After the Southern California wildfire died down, John and I finally set our foot on the mountains on Sunday. The plan was to do a traverse from Baldy to Iron mountain, which according to Christopher Brennen is a 13.5 mile feat. We woke up at 3 and left at 3:45am in two cars. We left John's car at the East Fork ranger station which is where Heaton Flats trail starts. Then the two of us drove (in my car) towards Mt Baldy ski lift. Unfortunately because of ice on the road we could not drive the last 500 ft to the lift so we parked on the side of the road and walked to ski lift base carefully avoiding falling action. It was 7am by the time we started walking up the first slope towards the notch. We were surprised by the amount of snow. We had come with the expectation that there would be some snow only on the peak. The trail from the notch to the peak of Baldy seemed completely different from what we were used to because of snow. There were two people ahead of us that day who did a lot of trail breaking for us. When we got to the base of Devil's Backbone about 20 minutes past the top of lift #4, with a snow ridge on it, it looked like a backbone. We left those trail-breaking guys past the backbone and started breaking trail on our own. The high country with lots of snow was a spectacular scenery. Sometimes sinking knee deep in snow, we made it to the exposed pass where the final approach to the peak begins. Inspired by the formidable snow-filled face of Mt Baldy and our grand goal of a long traverse, we started going up the slope. For John it was a slow going, this made me wait along the way. With wind raging and snow blowing, it started getting cold to the point it started freezing my nose. Insulation on my boots gave up and my feet started freezing. I kept on moving my toes to make sure they haven't lost their feeling yet. It was noon by the time we made it to the top. We sat on the east side of a pile of rocks to avoid eastward wind and ate our lunch and chatted with a fellow hiker for a long time. We had abandoned our plan of doing a traverse because we should have been on the summit of Baldy by 9am. Brennen estimated 15 minutes till West Baldy, but there was no way we were going to be able to do that in less than half an hour. The ridge looked full of deep snow. At our rate, it was going to take at least another 15 hours to our car at East Fork. Around 2:30 it got so cold that I started shivering with cold and John lost sensation on his toes. So we started running down. We were surprised to find the trail from the pass to the noth heavily trodden. Lot of hikers must have come up to the pass. Enjoying the high country and looking at the clouds and the sun, we made it to the notch just before the cafetaria was closing. After taking a quick break, we took the lift down to the base. If our plan had worked, John and I would have done the same amount of driving. I ended up driving for what seemed like hours through the mountainous road to the freeway, and to East Fork and back.
John, Wes, Loban, and I left Pasadena around 10am. Drove east on 10, then north on 15, then west on 138, then south on 2. We left Wes' truck at Vincent Gap and drove about 15 miles south to Islip Saddle in John's car. It was 11:45 when we left the trailhead at Islip Saddle for a 13 mile one-way traverse. The attraction of this hike is starting several ridges into the mountains and at the end of the day emerging on one of the last ranges before Mojave desert. It is a 8 mile hike to the top of Mt Baden-Powell which was misspelled on many signs as Balden-Powell or Biden-Powell. It is a gentle incline to the peak. On the way we took a little detour to Throop Peak. On Mt Baden-Powell, they have a monument for the founder of Boy scout not quite at the very top, maybe 20 or 30 ft from the top. Then it is a 4 mile of switchbacks down to the parking lot at Vincent Gap. It was 6:40 when we finished the hike. I was worried that it might not be very exciting because I had done about half of this hike with Madan to Mt. Islip but it turned out to be very enjoyable. I liked the gentle walking and the fact that we were doing a one-way traverse so we didn't need to walk on the same trail twice.
John and I drove 4.5 hrs to Lone Pine then to Horsecamp at 10,000 ft to sleep for the night on Friday and get some altitude experience. Saturday morning, we went to the ranger station hoping to get a permit for Cottonwood Lakes or Shepard Pass routes but we could not believe our luck when we found out that a multi-day permit ($15) was available for Mt Whitney Trail because someone had called half an hour earlier to cancel the permit. We drove to Whitney Portal (8000 ft) and gathered our supplies and hit the trail at 1:30pm. When we were at Outpost Camp (10500 ft, mile 3.8) we were tempted to stay there for the night, but we decided we would be better off the following day if we head on to Trail Camp or Consultation Lake (12000 ft., mile 6.3). We saw a group of people that looked really tired and disoriented and were asking us if there were rangers at Outpost Camp. Seemed like they needed to seek some help from the rangers as soon as possible. Our walking became really slow after Meadow by Trailside (11400 ft, mile 5.3) and every few minutes, John had to be encouraged with lies about how far the lake was. It was 8pm when we stopped for the night a quarter mile befor5Be Trail Camp. We decided to stay away from the crowd.
