Desolation Wilderness Permit — Highland

Highland (Zone 9): what makes it different

Zone 9 is Highland Lake and Lake Zitella, an off-trail zone in the northwest corner of Desolation that you reach by a primitive route leaving the McConnell Lake Trail near Horseshoe Lake. It takes 8 people a night. It is not the Highland Trail, which starts at Van Vleck and ends in a different zone.^1,4,2,10

Getting to the start

Recreation.gov says the zone is off trail and that experience navigating off trail is recommended. Access is by a primitive route off the McConnell Lake Trail near Horseshoe Lake. The Forest Service trail chart lists no destination in zone 9 from any trailhead, so there is no agency mileage for the zone.^4,2

That puts the start of the walk in the Lelands interior. Hiking Project measures 10.4 miles one way from the Rockbound Trailhead at Wrights Lake to the Leland Lakes, via Lake Doris and Schmidell Pass. It prints no distance on to Horseshoe or beyond.^9,2

A CDFW memo from March 2021 says no maintained trail reaches Lake Zitella, but a visible use trail with old signage runs to it from Horseshoe Lake. The Outbound's loop party saw a signpost at Horseshoe marking a trail to Zitella that the map does not show.^5,6

The first leg

No report fetched for this page reached Highland Lake. The first leg is therefore the McConnell Lake Trail itself: up to Schmidell Pass, past the Leland Lakes and McConnell Lake, over open meadow and dry stream bed to a signpost at Horseshoe Lake, about 3 miles from the pass by The Outbound's count.⁶

Peachy Hiker, who walked 15 miles on that loop in 2014, calls the zone a cross-country side trip from the loop and says they chose not to make it. Every hiker they met reported trouble finding the trail, so the leg to Horseshoe is where the navigating starts.⁷

Terrain and difficulty

Recreation.gov's only terrain note is the off-trail warning. CDFW adds that Lake Zitella sits in a granite basin at roughly 7,650 feet and drains north-east into Rockbound Lake. Highland Lake lies directly west of Zitella and is much larger and deeper; the memo gives Zitella a maximum depth of 5 meters.^4,5

A 2022 peak-bagger who reached the ridge above Forni Lake saw Highland Lake below him, with Tells Peak to his left and McConnell Peak to his right. The report does not say he walked down to it, so it tells you the lake is visible from there and nothing about the way.⁸

Quota at this entry point

• 2026 daily quota at Highland (Zone 9), overnight: 8 people a day. The Forest Service lists 6 advance and 2 walk-in and no year. Recreation.gov's zone 9 daily totals from May to September 2026 peaked at 6, the advance share, on 14 dates.^1,4

Rules specific to this entry point

Zone 9 is not a special management area, so camp 100 feet back from the shore of either lake. Wash cookware 200 feet from the water too; CDFW records a Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog population at both lakes.^3,5

The memo records trout removal at Highland Lake and trout stocking in Zitella until 1973, with no trout detected in Zitella for decades since. Frog counts at both lakes rose after 2013, and the memo lists the Highland trout removal as one possible reason.⁵

Where it leads

Lake Zitella is the lake you can approach with a use trail from Horseshoe Lake. It holds a population of Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frogs that CDFW has surveyed since 2002; detections of post-metamorphic frogs ranged from a handful in 1993 to several hundred in 2016 and 2018, and 140 in 2020.⁵

Highland Lake is the bigger of the two and has its own frog population, which CDFW calls the nearest source of frogs for Zitella. No first-hand account of a camp at Highland Lake turned up.⁵

What trip reports say

The Outbound's loop team reached Horseshoe Lake after crossing meadows and dry beds, noted the Zitella signpost, and carried on to the 4-Q's Lakes. They describe the trail past Horseshoe as vanishing onto a granite slab where cairns are small and rare.⁶

The Huntin Daddy's October 21, 2022 trip started from Van Vleck on the Highland Trail. He climbed with manzanita on the hillside up to Forni Lake, then to the ridge, where Tells Peak lay left, McConnell right and Highland Lake below.⁸

When to go from here

No report covers a Highland camp, so there is no tested window. The approach passes the Leland Lakes, which Hiking Project says are best in mid to late summer, with snowy slopes to scramble early in the season.⁹

Compare with nearby entry points

• Lelands: Lelands (zone 10) is the neighboring zone whose trail leads to the turn-off for Highland. It takes 19 people a night against Highland's 8, and its lakes sit along the primitive McConnell Lake Trail.^1,4
• Tells: Tells (zone 8) is the zone of Forni Lake, where the Highland Trail ends. The Forest Service lists Forni Lake at 4.9 miles from Van Vleck, and the zone takes 11 people a night. Highland Lake is not on that trail's chart.^1,2,10

Sources

1. Desolation Wilderness Overnight Quota, Eldorado National Forest, USDA Forest Service. Read 2026-10-15.
2. Desolation Wilderness Trails & Trailheads, Eldorado National Forest, USDA Forest Service. Read 2026-10-15.
3. Desolation Wilderness rules and regulations, Eldorado National Forest and Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, USDA Forest Service. Read 2026-10-15.
4. Desolation Wilderness Permit, division 307 (09 Highland), Recreation.gov. Read 2026-10-15.
5. Native amphibian monitoring in Desolation Wilderness; Rana sierrae monitoring at Lake Zitella, California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Read 2026-10-15.
6. Desolation's Primitive Western Edge through Rockbound Pass Loop, The Outbound. Read 2026-10-15.
7. McConnell Lake Loop, Primitive Trail, in Desolation Wilderness, Peachy Hiker. Read 2026-10-15.
8. Red Peak, Peak Bagging, The Huntin Daddy. Read 2026-10-15.
9. Rockbound Trail to Leland Lakes, Hiking Project. Read 2026-10-15.
10. Highland Trail #15E21, Hiking Project. Read 2026-10-15.
11. Desolation Wilderness Permits, Eldorado National Forest, USDA Forest Service. Read 2026-10-15.

Safety & planning

Alternatives to a Highland permit