Day 1 of 2025 Labor Day Trip to California, Sawtooth Peak

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The first day of my 2025 Labor Day trip to California. I climbed Sawtooth Peak, an imposing and picturesque peak in Sequoia National Park.

Sawtooth Peak from Sawtooth Pass

Sawtooth Peak stood as one of Sequoia National Park’s most singularly distinctive summits, revealing dramatically different characters depending on one’s perspective: its western face appeared inconspicuous, its eastern aspect unexceptional, yet when viewed from the north via Sawtooth Pass, its sharp summit emerged as a triumphant crescendo—the culminating note after a wild traverse through an agitato fantasia of ridgeline that captivated me at first sight online. Fortunately, Sequoia’s proximity to Yosemite meant I could readily attempt this climb before tackling Half Dome later in the week.

While planning this trip, I had allocated two days for Sequoia National Park. Ideally, I would explore the park’s more popular attractions, such as Moro Rock, Grant Forest, on Sunday August 31st, treating it as a warm-up for my attempt at Sawtooth Peak the following day, Monday, September 1st. Unfortunately, a weather system over Dallas severely disrupted my flights to California, and I only landed in Fresno on the morning of the 31st. Compounding matters, my checked bags were sent to the wrong airport, forcing me to spend time later that day buying clothes and supplies. This left me with only a single day for Sequoia National Park.
It was Labor Day weekend, and I was joined by a friend from the San Francisco Bay Area who had been equally drawn to Sawtooth Peak’s commanding presence, who ~~insisted~~ suggested that despite our lack of proper acclimatization, we should still attempt the peak with our one remaining day in the park.

So on the morning of September 1, with me dressed entirely in Walmart clothes, we set out for Mineral King, where the trailhead for Sawtooth Peak was.
Mineral King was a very remote area of Sequoia National Park, the 24.5-mile access road from Highway 198 consumed us an hour and 45 minutes. The route was mostly paved but in deplorable condition, marred by countless lateral corrugations. (I suspected these undulations were the work of tree roots burrowing beneath the pavement, gradually warping the surface above.)

As a sidenote, my camera was in my checked bags that were sent to the wrong airport, so all photos in this post were taken with my cell phone.

Parking Lot at Mineral King
Very full by the time of our arrival.

After some warmup, we started our hike just past 9am. Here’s GPS tracking:

(to accommodate my friend, I went slower than my typical pace, mostly between Monarch Lakes and Sawtooth Peak during ascent)

The first 7.3km (4.5mi) of trail to (Lower) Monarch Lake offered a leisurely walk through predominantly low-lying scrub. At several points along the way, the path opened onto sweeping views of the parking lot below and the East Fork Kaweah River valley, from which the long and bumpy Mineral King Road came from. The trail was in good condition throughout this section, and we reached (Lower) Monarch Lake after a comfortable 2.4-hour trek, where we paused briefly for a short rest.

Trail
Looking Back at Parking Lot
The small hill in the background was called “Miners Nose”.
First Sight of Sawtooth Peak
Monarch Creek
Valley
Where Mineral King Road came from.
Tree Grown on Rocks
Giant Mushroom

Trail
Mountains to the South
Mountain
An unnamed but colorful one.
Hills
Across Monarch Creek, Empire Mountain didn’t look that impressive in the background left.
Trail
Monarch Creek
Trail
Sawtooth Peak in the background.
Mineral Peak

On the map, it seemed that we could reach Sawtooth Pass via a different trail through Glacier Pass, one that remained on the other side of Monarch Creek throughout. We didn’t choose that path for lack of information.

Monarch Lake

Upon leaving Monarch Lake, the trail soon vanished into a vast field of scree—an unstable expanse that demanded considerable effort, as each step forward was often accompanied by a half-step slide backward. Faint traces of a path could occasionally be discerned among the loose stones, but more often than not, we found ourselves picking our way upward along whatever route offered the least resistance. Two “paths” existed on the map between Monarch Lake and Sawtooth Pass; we largely followed the longer one, as its gentler gradient made for a far easier ascent. The unstable footing combined with the elevation took quite a toll on my friend, who took about an hour and 40 minutes to reach Sawtooth Pass from the lake below.

Trail
Valley
A rich palette of colors, where Monarch Creek flew through.
Trail from Monarch Lakes
Trail from Monarch Lakes
Trail from Monarch Lakes
Trail from Monarch Lakes
Empire Mountain
Mountains to the Southwest
Mountains
Mineral Peak in the right, an unnamed one in the left.

