2018 Hiking Adventures

[BorregoWrangler]

2018 Hiking Adventures

You stand triumphant on a rocky peak and look at the whole world spread out below; and for a while, though still human, you are no longer merely human.

I’ll be sharing my hikes from around San Diego and (mostly) Southern California here. I’m looking forward to exploring new trails and revisiting some old favorites.

#1 Oak Canyon
3.5 miles | +300’

Oak Canyon, tucked into a relatively pristine corner of Mission Trails Regional Park just west of Santee, comes alive with a thin stream of gurgling water after seasonal rains. This area is popular with hikers and mountain bikers, though bikes are confined to dirt roads running along the canyon rim. Only hikers are allowed on the trail running through the most scenic, narrow section of the canyon.


#2 Kwaay Paay Peak
2.25 miles | +900’

Kwaay Paay Peak is a good alternative to Cowles Mountain for anyone who wants a good climb without a crowd. It is the fourth highest peak in Mission Trails Regional Park, at an elevation of 1194 feet. The name of the peak is from the local Kumeyaay Indian word referring to a leader, and a leader it is, in terms of its difficulty because of the vertical climb and elevation gain. The top of the peak is a large level area with many flat-topped rocks that allow one to rest and take in the panoramic view extending out to Miramar, Point Loma, and Coronado. Santee and La Mesa are below the peak.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#3 Granite Mountain
7.5 miles | +3100’

Granite Mountain towers along the western edge of the Anza-Borrego Desert, its flattish summit presiding over hundreds of square miles of desert to the east and the timber-dotted Laguna and Cuyamaca Mountains toward the south and west. No trail traverses Granite Mountain's upper flanks, though it's possible to approach the summit from nearly every point on the compass. You’ll encounter the full range of desert cacti on the trailless and rocky route to the peak. Closer to the top are scattered piñon pines, juniper and chaparral. The summit views are spectacular. On the far north horizon rise the 10,000-plus-foot summits of Old Baldy, San Jacinto Peak, and San Gorgonio Mountain. The Salton Sea spreads to the east. On rare occasions over to the west you can even spot far-off Santa Catalina Island and San Clemente Island.

 

[Haggis]

Nice! Keep it up!

 

[java230]

Very cool! Scenery is so different from hikes in the PNW!

 

[Gear]

Awesome Job! Loved the pictures. Keep it up.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

Awesome Job! Loved the pictures. Keep it up.

Very cool! Scenery is so different from hikes in the PNW!

Nice! Keep it up!

Thanks guys!

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#4 & 5 Corte Madera Mountain
7.5 miles | +1750’

San Diego’s “Half Dome.” I hiked this two weekends in a row, as an unofficial trail guide for a group event. On a clear late autumn or winter day atop Corte Madera Mountain, you can see forever, or at least as far as Santa Catalina and San Clemente islands to the west, and the mile-high Sierra Juarez plateau in Baja California to the south. From many parts of San Diego, Corte Madera Mountain's sheer south face appears as an abrupt drop in the profile of the eastern horizon. On the summit, you stand near the edge of that 300-foot-high precipice.

Corte Madera Mountain's summit plateau is covered by large sheets of granitic rock supporting patches of chaparral. From the southernmost point on the plateau you can peer over the abrupt face into the canyon drained by Espinosa Creek. To the southeast is Los Pinos Mountain, topped by a spindly-looking fire lookout.

 

[Dave]

This is great - you motivate me!!!

 

[richard310]

Awesome job thus far! Your photos are always breathtaking!

 

[brentbba]

You are my hiking hero John. I very much enjoy your hiking threads and pics. Thank you!!

 

[BorregoWrangler]

You are my hiking hero John. I very much enjoy your hiking threads and pics. Thank you!!

This is great - you motivate me!!!

Awesome job thus far! Your photos are always breathtaking!

Thanks, guys!

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#6 Indian Hill, Moan Benchmark, & Carrizo Palms
7.75 miles | +1700’

No trails out here. Just cross country and canyons to follow with lots of cactus and catclaw to avoid. Humans have used the area for perhaps several thousand years. The last Indian cultural group to occupy this area was the Kumeyaay. It was later used by local cattlemen and, much later, beginning in 1912, by construction crews of the San Diego and Arizona Eastern Railway — the “Impossible Railroad” — who dug tunnels, laid track, and built a large wooden trestle through Carrizo Gorge to connect with San Diego. Their construction camp was located near what is marked as Indian Hill on the USGS topographic map.

