People seeking shelter from sweltering Las Vegas days may find no better ally than Great Basin National Park with temperatures cool enough to support the state’s sole glacier.
Getting close to Wheeler Peak glacier and the picturesque cirque it calls home means about a five-hour drive northeast in the general direction of Ely. Such a mission also requires a 5-mile, moderately challenging, round-trip hike over quite a lot of rocky terrain (moraine in glacier-speak).
If trekking to a glacier is not your thing, there are several other ways to take a break from the heat and get some exercise in Nevada’s only national park. Options include the flatter path of Alpine Lakes Loop, the less-rocky route to a bristlecone grove or a guided underground tour of Lehman Caves. The best approach would be to pack in all of the above during an extended weekend.
Driving to 10,000 feet
Topping my priority list was Great Basin’s Glacier Trail. Who would believe glacial ice lies secretly underneath rocks in the driest state in the nation? Yet I heard its gurgling echo under my feet in late July 2025 and saw shrinking slivers of compacted snow around the rock glacier.
After entering the park, our adventure began with a trip up the precipitous-in-parts Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive, where roadside markers let drivers know every time they’ve added another 1,000 vertical feet. The road reaches 10,000 feet above sea level, making it the tallest paved road in Nevada.
We made a stop at Mather Overlook, where an informational panel shows the extensive coverage of glaciers past. The vantage point provides a good present-day look at Wheeler Peak, which measures as Nevada’s second-highest mountain at 13,063 feet.
Where the scenic drive ends is where popular trails begin at Bristlecone parking lot. Across the way and in an opening in the forest, a large National Park Service map shares important information and shows the directions that lead to Glacier Trail (an extension of Bristlecone Trail) and Alpine Lakes Loop.
From this trailhead, the way to Bristlecone and Glacier trails starts out flat and easy with views of Lehman Creek among pines and firs. Wildflowers, birds and butterflies are common summer sights in this verdant area.
Whimsical, ancient trees
After a wooden bridge crossing and about a half-mile from Bristlecone trailhead, there’s a signed junction that points left toward the Bristlecone-Glacier Trail. Hiking to Wheeler Peak glacier means passing through a remarkable stand of thousands-of-years-old bristlecone pines, among the oldest trees on Earth.
Taking a break to explore the grove on the way up to or back down from Wheeler Peak glacier is a must. The gnarly, whimsical shapes of the bristlecones complement the admirable survival story of 4,000-year-old trees, as told by informational panels.
For some hikers, the bristlecone grove is their endpoint. Turning around there, rather than continuing to the Wheeler Peak glacier, makes the hike about a 3-mile round trip. It’s considered moderately challenging in part because of steep ascents in a zone that’s 10,000 feet above sea level, where the atmosphere provides less oxygen.
For many, stopping to catch their breath is a necessity. Sturdy walking shoes, extra water, snacks and sunscreen are essentials on the Bristlecone and Glacier trails. Weather awareness is also critical because getting soaked by a summer storm at 10,500 feet could cause hypothermia.
Hikers who continue past the bristlecone grove toward Wheeler Peak glacier soon are spending more trail time with tall, skinny Engelmann spruce as well as alpine flowers. From the parking lot, glacier seekers travel about 2½ miles one way and gain about 1,100 vertical feet, ultimately putting them near 11,000 feet above sea level.
Otherworldly experience
Soon wider views open up of the Wheeler Peak cirque and surrounding ice-sculpted ridgeline, and there’s plenty of rocky evidence to illustrate the bulldozing power of glaciers. The National Park Service trail is manageably rocky, but the lateral walls and floor of the canyon look like paths of demolition and destruction. Thousands of years ago, a river of ice covered the area, and the glacier’s retreat left behind millions of varying-sized rock chunks and shards seen today.
There’s not much compacted snow still hanging in north face crevices or remaining at the base of Wheeler Peak, but slivers were still seen lining the sides of a rock mound covering invisible glacial ice last summer. Scientists expect the glacier may disappear as soon as 20 years from now. Some of last year’s snow was near the trail, but the park service encourages hikers to stick to the trail to protect a sensitive environment and to avoid getting injured in an unstable field of often jagged rocks.
As the challenging and unforgettable trek continued, the trailside was dotted with a few rockslide daisies, cushion phlox and alpinegold. Some of the path is packed dirt and other parts rock that is curiously squeaky when stepped on. Rocks are everywhere in mounds large and small.
Approaching Wheeler Peak cirque’s steep walls, hikers might hear and see small rockfalls from melting snow above, especially through binoculars. They may be lucky enough to glimpse black rosy-finches. As hikers step near rocks that are part of a field covering unseen glacial ice, they might hear or imagine they hear echoes underfoot that sound like gurgling and creaking.
Great Basin’s moraine walk is an otherworldly, exhilarating, educational experience.
On the way back down, I was reminded of younger days when field trips helped to simplify concepts as complex as glaciation and its power to carve scenic canyons and sculpt some of the American West’s most iconic mountainscapes.
If you go
Great Basin National Park is about an hour’s drive from Ely. The park’s main turnoff to state Route 488 is in Baker, a tiny town with limited lodging and dining options. Making reservations far in advance for guided tours of Lehman Caves and lodging in Baker is an ideal approach, but my family got lucky in July 2025 and managed a last-minute trip.
We stayed our first night in Ely, mainly for the opportunity to catch a ride and history tour with Northern Nevada Railway after a morning drive up from Las Vegas. Early the following morning, we continued on to the park and straight up Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive to hike the Glacier Trail. We stayed two nights in a vacation rental in Baker, where we found dinner at Sugar Salt & Malt and from Sandra’s Mexican food truck. Our ice chest was packed with breakfast and lunch options picked up in Ely and from home. Some supplies are available in Baker at the charming Bristlecone General Store.
Trip highlights included spending time in a bristlecone grove; getting close to Wheeler Glacier and glimpsing black rosy-finches; dipping our feet in Stella Lake on the Alpine Lakes Loop; going on a tour of Lehman Caves because a small number of tickets were released the day of; and standing under the Milky Way after driving a short distance to Baker Archeological Site after the partial moon had set. Great Basin has some of the clearest night skies in the contiguous U.S.
