High Sierra Topix

Hello everyone,

I'm doing a little route planning and was wondering if anyone has been over North Col or Cox Col this year? I'm also wondering about the condition of the Morgan Mine Road trail up from Pine Creek. Is it still a total washout?

I'm looking to do a loop from Pine Creek and had this route in mind: Pine Creek up to Royce Lakes > Feather Peak > Ruskie Pass > Seven Gables > Ursula Pass > Lake Italy > North Col or Cox Col > Peppermint Pass > Spire Lake > Morgan Mine Road > Pine Creek.

Any thoughts? Thanks!

I haven't been up that way this year and haven't been over that ground since the summer of 2020, but, for what it's worth the TR is here: viewtopic.php?t=20842

As far as I can tell the old dirt road/"trail" from Pine Creek toward Morgan Pass is not really maintained, so far as I am aware. This can be seen by the state of the old jeep trail where it is not washed out. There is quite the accumulation of boulders that have rolled from above come to rest on the old tread. The wash outs involve pretty difficult scrambling to get around--I recall you can circumvent one of them but not the higher one (or maybe I have that inverted).

As for Cox/North Col, see the post and other threads on this subject---the easiest route over the crest there is NOT the low point but the high lump to the north of it. This is pretty clear from looking at the topographic map which shows much lower gradient going over this hump than going up the chute to the low point.

Thank you for the feedback and link to your TR. And thanks for the North Col pointers! It seems like getting from Spire Lake back down to Pine Creek TH might be a challenge. I could always skip North Col and backtrack...but I'd really like to check out that area and I also really like loops that don't backtrack.