles up the road, it simply became the most inhospitable dirt road I have ever experienced and the walking became difficult on the loose rock and steep road grade.  As we approached the first rise, we knew our plan was in jeopardy.  This utility road was built to provide ease of access for the working trucks to build these power towers and as such they followed a very gradual elevation line along the steep canyons that it circumvented.  For us that meant that the distance in getting to the base of Two Tips East was much further than expected.  In fact, we climbed and walked along this road for over 4 miles before we even turned off to begin the climb to the top; as I said, the road was 30 plus years old and its smoothness was gone years ago making the walking very difficult and mental.

So about 90 minutes into our trek, we assessed our path up this mountain in the Truckee River Range and felt it to still be doable so we continued but now, with no trail.  As we proceeded, the landscape became very rocky.  Rocks that looked like they were ejected from a volcano long since dormant.

This is the terrain typical from our two hour break all the way to the summit - Steve is on the ridge if you look closely.

So the difficulty in walking continued.  At our two hour break, we were across the rocky meadow and ready to begin the climb up; elevation 5400 feet. Here is where it got real interesting.  As we climbed, the terrain became more unstable and steep.  Thinking we were going to simply rise to rolling landscape leading to the top we were surprised by another steep valley.  Our assessment led us again, parallel to the peak and up but not closer to the peak.  After about another hour or so, we got to our high point at about 6300' and still a mile from the summit over continuing difficult terrain.  With time passing and both of us having evening commitments, we turned and what what expected to be a 10 mile hike turned into 12 and we still fell short of this summit by 1 mile and 3 hours of time.

Once back at the 4Runner, we had in fact covered 12 miles in about 6 hours of hiking.  A great day!

SOME ADDITIONAL PHOTOS:

From our high-point we could see Pyramid Lake to the northwest...

...I-80 to the east and...

...the Sierras to the west!