Telescope peak

360 degree from telescope peak. Click this link, then click the photo to open it.

We planned on hiking Telescope peak on Sunday the 8th of Oct. Some members left Las Vegas on Friday to secure campsites at Wild Rose camp ground. Others drove up on Saturday.  It turned out to be unnecessary because there were many empty camp sites. Hike is 14 miles RT, with 3100 total feet of gain. We reached the summit in 4 hours, and about 3 hours down.

 Tent and sunset on Friday night.

 Close-up of sunset.

 Moonrise

Full Moon

Roadrunner

And a white tailed antelope squirrel

After the others arrived we drove up the road to see the charcoal kilns and to scout the road to the trailhead. It is about 6 miles of dirt, and 2 miles of high clearance road....but someone did get a nissan sentra up the rough part.

Breakfast on the morning of the hike

The group around the breakfast table.

Campsite on the morning of the hike

The trail starts out at Mahogony flat campground at 8100 feet. It winds it's way around Mt Rogers to a pass before winding around Bennett Peak.

The pass between Mt Rogers and Bennett peak. 

The back side of Bennett peak descends a little before starting the climb to Telescope peak.

View looking back at Bennett Peak and  the trail that traverses the back side of it. Two of our group are visible on this section of the trail.

Zoom of the last photo so you can see the hikers.

Looking back at Mt Rogers you can see the trail that traverses the flank of the mountain.

The first view you get of Telescope peak is after a bunch of switchbacks that top out about 300 yards from the summit as seen here.

On the summit

Looking back the way we came you can see the trail that goes behind Bennett peak and crosses the pass before Mt Rogers, then traverses the flank of Mt Rogers back to the car. This view is the middle third of the trip.

Badwater from the top

From the trailhead the path goes around Mt Rogers to a pass between it and Bennett peak.

From the pass it goes around the back side of Bennett then stays on a ridge for a while before the last switchback section

Last section along the ridge and up the switchbacks. You never see the peak till the top of the last switchback about 500 ft from the end of the trail.