The Tahoe Ogul Peak List lists Silver Peak’s Southwest peak as Peak #9 on the list.
I approached Silver from the Noble Canyon trail west of the peak. I traveled from the campground south to a point where I could leave the trail and climb cross country up to the saddle between Highland and Silver.
- The two peaks of Silver as seen from the Noble Canyon Trail.
I carefully studied the satellite pictures prior to my climb trying to select the easiest rout up the west slope. I believe I found a relatively STEEP but easy route.
Once I left the trail I entered a heavily forested area where the biggest issue was stepping over and around downed trees and big piles of bear scat. As the slope steepened the obstacles began to thin out. Eventually I exited the forest and the climb was clear of vegetation. Occasionally there was some brush but it was really inconsequential to impeding the climb.
After a solid 2000 feet of climbing I finally reached the saddle between Highland and Silver.
The climb along the ridge was mostly class 1 with some class 2 in places.
There are about 3 peaklets that make up the summit of the SW peak. I didn’t know what to do when I got to the first one so I just muscled up the class 3 rock to the first peaklet.
I realized I wasn’t on the actual summit so I scrambled over to the actual SW summit seen here.
The easy class 2 route to this summit is climbers right around the first two peaklets and then up over the ridge (in the picture above) and then climbers left along the ridge to the actual summit.
Looking back at Highland peak I could see why the climb of both Highland and Silver in one day has been compared to Whitney or Russell without the altitude.
This is a shot of the NE summit of Silver.
I guess there is some argument about which peak is higher. I don’t really care. The SW Peak is on the list. That is all I need to know.
I took this map from Cal Topo and drew a line roughly showing the route I took once I left the Noble Canyon Trail. I followed this route both on the ascent and descent. Maybe someday I will buy one of them fancy GPS tracker electronic things. I can then record my path and share it on the internet like all of the cool kids.
Thanks for reading my post!
-Russ
"...Or have you only comfort, and the lust for comfort, that stealthy thing that enters the house a guest, and then becomes a host and then a master?"
Kahil Gibran.
