Today was one of those spectacular, sunny, warm December days we relish in Southern California; perfect for just about any outdoor activity. High temperatures were forcast to be in the high 80's or low 90's, and temperature records for the date were expected to be broken in many areas. As I ran north in upper Las Virgenes Canyon, I wasn't sure where, or how far, I was going to run. On such a great day, it really didn't matter.

Yesterday I'd looked across at Simi Peak while ascending Ladyface, and realized it had been more than a year since I'd run to Simi Peak from the Victory trailhead at Ahmanson Ranch. Rain was forecast the following weekend, so I'd better take advantage of the good weather while I had it! The out and back run to Simi Peak would be a good one.

The most direct route to China Flat and Simi Peak from upper Las Virgenes Canyon road is the Sheep Corral Trail. This singletrack trail forks left (west) from the road where Las Virgenes Canyon splits, initially following the main creek west, rather than the pipeline north. The singletrack is popular with mountain bikers and can be used to connect to the Cheeseboro Ridge and Cheeseboro Canyon trails. Both of theses trails are good options for doing a lollipop loop back to Las Virgenes Canyon.

Today I would continue past Cheeseboro Ridge and Cheeseboro Canyon to the Palo Comado fire road. Palo Comado leads up and over a low pass to an old sheep corral at China Flat. Simi Peak is bit more than a mile west of the corral. It usually takes about 15-20 minutes to run there from the sheep corral.

Here's an interactive Google Earth browser view of a GPS trace of my out and back route.

Some related posts: Simi Peak Out & Back, Scenic Route to Simi Peak, Vernal Pool at China Flat

For an eighty degree day, it had been surprisingly cold in Las Virgenes Canyon. The canyon's east-facing slopes had been in shadow for much of the afternoon, and had lost any residual warmth to a crystal clear sky. The refrigerated air had spilled from the hillsides, collected in low points, and flowed in a frigid stream down the canyon.

In running shorts and a t-shirt, the cold air had been invigorating, but in the fading light I was glad to be out of the canyon, and running up the Beast toward Lasky Mesa.

The sun had set about 30 minutes before. Unmarked by clouds or contrails, the colors of the western sky were remarkably pure, ranging from the warm yellow-orange of a fleeting day to the cold steel blue of approaching night.

The sweet licorice scent of fennel swept past on a warm current of air. Along the trail crickets called, buoyant and hopeful; and a covey of quail chattered anxiously, debating flight. Above, the moon and Jupiter shone brightly, already beginning to illuminate the landscape.

On a hill to my right a solitary coyote yipped, and a nearby hillside answered in an excited sing-song of yips, yaps and yowls. Moments later another band answered the first, and then faraway a third.

Early in the run I had pushed the pace hoping to beat the sun back to car. Somewhere on the north boundary ridge it had become clear that I would lose the race with the sun. But I also realized it would not be a problem. There was no rush. I could catch the moon.

Ladyface from Heartbreak Ridge

I wasn't familiar with the routes on Ladyface, and wasn't certain I could get to the peak directly from the Heartbreak Ridge trail. But that's part of the fun of an adventure run. I had a general idea of what I wanted to do -- an out and back from the Phantom trailhead in Malibu Creek State Park to the top of Ladyface. And I had an idea of the time available to do it -- about four hours. The details would sort themselves out along the way.

Or at least that was the theory. It was now three in the afternoon, and I was one hour and 56 minutes into sorting out those details. Theoretically, I was supposed to be on the summit of Ladyface in about four minutes.

Earlier, I had run out of trail descending Heartbreak Ridge, and had used a network of coyote paths to get down to Cornell & Kanan roads. But then I chosen the wrong "trail" to start the climb of the peak.

For sure the route would follow one of the prominent ridges on the east side of the mountain. Since the descent of Heartbreak Ridge left me on the northeast side of the peak I had looked for a route there. One car was parked at the start of a dirt road, and a street vendor had indicated he'd seen people start the climb there. My thought was that maybe an established trail would work up the canyon and onto the northeast ridge.

Wrong Charlie Brown! The trail, which (ha!) turned out to be a freeride course, was a dead end. Following it burned about 10 minutes and a good chunk of elevation gain. I ran down and jumped up onto the northeast ridge, where I found a use trail.

Low on the ridge it looked like this trail might go to a subsidiary peak and not the true summit of Ladyface. Whatever it did, I was now short on time, and committed to this approach. I would follow it until either I ran out of time, or reached a summit.

The face was deep in shadow and wet from Friday night's rain. Still a couple hundred vertical feet below its top, I zig-zagged up through the steep outcrops of Conejo volcanic rock. It wasn't how I had pictured the trail on Ladyface, and I hadn't expected to be climbing on wet, mossy holds for the second weekend in a row.

