https://www.instagram.com/p/CADdsSnl6PFkvX3mkjhF4NYNbGZ4LoB15Q_p7w0/
Glass Mountains Traverse solo unsupported in a day!
30.3 miles, +7,717 ft, 13:17:33.
I love the Glass Mountains!! The whole ridge goes at Class 1, with 8 named summits. Mostly just walking on open sand and v small rocks, with a few neat sections of obsidian (where the name comes from). The whole time you get a great view of the Sierra crest, and often also the White mountains, the Owens River, and the Long Valley Caldera (one of the US’s three supervolcanoes!) It was extremely pleasant to spend a full day in motion again, something interesting and a little challenging but below my max ability levels so not dangerous.
I can’t find record of anyone doing this whole mountain range in a day, but it could also be the kinda thing a local did for training for something bigger and just didn’t think it was worth mentioning in its own regard. And of course the Nüümü/Paiute and Newe/Shoshone people spent (and continue to spend) a lot of time up here. I think this still counts as the Payahuunadü, the land of flowing water. I’m putting this route on the fkt site bc I think the Glass mountains are underrated and not currently a destination given they’re literally right across the street from the Sierra but I think they should get more love. This route would be an excellent first step for a hiker or runner who is looking to explore off trail travel where you get to navigate yourself, be up high all day in the mountains, and be self sufficient but without the nerves of navigating scrambling. Peter Croft says a ridge traverse is like being on a summit all day. So nice. I was not particularly fast but this route will go fast for sure and it’d be cool to see what other people do now that they know it’s an option so I wanna put it out there for others. :)
I did the route unsupported, previously dropping a water cache half way through and even camping near the finish and transporting myself from the end back to the start on my single speed mountain bike the next day (bike transport not included in time). You could do this route supported though by having friends camp at sawmill meadows and dayhike supplies up to you at glass mountain.
These are high desert mountains- do not count on any water being available on route. McLaughlin springs was a trickle early May 2020 but I wouldn’t count on it being year round. I ended up consuming 3L water and .5L tailwind. I saw many birds, many chipmunks, a ground squirrel, a hare, and no dangerous critters. Weather was perfect! Perfect!! The snow had melted just enough where I could mostly navigate around it without getting feet wet but it wasn’t hot enough yet to be debilitating, with a slight breeze just when I wanted it. Best time for this route is spring and fall. Summer gets really hot, winter it’ll be covered in snow.
Here’s my splits.
6:30 start
8:33 cone peak
9:37 Wilfred peak
10:38 Kelty peak
11:18 glass mtn ridge
12:06 glass mountain
12:51 glass mtn north
3:15 sentinal Meadows peak
(Got turned around in the forest and went backward on route for a while, adding time and distance, whoops, don’t do that)
6:40 marathon distance (lol @12 hr marathon)
7:50 bald mountain
If you look at the gpx closely you’ll see I got turned around at one point in the forest, so if you do the route yourself it will be ~28 miles total. Maps tend to show glass mountain north as glass mountain so don’t be confused by this - the higher DPS glass mountain is to the south, accurately reflected on Peakbagger. The high point of sentinal Meadows peak is just north of where indicated on the usgs maps too - you’ll find the register in a little ring of rocks under a large obsidian chunk.
Sports are still weirdly separated by binary gender but so ya know, bc I’m non-binary, both the men’s and women’s times are still up for grabs. Alone in the mountains is where I feel most like gender (and every other social construct) is irrelevant and has no bearing on my life. Get after it! (Covid disclosure: I mean get after it once it’s legal to travel in ca recreationally again that is. I suppose locals only for now. I could see the mountain I live at the bottom of on the route so I was still home, lucky in that regard. I didn’t encounter any other people on this whole trip, totally self contained, didn’t even need to visit gas station or grocery store, so definitely no virus spread.)
I made the finish right at sunset and it was magical! From the top I could see Mono Lake and Lake Crowley, both of which I ran around in a day in the past, and multiple mountains in the Sierra I’ve summited. It’s cool feeling like I’m becoming local, getting to closely know all of the land in this beautiful area where I live now. To look out at the Eastern Sierra and not see just MOUNTAINS but to know the name of each individual one and some of their unique characters, with much more to explore in the future. The idea for this route I just got last week in the Sierra, looking across long valley and thinking “I wonder if anyone has ever walked the whole glass mountains ridge in a day.” I’m grateful to now be where the mountains themselves inspire my endeavors.