Wheeler Pass, Nevada GPS: N36° 28' 11" W115° 45' 41" (WGS 84) May 13, 2001 home: page 1   Wheeler Pass is about 50 miles North of Las Vegas, NV in the Spring Mountains. The pass was once used as a logging road over the Spring Mountains to Pahrump, Nevada. The road is now used for 4x4 recreation, horse back riding, and camping. Our goal for the day was to ride over Wheeler Pass to the old Charcoal Kilns on the Pahrump side of the Spring Mountains. The drive to the area takes about 1 hour and 15 minutes from Las Vegas. To get there, drive North on US 95 for 36 miles (48 minutes) to the Indian Springs Prison. Turn left at the sign for Cold Creek then drive West about 13 miles (23 minutes) until you reach a designated parking area near a couple small springs. The road to Wheeler Pass runs past the parking area and follows several dry washes before heading to the pass. Our ride started near the small community of Cold Creek, Nevada. From here you can see Wheeler Pass in the V-notch on the right side of the picture. Willow Peak is the snow capped peak located in the middle of the picture. As we continued toward Wheeler Pass, the road meandered around hillsides and into washes along the foothills of the spring mountains. The road conditions to the pass varied from smooth to rocky in places. Here Ed and I took a trail break at a small camping spot along the road. The forest here is comprises mostly of Juniper and Pinion Pine with the occasional Ponderosa Pine. Back on the road, we followed the road up several more switch backs where the road began to significantly increase in elevation. Here we are taking another break at the summit of Wheeler pass. GPS: N36° 23' 32" W115° 47' 46" (WGS 84) At the summit of Wheeler pass, we were treated with a nice view of the valley below and road we just traveled. When we continued over the pass to the back side of the Spring Mountains the road continued to the Southwest. The road conditions on this side were also very smooth. Unfortunately the weather wasn't cooperating, and a thunderstorm started forming in our direction of travel. Soon after this picture was taken it started to rain and hail, but we continued anyway. After continuing west several miles past the summit, we finally made it to the old Charcoal Kilns. The four bee-hived shaped charcoal kilns were built in the 1875 to bake wood into charcoal for the mine smelter at Tecopa, some 60 miles away near Death Valley. Charcaol was made by cutting the wood from the pinyon and juniper forests on the mountains. Then, the wood is stacked the inside the ovens in such a way that high-quality charcoal would be made. The wood was then baked for several days, cooled and packed in bags. Unfortunately the rain started to come down harder, so only after a minute we headed back calling it a day. GPS: N36° 21' 45" W115° 49' 43" (WGS 84) home: page 1 Contact the author at speleo@intermind.net Photographs and information in this website may be copied or distributed for personal use only. For other uses, express permision by the author must be given. Use of appropriate photo credits requested.