There is a decision to make as you start northward toward the peak. Do you cross over to the left (west) side of the valley, or do you stay on the right (east) side?

Cross over to the left and you have a reasonable route across the lower part of the valley and along a western ridge leading up to King’s Crown Peak. Stay on the right and it’s easy to get too high. You either have to dip way down through the valley or continue walking the eastern ridge, which soon leads to peak 5083, a rugged butte crowned with jagged truck-sized boulders.

So we stayed on the right and walked the eastern ridge.

After boulder-scrambling to the top of peak 5083, we had to scramble back down to the saddle north of it.

King's Crown Peak and Silverado Ridge from peak 5083.

The view from the top.

We were watching them climb the ridge northeast of King’s Crown Peak as Tom, Chuck and I got under way. This wasn’t our planned return route, but I knew that the mine road was way down below on the other side of the ridge. To get to the ridge from where we were, we had to climb above a big thicket of manzanita. Finally we made it up to the ridge, just north of peak 5121.

Then we got the full blast of the wind! It almost blew us down. The day had warmed up to the high 40s, but nothing could have prepared us for the wind coming over that ridge.

We also had a big manzanita thicket below us, and no way go get around it. So we bushwhacked. The good part is that you can slip without falling. If the wind doesn’t keep you from falling, the branches will catch you. The bad part is that the branches are an enormous drag on your feet. It is really tiring to have to fight your way through them.

The going got easier when we were through the thicket. But it didn’t last. We soon came to the canyon that flows east between peaks 5083 and 5121. It’s full of brush.

We tried to get above the brush by climbing up on one side of the canyon or the other, but to no avail. So we bushwhacked right down the middle, with Ted in the lead serving as bulldozer. Finally we came to a tiny waterfall, which we had to go around. The ground was clear of brush on the north side! We stayed the course, and soon found ourselves on the mine road.

Then an angel appeared. Actually it was Anatoli, who had brought Peter with him and driven down the mine road to look for us after they walked back to Oak Flat. The road was smooth, the wind had calmed somewhat, and the afternoon warmed up to 50°, but it didn’t take us a millisecond to decide to ride with Anatoli and Peter back to the trailhead.

Finally, let me accentuate the positives about our hike to King’s Crown Peak:
•  3 of the 7 hikers – Anatoli, Tom, and Peter – enjoyed the lovely view from the top.
•  The air was clean.
•  No one had heat exhaustion.