We went to sleep at 9:30pm. The night was freezing and we were ill prepared for that kind of temperature. We had two Ridgerest mats and one sleeping bag fleece liner as our sleeping gear. We wore everything we had brought and tried to sleep but we were freezing the whole night and fighting for a few extra square inches of the fleece liner which we were using as a blanket. We woke up at midnight to the sound of an animal scratching the tarp under our tent and the side of our tent. So we were tensely awake for the next half an hour so. Finally it became quiet and we went to sleep. I got some headache when I woke up after what it seemed like five hours of sleeping. Getting excited with the hope that the night must be almost over, I asked John what time it was and our hopes were dashed when he found out it was 12:55am. My mild headache was certainly a sign of altitude sickness which had decided to appear in the middle of the night and did result in me having a vomiting episode at 1am. But I felt very refreshed after that and the headache almost disappeared. We were kept awake the whole night except for dozing off a few half an hour blocks because of intense cold that was freezing our fingers and toes, animals scratching and the wind buffeting our tent.
Both of us had lost our appetite for Cliff bars we had brought but we were force feeding ourselves until we started getting terrified at the thought of having to eat any more Cliff bars. At 7am, the sky was looking cloudy and we were debating if we should go up the mountain or down to the trailhead. Armed with tiredness from the altitude, lost appetite, and fear for rain, we decided to go up anyway. We started off at 9:30am only with 4 liters of water, 8 Cliff bars, two layers of fleece, and a tarp to hide under in case it starts raining. We were dreading the switchbacks, but that went by fast. I started getting a mild headache when we started heading up the summit after the notch on the crest for the last two miles of the trail. To not stress my body, I deliberately started walking really slow and John for the first time in this trip passed me and disappeared ahead of me. After what it seemed like hours of struggling the final climb to the summit, John and I arrived at the summit at 2pm. We stayed on the summit till 3pm enjoying dried apple chips, looking at people feeding the marmots, and enjoying the view of the high country.
Coming down, both of us were tired. 180 ft climb to the crest from the notch was the most difficult part of this entire hike. It probably took us more than half an hour to hike this 180 ft climb in 0.5 miles. Once at the switchbacks, we ran down fast so we could nap at our campsite. We ate bread for our snack and napped for 20 minutes dreaming of all the delicacies that we didn't have. Shortly after 6 pm, we started off for Outpost camp because we were determined to not camp that high for another night. I was carrying the pack with tent and Bear-safe food canister and John was reluctantly following me. We made good pace and arrived at the Outpost camp at 8pm with a half an hour break that John took to look at the cliffs just above the Trailside Meadow. Once at the Outpost Camp, we decided that we needed no more terror of bears scratching our tent in a freezing night. We ate bread for dinner and walked fast to the trailhead. We had a day hiker tagging along with us because it was dark, he was tired, and apparently he didn't seem to like the idea of meeting bears when he is by himself and is in that state. We were getting warmer and happier with every feet of going down. At 9:45 when we arrived at the trailhead, we decided to drive back to LA the same night.
