High Sierra Topix

With the unlikely last name of Hengst (albeit by marriage), you can understand why I have been eyeing Hengst Peak in Mineral King ever since I spotted it on the map. Last Saturday I talked two of my friends, Nathan and Karen, into braving the MK road and tackling the peak with me. On the way, we also hit White Chief sortofa Peak and Eagle Crest (or at least what is the highest point in the vicinity).

Many thanks to Shawn for his helpful trip report and for sending me some photos of Hengst.

Here are Nathan's photos of our trip:
http://natedeb.com/krv/displayimage.php ... t=43&pos=0

After wrapping up the car against pesky marmots, we started out shortly before 9 am. We hiked through White Chief Canyon, visited the marble mine, found our way up to lovely White Chief Lake, then continued up the steep slabs to the ridge between White Chief Peak and Eagle Crest. Like Shawn, we found no register on the presumed White Chief Peak, but the views were great. Eagle Crest was a lot more fun with a bit of Class 3 climbing and some tricky (for us) route finding. There is a register on top, and also pieces of Karen's camera down in one of the cracks
I lost my camera off Sawtooth in MK almost exactly a year ago. If you go to Mineral King, wear a safety strap for the camera!!!

Hengst Peak was just across the high meadow, and we headed up about 4 pm. I was skeptical that we would make it in time, but my good friends convinced me to go on, and it turned out to be not nearly as hard as it looked. We did a little bit of unnecessary boulder scrambling on the way up, but found a good easy Class 2 route on the way down. Then we headed down the steep loose slope to Eagle Lake and returned to the trailhead just in time to not have to use our headlamps. The weather was perfect and the air was clear - a pretty near perfect day in Mineral King! (Well, if you must know, I tripped on a stupid rock coming down the trail and went sprawling, but no harm done.)

If anyone wants a hiking partner for Mineral King, be sure to keep me in mind, because I'm game almost any time!

Alice "Moondust" Hengst

Way to go Mrs. Hengst!!!!!!
Fantastic trip report. Another great hike in the Mineral King area. I love the photo of the marmot net around the car - them critters must realy get nasty. Sorry about the camera though.

Mr. Nathan was somewhat toast the next day but still managed to make it up into the Domelands near Mantar Meadow for a climb of Black Mountain the next day. I would say that boy definately has been bitten by the bug.

It is always fun to climb your namesake - with a name like Brown - I have found several peaks to summit with my name. Oh yeah - and since my first name is Tom .......
Last year while climbing Clouripper we stoppped by one of the lakes .... Brown Lake. But when I peered to the north from the southern end of the lake - I was looking at .....
Mt Tom Brown Lake - ---- how many can get their full name in a single panarama view.

See you Saturday for a visit to the east side...... Tom

after losing a few pieces of gear, I tell everyone "lanyard, lanyard!" TomG had everything tied down, but still lost his radio this weekend (it wasn't tied down). Bummer about losing the cameras.

Hey Alice....

Sure glad see you had a great trip. Looks like quite the adventure, given the route and so forth.
Your words have inspired me to put a Mineral King trip on my to do list this year (it's been a while since I've been there).

Shawn