Monday, June 30, 2008

Hitting the Trails



Saturday morning and I went for a 9 mile hike with my friends John and Carlos from work. We got an early start to beat the heat, and got to the trailhead at about 7am. We had driven up to Mt. Baldy village to hike the Icehouse Canyon trail, and with plenty of water packed, we started on the trail.

It was an easy couple miles to start, then got steeper and consisted of many switchbacks. It was 3.6 miles from the trailhead to "the saddle" which was kind of a groove in the ridge between two peaks. We could see down the north(I think it was north) slope from the saddle, and took a break to rest on a log and take a couple pictures. We decided that we were all still doing okay, and continued the upward trek a slightly steeper 9/10 of a mile to Timber Mountain.

At the top I signed the log book with our names and the date, just in case there was any question later as to whether we had made it or not. We took a couple more pictures and rested another few minutes while we enjoyed the 360 degree views of wilderness, and the 15 freeway off in the distance. We could see Silverwood lake, and on clearer days it is possible to see Catalina from where we were.

Heading back down was a pretty easy trip, as downhill usually is, and we even sped up our pace for fear that some of us might pee our pants if we didn't. I was using my new running watch to time our trip by using the lap timer to break up our times, but I still haven't figured out how to review the times yet. I do know that we covered a total of 9 miles, and that it took us 4hours 38 minutes total including our rests. We had a change in elevation from lowest point to highest of about 3500 feet.

Overall it was a good hike, and I look forward to spending a few more days during this summer break enjoying the mountains, which are so damn accessible from where I live, as time with friends, and excercise.