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Apr 26, 2022 — Juniper Peak is a minor unranked summit within Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area with excellent views toward the sheer face of Rainbow Wall and gorgeous dome of Bridge Mountain. Reaching Juniper Peak is only Class 3, but this route traverses from Juniper Peak across its southwestern ridge over to Gunsight Notch Peak, pushing the class rating to 5 due to a difficult section at around the halfway point. Most will likely prefer to do Juniper Peak as an out-and-back, but it's a short detour to attempt the traverse if you're so inclined. Just a little note that halfway through my trip report photos you'll notice a change in hiking companion and lighting going from 2022 to 2017 since I'd already documented the second half of the hike on a previous outing.
I've linked the trailhead coordinates above to just outside the exit of the Red Rock Canyon scenic drive at a large parking area, which is where we parked. Starting here means you don't have to drive the loop or deal with entering the park to do this hike. However, it does add about 2 easy miles of desert walking round-trip. Alternatively, you could park at the Oak Creek Trailhead here (36.1109, -115.46616) which gets you a bit closer, but requires driving the scenic drive. You could also park at the Pine Creek Canyon Trailhead for a comparable distance.
After hiking along well-maintained trails through the desert and reaching the Oak Creek Trailhead, we picked up the Arnight Trail and took this toward the mouth of Juniper Canyon where the trail became much more difficult to follow. There's a web of social trails everywhere. I recommend sticking close to the northern bank of Juniper Canyon and follow whatever trails seem most well-trodden before dropping into the drainage at roughly the 4600' contour line. Once within Juniper Canyon, there's some fun Class 2/3 on massive boulder obstacles typical for the canyons of Red Rock. The boulder-hopping only lasts for a few hundred feet before a heavily eroded trail leads out of the canyon drainage and steeply along the southern side of Juniper Canyon. The trail then drops back into the drainage and up to a small talus field that lies at the base of Juniper Peak's sheer southern face. Technical climbers may know this wall as Brownstone Wall.
Cairns mark the way up the boulder field and onto a wide slab of slickrock sandstone. Keeping pretty close to the wall to avoid larger cliffs (Class 4/5 scrambling), the cairned route took us north as it led away from Juniper Canyon. As the extended sandstone slab faded away, the route reached the west ridge of Juniper Peak and then led west, taking us up Juniper Peak's east ridge.
After a few hundred feet of ascending the east ridge, we got to an incredible overlook toward Bridge Mountain to the north, and cairns led south on some large ledgy boulders, nothing exceeding Class 3. Just below the summit, there's a pull move (Class 4) or a rabbit hole (Class 3) to crawl through to get to the top. After hanging out on the summit we continued southwest with the goal being to reach Gunsight Notch Peak. On our first run at this traverse in 2017 we didn't know anything about this ridge, except that some folks do the traverse in reverse (coming from Gunsight Notch Peak over to Juniper Peak), but we figured we could try to locate a route in this direction.
A few hundred feet along the ridge introduced some Class 3 on large boulders, a short squeeze through a crack, and a lightly exposed and short wannabe knife-edge. We neared the saddle separating the two peaks, which is where we found the crux. Above we could see webbing around a boulder for where the rappel would be done if coming from Gunsight Notch Peak. Keeping just to the right of the ridge, a few Class 3/4 moves took us up to a wide ledge and a big crack. The crack would serve as a Class 5 section of moves without much exposure. There's a ledge with a massive drop behind, but the climb is far enough away from the edge that a fall would likely not be fatal. On our first go at this traverse I was able to find a slightly easier option just next to the crack, but on the second visit I was oddly unable to locate that spot again.
Once past the crux, the going was easier to the summit of Gunsight Notch Peak. From its summit we dropped to the left (south) into Gunsight Notch, a long gully that drops steeply back into Juniper Canyon. This section included plenty of fun stemming, Class 3 moves, and a fixed line aiding in a tougher spot (Class 3/4 without the line aid). Once the gully opened up, we followed a very good social trail down into Juniper Canyon. Note that if you're bushwhacking through the Gunsight Notch gully, you went the wrong way.
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