Finally, Sawtooth Pass greeted me with the imposing silhouette of Sawtooth Peak, together with the serrated ridgeline ascending towards the summit-a magnificent sight now rendered authentic and breathtaking in person.
The pass bustled with hikers, most heading east into the deeper reaches of the Sierra Nevada. We appeared to be the only party that afternoon bound for Sawtooth Peak itself. After a brief rest, we continued on our way.

Sawtooth Peak
Sawtooth Peak
Columbine Lake and Sawtooth Peak
Columbine Lake
Needham Mountain

Here’s a video that I took at Sawtooth Pass:

13 seconds, 2160p60fps, H265 only, 20Mbps/35MB file size.

Departing Sawtooth Pass, we were caught somewhat off guard by the absence of any obvious trail toward Sawtooth Peak—we hadn’t downloaded an offline map beforehand. A few cairns dotted the route, though I didn’t find them super helpful. Initially, I attempted to follow the ridgeline, but it soon grew too exposed, forcing me to veer slightly away. The optimal degree of deviation was uncertain to me. I discovered that, generally, straying farther from the ridge meant encountering more scree than boulders: while some boulders proved difficult to scale, those that could be scaled offered more stable passage than the loose scree.
The route was officially rated YDS class 2, but I nonetheless executed one or two moves that were class 3. Perhaps our time constraints prevented us from scouting easier alternatives—a luxury denied without offline maps. Luckily, I felt that the terrain allowed for some variations in routing, sparing us from anything overly technical.

Boulders along Path to Sawtooth Peak
Sawtooth Peak
Boulders along Path to Sawtooth Peak
A bit hard to tell where the correct path was.
Boulders along Path to Sawtooth Peak
A bit hard to tell where the correct path was.
Trail to Sawtooth Peak
Overlooking Monarch Lakes
Mountains to the South
Valley
Where we came from following Mineral King Road.

In the end, it took me an hour and 10 minutes to reach Sawtooth Peak from Sawtooth Pass (a bit longer than I had hoped). The (small platform off, see slideshow below) summit offered magnificent panoramic views, the most striking of which lay to the north: the serrated ridgeline from Sawtooth Pass, and the equally jagged Kaweah Peaks that dominated the horizon.

Top of Sawtooth Peak
On top of this rock, too small for me to get on.
Top of Sawtooth Peak
On top of this rock, too small for me to get on.
Boulder on Sawtooth Peak
Slightly lower than its highest point, but large enough for us to rest our legs.

Ridge to Sawtooth Peak
Ridge to Sawtooth Peak
Mountains to the North

Columbine Lake in the lower-right, mountains of Great Western Divide in the center before Kaweah Peaks Ridge in the background right.
Mountains of Great Western Divide
A faint trail visible onto Black Rock Pass.
Kaweah Peaks
Mountains to the Northwest

I had been treated to a preview of many nearby mountains during the previous day’s flight to Fresno, delightfully, that included Mt. Whitney, the highest peak in the lower 48, which stood with surprising humility on the eastern horizon. My friend was equally captivated by the abundance of alpine lakes scattered throughout the landscape, their presence offering a welcomed variation to the otherwise harsh rocky terrain.

Mountains to the East
Mt Whitney, the highest mountain in US’s lower 48, in the background left.
Needham Mountain
Mountains to the Southeast
Amphitheater Lake
Mountains to the South
Along Great Western Divide.
Summit Marker
Emm, someone swapped that with one from Grand Canyon.

View around Sawtooth Peak

Here’s a video around Sawtooth Peak:

13 seconds, 2160p60fps, H265 only, 20Mbps/34MB file size.

We stayed at Sawtooth Peak for about 35 minutes before starting our descent at 3:20pm, a bit short on time since there was only 4 hours of daylight left.

While descending towards Sawtooth Pass, I took a slightly different route that was more to the west, in more scree territory. Emm, I didn’t like that.

Fortunately, descending through the scree field between Sawtooth Pass and Monarch Lake was much easier than climbing through it. After reaching Monarch Lake, we quickened our pace considerably compared to the ascent.

Trail from Monarch Lakes
Trail
Trail
Deer
The only animal encounter of the day.
Monarch Creek Gorge
Returning to Trailhead Parking

In the end, we got back to the parking lot at 7:55pm just as civil twilight was ending, concluding the entire hike in just under 11 hours.
And it was followed by another not-so-pleasant ride through the bumpy Mineral King Road back.
END

Day 1 of 2025 Labor Day Trip to California, Sawtooth Peak by Huang's Site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Category: Hiking, September 2025, Sierra Nevada, Travel Tags: Sequoia National Park

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Day 1 of 2025 Labor Day Trip to California, Sawtooth Peak

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