The second summit of the day was part of a group of USGS benchmarks with the names of Moan, Groan, Gasp, Puff and Grunt. You’ll certainly be doing all those things when exploring this rugged backcountry. After descending the peak, crossing the old railroad track, I dropped into a tributary of Carrizo Gorge to visit the largest and most remote grove of palms in Anza Borrego. During 1912 through 1919, railroad workers installed pumps here to supply water to their camps. A mile past the palms I enter another canyon and scramble over a series of bedrock exposures and dry waterfalls, cross over then under the railroad tracks again to complete the loop and arrive where I had parked earlier that morning.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#7 Split Mountain East Side High Point
4 miles | +1500’

“This is the desert at its lowest, hottest, and to the unappreciative eye, most unfriendly. To those who know it well, however, it is a fascinating labyrinth of rugged canyons, twisted arroyos, and mud hills, containing some of nature’s best examples of earth sculpture.” -Jerry Schad

Cold and windy trek to Split Mountain’s East Side High Point. Just south of Ocotillo Wells at 1690’ elevation. Plenty of cactus to dodge along the rocky ridge leading up to the summit. This area is rich in geological oddities. The wind caves are a popular destination here- sandstone outcrops where sandblasting by winds has hollowed out chambers and skylights.

In their book, Geology of Anza Borrego: Edge of Creation, Paul Remeika and Lowell Lindsay tell us that a shallow marine sea occupied the eastern edge of Anza-Borrego about 4 or 5 million years ago, and the Fish Creek basin was inundated. The marine environment, consisting of the gypsum, turbidite sandstone, mudstone and calcareous sandstones that we can see out there today, supported a multitude of intertidal shellfish. Now that the sea is no longer there, over 200 invertebrate fossil species have been identified, including snails, periwinkles, starfish, sea urchins, barnacles, corals, oysters, and clams.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#8 Elephant Trees Discovery Trail
1.5 miles | +100’

Elephant Trees Discovery Trail climbs gently up a rock-lined alluvial fan, granting the hiker the opportunity to view a rare elephant tree, before eventually looping back to the parking area. The elephant tree, a rarity in the California deserts, attains a height of only ten feet and sports a peeling parchment-like bark and wrinkled limbs that vaguely resemble the skin of an elephant—it’s a bit of a stretch, but the tree is still much admired by park visitors. Elephant trees are common to Baja California and the Mexican state of Sonora, but are scarcely scattered amid the washes and canyons of Anza-Borrego, one of the northernmost extents of their range.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#9 Kitchen Creek
1 mile | +200’

Just a short distance along the PCT from Kitchen Creek Road are some great seasonal swimming holes. After getting off work early last Monday, I took my daughter and niece out to check out the creek after some recent rains. The water was certainly on the chilly side but we all had a blast. We even met a few northbound PCT thru hikers on their way to Canada.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#10 Cedar Creek Falls
4.5 miles | +1200’

“Hikers” on this trek have often been known to walk in wearing flip-flops and carrying nothing but alcohol. After hours of partying, many would require rescue while trying to climb back up the canyon. At one point, the county’s emergency services were rescuing 3-4 people per week. There have been a number of fatalities here, from either jumping off the cliffs or from heat exhaustion during the hike back up. As part of their efforts to make hiking the falls safer, they instituted a permit system.

The original closure was put into place on July 9, 2011, and ran through to March 30, 2012. There are stiff fines for anybody jumping off cliffs, drinking alcohol, and hiking without a permit. Despite all of that, this is a spectacular hike. The San Diego River at the bottom of the gorge is full of shady cottonwoods, willows, oaks, and sycamores. Creek Falls is a stunningly beautiful place. Hopefully everyone does their part to help keep it that way.

 

[Al Swope]

Those falls are really cool.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

Those falls are really cool.

Yep. Thank goodness for the recent rains!

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#11 Old Banner Toll Road to Warlock Mine
3.25 miles | +800’

Exploring the depths of the old Warlock Mine, near Julian. Discovered in 1870 and worked until 1957, it was also used as a designated radioactive fallout shelter in 1962. However, a collapse two years later put an end to that.

 

[BorregoWrangler]

#12 Horsethief Canyon to Pine Valley Creek
3.25 miles | +500’

Another one of my favorite places to bring the kids after we’ve had some rain.

“Horsethief Canyon offers one of the quickest escapes into a designated wilderness area available to urban San Diegans. The canyon is a major entryway into the 13,000-acre Pine Creek Wilderness, south of Descanso and Pine Valley.

Substantial rain transforms this place into a foothill garden, with water dancing down the larger ravines and careening off boulders in Pine Valley Creek -- the large drainage bisecting the wilderness area. True to its name, this corral-like canyon was used in the late 1800s by horse thieves to stash stolen horses in preparation for their passage across the international border.” -Jerry Schad