Highland Peak - pretty high land up there!

What's special about 10935 feet? Nothing really, except if you convert it to meters, you end up with the "pretty number" 3333. Well that's the height of Highland Peak, my goal for the day. This peak also has a pretty high prominence of 2456 ft, so the view up there is expected to be quite impressive. One more time, the prerequisites were very similar like for my last two hikes (one & two). I knew, I had to be a little faster though, because there where 5km more to walk and a few meters more to climb during the same time like I had last week. However, since I was in this area three times now, I knew pretty well what to expect and the only "unknown" on this hike was the climb from Noble Lake to Highland Peak and back down to the saddle towards Silver Peak. The rest was on well maintained trails and/or terrain which I've hiked before.

Starting at the Noble Creek trailhead instead of the PCT trailhead at Ebbetts Pass doesn't make a huge difference if you want to climb Highland Peak, both for distance and altitude gain. At Ebbetts Pass you start at a higher altitude, but when following the PCT to Noble Lake you drop down to Noble Creek as well and when returning back to Ebbetts Pass you need to hike almost 1000 feet uphill at the end again. I planned to do a south-north traverse of the peak, would end up closer to the Noble Creek trailhead and since I knew the way down from the Saddle between Silver - and Highland Peak already, this was the preferred choice for my starting point on this day.

Even though I was stopped by the Markleeville Sheriff on my drive to the trailhead, I get to it a little earlier than last week (or, the early arrival is part of the reason why the Sheriff stopped me ;-). I start hiking right away and get to the PCT and later Noble Lake in about 2 hours. After a short break I then walk to the upper (smaller) lake there and head towards the lowest point between Highland Peak and P. 9741. It's easiest a little below the base of the almost vertical drop from P. 9741 and then make a slight NE detour to get up the steep slope leading to the saddle. From here there is a good use trail along the southwest ridge which takes me to a few false summits before getting to the very top. All the technical difficulties can be avoided and the easiest route to the top is only a class II hike in my opinion.

From the first false summit at around10600ft, I follow the southeast side of the ridge along a pretty good use trail, which winds it's way between knee pines and then goes back to a little saddle in the ridge, about half way to the Highland South Peak (P. 10824). There I hike down to the base of the almost vertical drops northwest of the ridge and follow it to a minor saddle northwest of the south peak and from there to the top of it. This minor peak offers a nice view down to Bull Canyon and - Lake. In order to get to the higher and main north summit, I follow the ridge line down to the saddle (sometimes bypassing some drops left, sometimes right) and then some easy talus and boulder hopping all the way to the top.

The view up here is quite impressive all the way down the Carson Valley or in the south even some mountains in Yosemite National Park, more than 100km away. I enjoy the nice spot for quite a while before I head down to the saddle between Silver and Highland Peak. In order to get there (and avoid technical climbs) I do some sort of "slalom", sometimes left sometimes right of the ridge and where it's easy enough right on it. From the lowest point I walk down to the Noble Creek trail, pretty much the same way like last week (somewhat directer near the saddle) and then follow the trail back to the car.