Starting tomorrow at 7 in the morning, The Nevada Department of Transportation will be restricting access on State Route 158. NDOT will be test blasting the area to make way for an excavating project to lengthen and add a new overlook to the trail along State Route 158. The lane restrictions will remain in effect until 7 p.m. Thursday.
The lane restrictions will resume next week starting Monday and ending on Thursday. The expansion project should be completed by November.
The annual Mount Charleston Arts and Crafts Fair is coming up. It will be held August 11th and 12th from 10-4 at the Resort on Mount Charleston. There will be over 35 local vendors, barbecue, music on Sunday, and more! As of now the weather forecast looks good, but rain or shine, the event will not be cancelled.
For more details you can check out their website here.
On Saturday, August 4, the Las Vegas Ski and Snowboard Resort will be hosting the 21st annual “Festival in the Pines” from 10:00 am-4:00 pm. The event brings together groups that educate and promote outdoor recreation in the Spring Mountains. There will be food, music, booths of arts and crafts, sessions about activities in the SMNRA, and plenty of cool mountain air.
The cost of the event is $3 per person or $5 per family. Dogs are welcome but they must remain on a leash.
If you are interested in participating or to get details on a booth, please contact:
Patricia Scaggs
p: 702-340-5243
e: pscaggs702@hotmail.com
Another very large marijuana grow operation was shut down on Wednesday. The DEA was involved in the bust after getting a tip from a hiker. The operation took place on the back side of Mount Charleston. Aproximately 11,000 plants were seized with a street value of over $16 million!
If this sounds familiar, it is probaly because over 50,000 marijuana plants were seized from the mountain last year.
Explore the Spring Mountains National Recreation Area with free interpretive hikes.
A night hike discussing wildlife adaptations after dark is planned for 8 p.m. each Friday, beginning at the McWilliams Campground host site.
A Junior Ranger program to test youngsters’ hiking and fire-safety knowledge and expand stewardship and research skills is set for 1 p.m. Aug. 4 at the Spring Mountains Visitor Center.
Guided hikes through the Lower Bristlecone area and the Fletcher Canyon Trail are planned for 10 a.m. Sunday and Aug. 4 at the Spring Mountains Visitor Center.
Campfire programs are planned for 8 p.m. each Saturday at the Hilltop Campground. Due to limited parking, the program is recommended for campground guests only.
The programs are made possible through a partnership between the U.S. Forest Service, the Basin Institute, and the Southern Nevada Conservancy.
For more information, call the Visitor’s Center at 702-872-5486
Source: LVRJ
Mount Charleston will be receiving a $90 million renovation over the next few years. When completed in May of 2015, a new visitors center will have been built and three campgrounds along with 4 picnic areas will have been renovated. Two of the current campgrounds, Kyle Canyon and Old Mill will have been converted to picnic areas. The Fletcher View and Hilltop campgrounds will not be affected by construction.
As of today, construction will start at the Kyle Canyon Campground which by next year will be a picnic area only due to new legislation regarding flood areas. Other campgrounds will be renovated and enlarged as well which should make up for the campground space being lost.
The new visitor’s center will be the focal point of the project. It will be 4,300 square feet, cost around $10 million when completed, and will be located along Kyle Canyon Road. The current visitor center is located miles inside the recreation area and is more like a set of dilapidated wooden buildings. Due to the location of the current visitor’s center, most people that drive to the Mount Charleston area don’t even see or visit it.
As a result of the size of these projects and current roads, construction traffic will be inevitable. As new stories or road closures happen I will be sure to post about it.