On my way back to LA, I decided to stop at Mt Shasta and try a little excursion. John and I had already tried the Avalance Gulch route past weekend, so I decided to explore the Old Ski bowl route. After packing up my tent and eating a quick breakfast, I hit the trail at 4am. After half an hour, I suddenly realized that there were too many trails and I was not sure which trail is the one that I am supposed to be on. So I sat on a rock and enjoyed the silence and the sky that was slowly getting brighter. Once I could see the surroundings, I made sure to stay slightly to the right of Green Butte. Sargants Ridge was looking scary with a big scree on its entire face. Lots of big rocks were getting ready to rumble down and crush me. At 7:30 or so, it started raining so I started running down because I didn't want to die in a rockfall. Then it stopped raining so I started going up again. I could see Bunny flat, Hosecamp and tents on Lake Helen along Avalance Gulch route over in the distance on the other side of the ridge to the left. Finally around 8:30 after dodging a few rocks coming down and causing some landslides, I got to the ridge (11000 ft and next to Shastarama point) that overlooked Mud-creek glacier. Glacier looked smooth, awesome, and treacherous but looking down on the face I had just climbed was scary. Then it started raining again. I started running down the rockfall and did glissading on the rocks. Then it stopped raining and started wishing that I had spent more time at the ridge. After causing too many landslides and getting scared to the point that I felt normal to get scared of rockfall, I managed to arrive on the flats next to Green Butte in one piece. Then it started raining again and I ran for half an hour to the trailhead at which point it stopped raining. It is a good feeling to survive the most dangerous thing that I have ever done. It was 11am and it was time to drive to Berkeley.
John and I tried our best to climb Mt Shasta but time wasn't right for us. We woke up at 12:00 at Bunny Flat but it was 1:00 by the time we started. After walking for half an hour I realized that I forgot my sunglasses so I had to come down to the car to get them. John took an hour nap I think. Going was slow, and Green Butte on right right over in the distance was already looking cool even before we made it to Helen. Then going was even slower. When we reached the bottom of the heart above Lake Helen John decided that it was going to be too dangerous for him to go any higher. We decided to glissade down from there. At Helen we stopped for a little bit to enjoy the ridges on the two sides that were showering the gulch with constant supply of rocks. Those ridges were looking knife-sharp from our vantage point. After finishing walking on the snow, half an hour below Helen, we took a long break to dry ourselves up and eat and drink. Then it took a long and torturous afternoon and a lot of boulder-hopping to make it back to Horse camp. By the time we were at the car, it was 6pm. At 8pm ,when we finished eating dinner, I realized that I had six hours of driving to do.
Jamesina, Sam, Denis, Ying, Roland, and I climbed Saddle mountain on Saturday, camped at a designated clean-up site (definitely not a camp site) Saturday night and on Sunday after visiting Tillamook cheese factory climbed a mountain on the coast with great views.
Jamesina and I hiked 8 miles today. The left turn from Pacific Crest to McNeil was not obvious so we went past the barricade and on to the mudslide area, crossed the stream with a lot of hesitation and sat on the boulders and ate some food. Views of waterfall and mountains with patches of clouds (Jamesina says like Scotland) provided an incredible scenery for a picnic. Then we came back, found the correct turn, went up a steep trail to McNeil point enjoying great views from the side of the ridge. The oldest carving in McNeil's hut was from 1993. We ate the rest of our lunch on the meadow at McNeil point and headed back to Hillsboro. Mt Hood with its permanent glacier and steep face looked so close but so formidable from the point.
Atul, Basant, Jamesina, and I hiked a 11 mile loop. We started at the Kings mountain trailhead which is 3.5 miles from the summit. Then we hiked 3.5 miles along the ridge to Elk mountain. Then 1.7 miles of nasty scrambling down to Wilson River Creek trail. 3.8 more miles to Kings mountain trailhead. Total of 6.5 hrs of hike.
Teri, Jamesina, and I hiked in the park and enjoyed spectacular views of Mt. Rainier, Mt. Adams, Mt. Hood, and Mt. St Helens from a single vista point. Unusually sunny and clear day for the North-West.
On this trip with Basant and Jamesina, we did a night of camping and climbed St Helens the following day.
On this trip with Sam W and Jamesina S, we drove to Crater Lake in Southern Oregon, got campsites about 20 miles east of the lake for $5 per person, pitched our tent and drove to Lassen Volcanic park in Northern California. We stopped at a diner/bar type place at Deadhorse Summit for lunch. Jamesina wanted to eat her own lunch but Sam and I ate in the eatery and chated with logging people who worked in the area in the 40s and were coming back for a visit. It took another hour or so to get to the park. We first went to see the sulphur spring with some hissing sound. Then we climbed Mt Lassen which took about four hours roundtrip. Some snow in the begining which was hard to deal with (esp for Jamesina and her tennis shoes). After snow area, we decided we were tired and wanted to follow a real trail so we walked slowly up the summit. There were great views of nearby mountains covered in snow. With a little bit of bouldering we got to the top. There was a giant tower (perhaps weather tower) at the top. We just sat and ate then headed back down and drove to Crater lake because that is where we had our tent pitched. It was 1am by the time we arrived at our campsite.
