Dogtooth Peak 2003

Wilderness: Dinkey Lakes Wilderness
Trail System: Cliff Lake Trail
Latitude: 37.0915
Longitude: -119.0222
Elevation: 10,254 feet

Day 1 – Hike in and fish the lake
Cliff Lake and Dogtooth Peak can be reached from the Cliff Lake trail head located at the back end of Courtright Reservoir. This trip, we will base camp at Cliff Lake while visiting the surrounding areas. The trail is not very hard and we reach the lake in a decent amount of time. The trail from Courtright to Cliff Lake is about 3 miles long. Once there, we spend most of the day fishing until sun sets.

Day 2 – Climb the peak
We spent the second day climbing Dogtooth Peak. It gets it’s name for the tooth like shapes sticking up from the top and has a nice view of the Courtright Reservoir and the valley hosting the Dusy/Ershim Trail. There are also tons of beautiful black quartz crystals laying around if you have the time to scavenge the back side of Dogtooth Peak. After Climbing Dogtooth, we decide to cross-country down the mountain to Bullfrog Lake before heading back to camp.

Day 3 – Hike Out
This was one of my least favorite places to visit. Although some of the sites were beautiful, it just didn’t have that backcountry feel to it. I highly recommend this trail for single-day hikes or a quick one-nighter.