Mount Price

Mount Price/Agassiz Peak Double

October 14th, 2013...chilly 7:40 am start (31 degrees).  My friend Fred and I hiked from the Lyon's Trailhead hoping to get 3 of the 5 peaks which are part of the Crystal Range Traverse.  On this day our access was off Highway 50....go 4 miles up Wright's Lake Road.... and you will see a turn off sign and parking area for Lyon's Trailhead .  This hike starts off fairly easy for the first 5 miles or so at which point the trails merge at a sign for Sylvia's Lake or Lyon's Lake....you head left to Lyon's Lake maybe another 1 mile or so...again fairly easy.  This is where the trail ends and you are left to climb up the slab rock, talus, and scree to the top....pretty difficult but probably only another mile to the peak of Mount Price.  We decided to then head over to Agassiz Peak....a very enticing and interesting looking peak which is fairly close...maybe another  1/2 mile...not so difficult.  From here you can see Pyramid Peak looming large to the southeast.  We decided to go for it.....it is probably less than a 1 mile away...but the going is very very difficult....thru huge refrigerator sized boulders/talus/scree and slow going.....after about 1 mile and over an hour....we decided the north face ascent was our best option (wrong)! We were probably only a 1/4 mile from the top...but.... Given the miles we had already put in and not wanting to finish up in the dark....we decided to save Pyramid Peak for another day and a to try a different approach from the south of Pyramid.  In all this hike took us over 9 hours and 15 miles (roundtrip). We headed down to Sylvia Lake.... then the 5 miles back.... on the nice easy trail to the car.  A very tough day of hiking and one of the most difficult in the Tahoe Basin if you are trying to get all 3 peaks from this route.  If we had been content to just do Mount Price and Agassiz the day would have still been a fairly difficult couple of summits.   If you try to do this route....just remember....no trails from Sylvia Lake or Lyon's Lake to any of these peaks!!  Good Luck....brings lots of water and nutritional food. Mount Price / Agassiz Peak ....Note: I have discovered the West Ridge access to Pyramid Peak from Slyvia's Lake since this posting which looks like some scrambling to a SE notch...and then apparently there is a trail along the west ridgeline to the top.  I will be trying that soon!