For years now, I've looked at doing Charleston & Mummy from Lee Canyon to the north. The roadhead is some 800' higher, but there's no trail up to the Charleston-Mummy ridge. We scheduled it a couple of years ago, but got snowed out. This time it went well. Charleston & Mummy are about 5200' gain & 17 miles; we took about 11 hours to do both peaks.
We met at the ski lift parking lot at the upper end of Lee Canyon at 6 A.M. Can't find the trip sheet, but I think we had about 22 people; all made Charleston, most Mummy. We hiked south under the west ski lift then up the canyon to the ridge trail at 3288T on the 7.5 topo, west to Charleston, east to Mummy, then back the way we came. We tried to angle up from the descending trail below Mummy; probably best to stay on that trail a bit further & hike directly up to regain the ridge. In climbing Mummy, traverse left for a hundred yards or so when you reach the wall just below the summit plateau.
The campgrounds were pretty full, so we drove down to US 395, drove S 4.4, then turned left down the gravel road toward Corn Creek Field Station, etc. About 2 miles down this road, we turned off, parked, & had a campfire.
Sunday about 10 of us did Clark on the way home. The October 1988 Road & Peak Guide is inadequate & should read:
"35 mi. past Baker on I-15, take Bailey Road off ramp over the freeway, turn left immediately on paved Clark Mt Road. Pavement ends at 1.0 mi. Turn right at 1.4 & drive past mine tailings on right Bear left at 2.1. Bear left at 3.7. Right fork at 4.2. Left fork at 4.3. Left turn at 5.7. Park near end of road at 6.7 from I-10.
Hike east to ridge top & take ridge north to the cliffs. Follow the cliffs up almost to the E-W summit ridge. About 50-100 yards back from this summit ridge, an almost vertical 20' of solid class 3 leads up to the class. 2 ridge. Follow west to the summit."
1) Group camp at Mesquite Spring (should be reserved ahead),2) Hidden Valley Road at least 1 mi. E of Teakettle Junction (no groundfires), or drive 7 mi N from Ubehebe Crater road out of the Monument. I had not yet bought the DPS FIRETUB, so we drove out of the Monument, an option which will be prohibitively far if the Desert Bill passes. Good campfire; water left outside froze that night.
Sunday we got up at a slightly more decent hour, drove back down Racetrack Road & parked at about 4863' on the 15' topo. & did Tin in 6 hours round trip. We signed Ron Hudson & John McCully out as they couldn't stand to poke along at 1300'/hr. Hudson did the 4100' to the summit in 2 hrs flat. We did both peaks by the routes in the DPS Road & Peak Guide, except for parking further south for Tin. Others on the trip were Wendy McCully, Carl Brodene, Doug Hatfield, David Welbourne. Thanks to Karen for the usual great assist.