Kim L and I did a 5 mile loop to Wauna view point and back. We parked at Bonnville exit 40 (40 minutes drive from Portland, OR) on I-84. Then we hiked up a well-travelled and well-maintained path to Wauna view point. We only met four or five groups of people on the trail. The trail is very green, has lots of flowers, and has very gentle incline. On our way down, we took a fork that took us to Eagle creek trail head (which is probably the most popular trail in the Columbia river Gorge) at exit 41. There was a wooden suspension bridge just before the trailhead. Then we had to walk on a bike trail back to the parking lot near Bonnville power station (at least giant transformers making a loud humming sound ).
Kim had to go after that but I wanted to do more hiking so I ended up doing a 6 mile loop in Multnomah falls area near exit 30. The first 1.5 miles to the top of the falls was on a paved trail and was very crowded. There is a view point at the top of the falls. Then the trail is no longer paved (nice!) and the crowd suddenly disappears. The Perdition trail is closed, and this makes the loop slightly longer. Once at the Wakheema Trail junction, uphill part is over. The trail winds through beautiful forest. At the next junction, I wanted to look at the Wahkeema spring so took the left fork, and I saw water just coming out of the ground. On the way down, there is a nice view of Wakheema falls. Once on the road, there is a trail on the side of the Historic Columbia highway that goes back to Multnomah Falls. This loop took two hours with three breaks, one of which was a reasonably long lunch break.
Dan, Jackie, and I wanted to spend a day hiking in the coastal area and Tomales Point seemed like a great area for its distance (about 9.5 miles and views). The trailhead was about an hour drive from Berkeley, CA. The trail starts at an old dairy farm, passes by some Cypress trees and goes through rolling hills and lots and lots of flowers on either side of the trail. Elk sightings was very frequent till the Windy gap which is marked again by a cluster of Cypress trees. Then the trail becomes sandy, climbs up a little bit then goes down all the way to the point. Dan and I decided to do a little bit of excursion so we climbed down the cliff (the rocks were loose) to the water and look at the life in the ocean. There were lots of sea shells that we had to step on but we tried to avoid stepping on squishy animals and plans as much as possible. Saw some star fish and giant crabs. After spending 10 minutes on the beach, we thought Jackie might be getting worried so we climbed up the cliff, traced back about five minutes on the trail and ate lunch. It was very windy. When we came back, the trail seemed much longer than on our way going to the point.
Basant and I got to the trailhead by 8am. (I-10E to Azusa north to San Gabriel Canyon to East Fork). We parked next to the East Fork ranger station and hit the trail. To our surprise we found the trail go across a stream. We decided to take our shoes off and crossed the stream very slowly. The water was cold and the rocks sharp. When we were drying our feet on the other side of the stream, we saw a group and we asked them how many times we have to cross the stream. We heard an answer of "22". We thought he must be kidding and we walked for five minutes and we had to cross the stream again. It was getting slow taking off the shoes and putting them on so once on the other side of the stream we walked bare feet for five minutes and we had to cross the stream again. Then we thought maybe we should just head home because walking bare feet on the rocky trail is miserable. So is crossing knee-deep stream full of high-current cold water. On our way back we asked a group that was fishing in the stream, and they explained to us that the trail we were on is called East Fork trail and the trail going to Iron mountain splits off near the fence close to the fire road. So we headed back bare feet. Got to the fire road and sat there for half an hour drying our feet. Then we put our boots on and start cruising at 10am on Heaton Flats trail on our way to meet Iron Mountain.
