Old Dad Mountain

4-Feb-67

By: Steve Smith

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In the heart of the Devil's Playground one must be prepared for sand and poor driving conditions. On a second and successful try, Bill Banks and I left Baker Sat morn on a good southwesterly road and drove about 9 miles. Here we turned off onto a badly washed out road that runs along the western side of the range (get out your maps). Bill drove across four large sandy washes but we spent three hours extricating our VW from the fifth one! Luckily the final one. An interesting and fast route can be made for climbing Old Dad can be utilized by driving a fair but passable dirt road to a mine area two miles north of the peak. It is possible to drive 1/2 mile past the mine and up a dry stream bed running along the eastern side of the range. Starting here, we followed one mi. of wash, and attained the ridge. The obvious hi-point is reached in i-1/2 hrs. An interesting item on the summit is a large X, constructed by flown-in NASA men for use as a reference point in making speed-time trials for the new F-112 jet fighter planes. Seems our peaks can't be left alone!


Detailed information for visiting one or more peaks mentioned in this article can be found in the
Desert Peak Section Road and Peak Guides

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