Meiklejohn Peak experience

Last year we stayed in Beatty on a trip to Death Valley and one of us spotted Meiklejohn Peak on a map or in a book. It's on the eastern side of Bare Mountain and is known for its large white butte (cue many stupid puerile jokes from me, along with remarkable restraint and some moderate and justifiable eye-rolling from others in the back seat of the rental car. You know who you are.)

However, seeing it on a map isn't quite climbing its gritty flanks, and of course, we wanted to check it out. (Actual mountain with our name! Obviously.) So on a recent trip to Beatty, we asked about it at the museum. Turns out the museum has a handsome antique pigeon hole cabinet full of photocopies about local spots of interest. And Meiklejohn Peak turns to be, among other things, a place where you can go and dig fossils out of a huge (nearly three hundred feet thick and a thousand feet long) ancient limestone outcrop (Ordovician, dontcha know.)

Tuff hills

We coaxed Harry into an off-road kind of mood and set off with the photocopy, a camera and curiosity. The photocopy had two rough maps which didn't quite agree with each other or the written directions. That makes it kind of fun though, you have to really pay attention to where you're going. Harry's previous owner fitted him out with a fancy aftermarket rear view mirror that includes a compass bearing of reasonable reliability - that helps, too.

Looking east towards Meiklejohn Peak

The road climbs into the hills, along a ridge beside a big wash. The hills here are vividly coloured ash and tuff. There's a turnoff a couple of miles in that heads south to the old Daisy fluorspar mine, one of Beatty's most long-working. Then the road diverts north around Bare Mountain itself, and at last another turn to the right takes you up the hill towards Meiklejohn Peak. Also towards the enticingly named Secret Pass. (Also towards a microwave tower installation. Ho-hum.) The road forks a little way in - the Secret Pass road was not so Pass-able for a 2WD passenger car, and the microwave tower road was so steep it's a shame not to go ahead and call it precipitous. So we parked the car and got out for a walk.

Road to Secret Pass

I'm guessing we were at about 4000 or 4500 ft? A good thousand feet or more of mountain towered above, but it was high enough for the breeze to be cool, though the sun was hot. We walked maybe quarter of a mile up the road, to where we could look down the curve of Secret Pass. The road drops steeply away around Meiklejohn Peak to the southeast - the best fossil hunting is said to be round that side of the mountain. Maybe five miles out of Beatty, and you're in the back of beyond, give or take the comms tower. The Secret Pass is high on my list for 4WD exploring. It leads down to Specie Spring (great name ...) and more back of beyond as well as the mud mounds. Camping is allowed up here, too.

If we'd followed the road further, rather than turning off to the mountain in question, we would come to the ghost town of Telluride. Like its more famous Colorado cousin, named for the gold-bearing mineral found there. Another trip for another day.

Dear little burros and burrito. I think their ears are watching me.

When I say we walked, this grossly overstates our net speed, because the road is not just scattered with but actually made of rocks in astounding profusion of variety. We kept stopping to pick up glittery or peculiar bits. There's a big outcrop of shale, as well as the limestone - including zebra limestone, which with its lines of dark and pale stripes is a strange and wonderful thing to behold. Then, too, igneous rocks of many shapes and patterns. Just as well, really, that we had no tools for digging. We would have been all day ... And next time, we will.

Bye burros, we'll be back.