The trail is gradual in the begining but goes through the southern face of a ridge that is covered with so many flowers. Never seen that many flowers in wilderness. The trail is not well maintained and this means lots of bushes and flowers brushing the body. It was a good thing we had long sleeve shirt and pants even though it was hot. After getting to a pass, Basant and I took a nap on the trail and we fell asleep for 10 or 15 minutes. Then we kept on going and Basant was saying he was getting a little tired. We reached a major saddle 2.5 hrs after being on the trail. Real climb starts at the saddle. It is very steep. It is very slippery with loose sand and rocks and mud. It goes on and on for 3000 feet (according to a group that gave up the climb shortly after the saddle). They were right. The trail is steep and Basant being tired didn't help. He was complaining of headache and tiredness but we made it to the top 4 hrs after leaving the saddle shortly after 4pm. Then we ate our last lunch and took a nap for half an hour on the summit. Coming down was very tricky (slipperly) and Basant fell down a few times and got some thorn in his toe. One of his falls looked bad but fortunately nothing was broken. We were back at the saddle at 6pm and we started running down to avoid wild animals (having seen lots of big lizards and a rattlesnake on our way up). It only took us 1.5 hrs to get to the trailhead. While we were driving back, we took a wrong turn and there was a road closure because of fire. There were lots of fire trucks racing on the road. Fortunately the road was not closed outbound to LA. It took three liters of water to do 14 miles of walking and climb 6000 ft in one day.
Approach is the same as the last hike to San Gorgonia. This time it was John and I who left home around 5am. We started hiking around 7am. It was snowy from the very begining and I was getting worried about my boots which are not waterproof. We got to the steep uphill part immediately after Basant's rock climbing spot. About high camp area, things became increasingly sketchy. We thought we found a trail on a foot deep snow, and we followed it for a while and we met a couple and they asked if we knew the trail and turns out we were just following their steps and they were as lost as we were. But we knew the general direction so we kept on moving. Incredibly difficult to move because underneath that foot deep snow there was hard-glazed ice so we slipped and fell a lot. Once out in the open, John started getting tired and started seeing people camped on the summit with campfire. Walking on the side of the mountain was very slippery. Then John put his glasses inside his gloves and set it on the floor only to have it blown away and lost his glasses and we were searching for his glasses in intense sunlight for half an hour in intense sunlight in snow. I got very tired. Finally we started again, and we had to crawl on all eights (hands, elbows, knees, and feet) to get past icy stretches. John looked comical doing that and probably I did too. Almost slipped off the face of the mountain once. Should have brought crampons and ice axe. Then we got to a rocky pass just before the summit and I lied on the rock and John comes running foward. It was 4pm and he insists strongly that we go to the summit NOW!. I was a little surprised with his energy. We go up crawling again to the summit. We come down to the same pass and John is about to pass out. He says he has altitude sickness and is about to pass out. He says he is seeing things in his head. He eats a quick lunch and we just wanted to get out of there. It was probably 5pm. By the time we get to the parking lot it was after dark. The following morning I had intense snow blindness (ended up taking two days off) and John's face had intense sun burn (face looks like a basketball). With snow blindness and altitute sickenss, seems like John and I graduated a mountaineering school.
I woke up at 3:00am, picked up Basant at 3:30am and drove on I-10E for 60 miles. Then we drove on 38NE for 15 miles or so, then turned right on Home something road and drove for a few miles. Turns out we needed a pass and the store would open at 8am. It was 6am when we got there. After going on a recon trip to the trailhead, took a nap. When the store opened, the person told us that we didn't need a pass because it was the last saturday of the month or something like that. Then we drove to the trailhead and started hiking. The first section was supposed to be very strenuous but it wasn't terrible. The views were great and the place was very untouched. There were patches of snow after that steep section. We then rested on some rocks which seemed the last dry and comfortable place before encountering lots of snow. After the rest and quick sandwich eating, we were on the trail again. The trail then turned east and up a ridge. There was a lot of snow and it was very slippery. We finally made it to the top of this ridge which had convenient dry spots for some power naps. Napped for an hour or so. We had to turn back and it was scarry coming down on packed snow. We did a little bit of slipping and Basant did his fair share of banging his knees on rocks and falling on snow. Once back to the rock place, Basant did some rock climbing. Then we just walked back fast. By the time we were at the parking lot it was 3:30pm. It was about 5:30pm when we were back in LA.
