Boundary Peak, Montgomery Peak, Mount Dubois

2-Jul-77

By: Mark Hurst

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Private Trip

At the instigation of the writer, Simone deMiguel, Marty Trudeau, Kenneth Jones and later Ron Flitterman conspired to bag the above seldom led three peaks. Driving up Friday night the quintet car camped just off the Westgard Pass. Sat AM local directions to Middle Canyon were received from personnel at a ranch on Hwy 3-A north of Dyer, Nev, Driving up Middle Canyon to the end of the road proved challenging as the area, according to locals, had received 9 rather than the normal 3 inches of rain.

Once at the road head we loaded our backpacks omitting the 2 plus gallons of water originally considered necessary. After a leisurely hike of about 4-1/2 hours we arrived at a well wooded virgin campsite at about 10,000 ft. elevation. While this spot proved convenient to all peaks it was several hundred feet above the nearest water--a roaring spring! We found ourselves just south of a canyon running up to the saddle between Montgomery and The Jumpoff.

Sun AM we left camp at 7:30 for a chute up a SE spur of Montgomery. Attaining Montgomery (never exceeding class 2), we made the standard but reverse traverse to Boundary. From Boundary, we descended a south chute, crossed or traversed above several canyon washes and arrived at our base camp about 5 PM. Simone was proud at having gotten her seventh desert emblem peak!

Mon AM saw Marty, Ken, and Mark leave camp when the first sunlight hit their sleeping bags. A slightly western variation of Wheelock's main route up to the Pellisier Flats was dictated by our base camp location. The trek south at 13,000 plus feet was windy, cold, but clear. Sadly, DuBois lacked a good register as opposed to Monty and Bdry. Ken left a register book in a plastic bag found with very recent signatures belonging to Pat and Bill T. Russell and Heusinkveld and Keating. Round trip from camp required six hours.

Two interesting sights were noted climbing DuBois--a new solar powered "repeater" off the summit, and a massive 10 ft. cairn (purpose unknown) located at the start of the plateau trek.

The writer is very appreciative of Doug Mantle's suggestions for the Middle Canyon camp location and the climbing route on Monty.


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