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| Hiking | 4.25 Miles |
1,700 AEG |
| | Hiking | 4.25 Miles | 2 Hrs 35 Mns | | 1.65 mph |
| 1,700 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | After Sugarloaf near Bullhead City, I was up for some more off trail fun so paid a visit to Bull Mountain in Kingman. I parked at the end of Camelback, where the pavement ends and the mine road begins. I wouldn’t call it passable in a non-clearance vehicle; it was in pretty rough shape. I walked up the mine road for a little less than 20 minutes, or approximately one mile. You pass some old mine sites and reach an area with a rock outcropping to your right, just before the road starts to dip. Nice views of Kingman from this vantage point at approximately 4,000 feet. This is where I started off road, heading for the nearest chute drainage, which would be my access to the top. There was some semblance of a pathway here and there for the first third of the climb until the drainage becomes more defined and eventually turns into a chute. Once in the drainage, I just kept going up, shooting for a saddle of sorts between two rock outcroppings, which was near the top of the plateau/butte/massif/whatever this is called. I did pass what I believed to be a cairn about halfway up, but that was the only one I saw on the ascent. It took me less than a half an hour to reach the saddle upon leaving the mine road, so not too bad. Probably a little over a thousand foot climb from the road to here. From this vantage point, I could now see that the north slope of the mountain still had a good amount of snow on it.
Once in the rocky areas near the top, I saw that this would now require some scrambling and climbing. I climbed up a couple sections, just trying to keep getting higher. Hit a point where I had to downclimb to keep getting higher, so I retreated back down to the nearest drainage, which had a nice chute to go up. Went up this chute and after a few short uphill scrambles to head east, this put me on top. I am unsure what the spot elevation is, but I can make out a 5300 contour on the topo, so presumably something above that, but below 5400. I walked over to the south edge, which appeared to be the high point. The area at the top is quite expansive and probably a mile from east to west. I started heading to the west end, but after a few minutes, I decided to turn back as it was starting to get later in the day. Exploration would be better left for a future visit.
I headed down the chute I took for the last 100 feet or so on the ascent and decided to just stay in that instead of retracing my now confusing steps. The downhill was much more slow going than the ascent. Tons of loose rock, scree, you name it. It was a good thing I was the only one out there as I was sending rocks flying all over the place. At one point, I dislodged a huge 100+ pound small boulder and it went tumbling down the chute. It eventually rested about 100 yards further down. You really do have to be cautious on every rock you step on, even the big ones, as most of those were not stable. In one area I could hear movement beneath the large rock that I had just stepped on. If you do hike this with someone, I would highly encourage being side to side. On this chute, I spotted two cairns along the way. I eventually made it back to the mine road and to my vehicle with no incident.
This is a very fun little mountain and there are doubtless numerous ways to the top. No risk of getting lost because the mine road is always in plain sight. I will be back to explore this again. |
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