Courtright Reservoir is a favorite annual trip of mine, and I've now been
going for the July 4th holiday (with the Southern California Mountaineers'
Association [SCMA]) for five or six year now. I've climbed scores of routes on
Penstemon, Trapper, Power, and Marmot Domes, but for some reason (alcoholic
nights?) I still hadn't been on some of the other domes that are more remote.
As more of an alpine climber who enjoys pushing the limits of my endurance
during very long days, Dogtooth Peak has long remained an object of my
attention. Most Courtright Reservoir climbers have never heard of it, let
alone even seen it. Lending it an even more obscure flavor, I hadn't heard of
anyone in the SCMA having climbed it, and there exists only one route topo in
Greg Vernon's Sequoia/King's Canyon guide. Old trooper and FA-nabber Fred
Beckey was reported to have done a line on it, but damned if there's a topo of
it or any good idea where the climb goes or what it does. With these things in
mind - mixed with one long approach - this was starting to sound like my ideal
of a good adventure climb in the Sierra.

Shauna and I had decided that our second day (Saturday) at Courtright would be
the day of our climb. This unfortunately precluded us from directly partaking
in one of the most massive drunken and stupefied campfire shindigs reportedly
ever held by the SCMA (Friday night, July 4th). I say directly partaking, as
the door of our tent was a mere ten feet from the drunken blabbering and
mindless alcohol-induced drivel taking place around the fire. Gerry's drum
team was beating a continuous trance, while inebriated and senseless club
members danced like islanders around the fire - all the while sharing (perhaps
inaccurate) stories of Native Americans and singing patriotic songs replete
with missing verses. As I tried so desperately to sleep before our 5 a.m.
alpine start, I could only mutter to Shauna how stupid and inconsiderate my
fellow club members were in such oblivious states of insobriety. Naturally, it
led me to question who exactly the stupid one was. While our friends were
reveling in perhaps the biggest and finest SCMA celebration ever - imbibing
Greg Steven's Buffalo Milk's, Gerry Cox's margaritas, and John Gonzales' 'Bug
Juice' - like idiots we were trying to get beauty rest for an alpine climb.
Whose dumb idea was this, anyway?

Throughout the night I kept reawakening to continuous noise, yet with a
declining crowd. Finally, the last tired and weakened voices I heard were
coming from Greg Stevens and Fred Class. When some witnesses later told me
that these two Brethren of the Distilled Juice were still possibly around the
fire just prior to our awakening, I was surprised that we hadn't awoken to
find them arm-in-arm while blurting forth emotional stanzas of Purple Mountain
Majesties.

Dave German and Judy Rittenhouse - always patriots of wildly conceived plans
(like mine to climb Dogtooth camp-to-camp) - quite willingly agreed to visit
Dogtooth with Shauna and me. Dave willingly agreed, anyway. I'm not so sure
Judy even knew what was in store for her. Then again, I try to keep such
detailed trip information from Shauna as well, lest I give her opportunities
to back out based on mileage or climbing difficulty.

At 6 a.m., Dave and Judy promptly arrived at Party Central Camp, and we
shortly thereafter commenced with the Long Walk. After about one mile on the
trail, the one and only view of Dogtooth Peak that we'd have came before us.
We could only acknowledge that indeed it was there, and that it might be a lot
walking to get there. Walking never hurt anyone.

Being that the trail follows Nelson Creek and other creeks for most of the
approach, we quickly and unanimously agreed that the mosquitoes were a bit of
a problem; DEET is good (I have never encountered a worse mosquito situation
in the Sierra than in the Courtright region, year-after-year). Although quite
beautiful, the biggest problem that the trail presents for the approaching
climber is the inability to see much more than trees for the whole distance
(not that there is anything wrong with trees). I had roughly planned that we
would approach Cliff Lake as near as we could, and then when we could see
Dogtooth, we would cross-country to reach its base. The problem was that we
were at Cliff Lake before we ever saw the peak.

Cliff Lake was a good opportunity for us to refill water bottles and scout the
rest of the approach to the peak, which we were clearly on the west side of,
and our intended climbs were on the east side. Cross-country travel from Cliff
Lake was thankfully very easy, passing by the diminutive Bullfrog Lake and
then finally onto the open slabs on the south flank of Dogtooth. We proceeded
quickly across the slabs, slowly gaining elevation to the foot of the east
flank, and then finally dropping our packs to find our individual lines.

In a nutshell, there's not much beta to give about what we climbed. I assume
that we mostly made first ascents of new lines, although we didn't draw topos
(it's all mostly slab with indistinctive features), and we didn't ever find
any of the features on the Moser/Vernon/Hickey topo but the distinctive and
large crystal 'plug' about one third of the way up. There were also an untold
number of interesting pockets of smoky quartz on route and scattered at the
base of the peak. Although I don't really remember specifics of the climb, we
3rd-classed (roped with running belays) the majority of it, and only belayed
about two pitches of 5.7+ at the top. Our line ran directly to the summit, and
the last moves popped us directly onto the summit proper. We spent a
considerable amount of time basking in the superb weather and enjoying lunch
while taking in grand views of perhaps more than 100+ miles of Sierra
high-country to the east.

Our descent had a couple of easy albeit exposed 3rd class moves, while the
remainder was relatively uneventful, back through Cliff Lake and then down
into the mosquito-hell of the trees.

I cannot recommend a climb of the northeast flank of Dogtooth Peak if you're a
lazy no-approach pure rock climber looking for a hard technical challenge, but
if you enjoy rambling alpine adventures, testing your footwear, donating
blood, and taking in grand views of the Sierra, I highly recommend it. Take a
rest day from the clip-up's of Power Dome or Trapper Springs and go for a walk
on the wild side of Courtright.