The approach to the trailhead is the same as other Mt. Baldy trips. This time it was John, Madan and I who wanted to get to the top of Mt. Baldy from the bottom of the ski lift. I had done the ski lift section (1300' of climb) and rest of the trail in two separate occassions but not the whole climb in one trip. John had done just the ski lift stretch and Madan had done the trail starting at the end of the ski lift section. The intention was to climb all the sections and enjoy some cold weather at the top. We did the ski lift section in little over an hour. Then we took the trail all the way as opposed to the steep landslide or ski trail sections to the end of the second chair. Then we slowly came out of the tree line into the cold and wind. Madan was wearing shorts so he had to turn back but John and I went ahead, by the rushing plume of clouds and the shadows they make on the snow. It was a frigid alpine weater on the top -- my hands were getting gold even with gloves, nose was getting really cold and was getting worried I might get a frost bite. John was suffering too. But we had lots of fun standing against the cold wind on the top and looking at the clouds rushing by the pass that we had traversed on our way up. Then we started freezing so it was time to head back. On our way back, we found Madan in the ski hut. Then we slid our way down on the last ski lift stretch. Once back home, we went to eat pizza at Charlie's Trio.
John and I drove for half an hour on I-10, took Mountain Ave exit and drove 15 miles north to Mt. Baldy ski lift station. Then we walked up 1300ft. to the end of that ski lift stretch (Chair A). Towards the end it got pretty steep and had to use hands to make sure we dont roll all the way to the bottom of the hill, but it took less than an hour and it can't be much more than about a mile. The motivation behind this hike was to see how hard this section is and to think about the possibility of hiking all the way to the top of Mt. Baldy someday rather than taking the lift and hiking only part of the way (like my previous trip to Mt. Baldy). We saw some snow on the sides and on the ski trails but not enough to ski. It was chilly on the top. We took the lift on our way down ($5 one way).
Basant, Frances, Kundan and I stopped in Las Vegas on the 18th. On the 19th drove to Flagstaff. On the 20th visited Grand Canyon, hiked down the canyon on South Kaibab trail and camped in Mather Campground. On the 21st, we drove to Death Valley National Park and camped there. On the 22nd, I hiked Mosaic Canyon trail. Then we hiked Sand Dunes and Golden Canyon all the way to the vista point. We also walked around a bit on Devil's Golfcourse and Artist's Palette. Then we drove back to Los Angeles.
Madan and I went to Dawn mine for the second time and we almost missed it because some guys gave us wrong direction. Then we found another group that told us where to find the mines. We explored the mine shafts.
Madan and I were surprised that there was still snow and ice on the trails. We drove 40 miles in the Angeles Crest highway to Isilp saddle. Luckily the roadblock was at Islip saddle and not before it. We walked across the highway and started walking on a paved road for half a mile when we realized we were walkign on a road and not a trail. Then we had to come back and we saw the trailhead for Pacific Crest trail just to the left of the road that starts across from the parking lot. The trail starts climbing up immediately and we saw the first patches of snow and ice just five minutes into the hike.
North of Pasadena. Madan and I started a little after 2pm with very little idea about the location of the trail. We went to the gate at the top of the ridge and walked on the paved road for a 5 or 10 minutes then turned left to a trail. The trail went along the ridge for a little bit then descended to the stream as it passes by an abandoned mill? After crossing a bridge and passing by a dam on the right, the trail just goes along the stream for quite some time. Lot of opportunities for scrambling. That was fun. Unfortunately we were not able to get all the way to the mine. Where we were probably about 5 or 10 minutes from the mine, we lost the trail and kept on asending a steep hill with very loose rock and soil. After half an hour of doing so we gave up and came down the hill and started hiking back with only half an hour of light remaining. Turns out the trail on the right side of the stream (when you are coming back) does not involve any boulder hopping at all. So even if it was dark and Madan a bit stressed we were able to move pretty fast and we made it back to the car without any crazy things happening to us.
A back-packing cross-desert trip with Dan, Mikkel, Alex, and Jackie. We drove to the south entrance of the park (Cottonwood visitor center) in two cars Friday morning. We drove my car to Porccupine wash, parked it there and we started heading west. We were carrying water for two days. Everyone had to carry 3 liters of drinking water per day. We were also carrying three liters of cooking water. Then we had tents and other accessories. Packs were quite heavy.