Two hours and 3 minutes into the adventure I scrambled onto the summit. A surprised hiker asked, "Where did you come from?" I explained, and he commented, "I've never climbed Ladyface that way."

I jogged down the well-used, but somewhat manky trail on the southeast ridge, followed Kanan back to Cornell Rd., climbed back up Heartbreak Ridge, and made it back to the car a couple of minutes after five o'clock.

The face was not steep, but I was glad the pockmarked volcanic rock had big holds. Rainwater filled some of the pockets, and patches of lichen and moss on the face were saturated and slippery. It wasn't a runout climb at the Needles or Tuolumne Meadows, but gravity still worked the same way. I reminded myself not to do something "stoopid."

At the top of the face I looked around and sighed, and then looked around and sighed again. It was another stunning morning on the western ridge of Boney Mountain. To the west a nearly full moon struggled to remain above the hills, its brightness veiled in a mix of clouds. Another storm was expected in the evening, and the sky told of its approach. Broad strokes of cirrus brushed the blue above, and here and there fingers of tattered stratus reached into the coastal canyons and clung to the wet hillsides.

Today's forecast for the Santa Monica National Recreation Area had called for mostly cloudy skies, and a high in the 60s. At the moment it was mostly sunny, but already there were hints of clouds developing on the ridges and mountaintops. At some point in the day the clouds would envelop the mountains, and transform the morning's expansive vistas into a dimensionless gray. I hoped to get up the ridge, over Tri-Peaks, and to Sandstone Peak before that happened.

By chance the clouds behaved, and the splendid views and weather continued all the way to Sandstone Peak, and beyond. The run back to the Wendy Drive trailhead on the Backbone, Sycamore Canyon, and Upper Sycamore trails could not have been better.

As I climbed the final little hill to the parking area I noticed I had no shadow. Over the course of the afternoon the cloud deck would continue to lower and thicken, and by evening light rain would begin across the area.

Some related posts: Clouds and Crags, Conejo Valley Sun and Boney Mountain Clouds, Sandstone Peak from Wendy Drive

Mt. Baldy from the North Backbone Trail

If you have a passion for the outdoors, you can get pretty creative when devising a reason for doing a particular run, hike, climb, ride, paddle or other adventure. My rationale for today's outing was that I "wanted to measure a tree."

The tree is an isolated and aged Sierra juniper poised on a rocky ridge on the North Backbone Trail on the back side of Mt. Baldy. I'd noticed it while doing the North Backbone Trail in 2006. At that time I had estimated the girth of the tree from a photograph, using my cap for scale. I've been intending to get back to the tree for years, and hopefully that was going to happen today.

With one little twist. This time, instead of approaching the tree from the Blue Ridge trailhead on the back side of Baldy, I was going to start at Manker Flat, climb up Baldy, and then descend the North Backbone Trail to the tree. This meant I would get to climb Mt. Baldy twice.

Of the trail runs I do regularly, the Cottonwood - New Army Pass loop is the closest one to Los Angeles that goes over 12,000'. It starts at an elevation of about 10,000', and reaches an elevation of 12,300' at New Army Pass.

The run loops through glacier-sculpted Eastern Sierra terrain, crosses the crest twice, and along the way passes some spectacular high mountain meadows, lakes, and stands of weather-hardened foxtail pines.

Because of the altitude and the technical nature of some sections of trail, this run feels longer than the 21.25 miles indicated by my GPS. Another reason it seems longer is that I usually do the run as a day trip, driving from a few hundred feet above sea level in the San Fernando Valley, up to the Horseshoe Meadow trailhead at 10,000'. Depending on the number of photo stops, and if I have to stop for water, the loop can take 30% to 40% longer than a loop of the same length and elevation gain near sea level.

Today's run of the loop was outstanding. Short-sleeve and running shorts weather, and people on the trail as happy to be there as I was.

Here's a slideshow with some additional photographs from today's run.

Some related posts: Cottonwood - New Army Pass Loop, Mt. Langley in a Day from L.A., Climate Change and the Southern Foxtail Pine

Goat Buttes and the Bulldog Climb from Near the Start

The week following the Mt. Disappointment 50K, with the Edison and Kenyon Devore climbs still etched in my mind, I noticed that the Bulldog 50K hadn't filled yet. Hmmm... Could I do it? The little hill on my Wednesday afternoon run hadn't felt bad. Thursday I had done a little longer run, with a little longer hill. It was no Bulldog climb, but it felt OK. I decided that if the 50K didn't fill by Friday, and the weather forecast for the race wasn't crazy hot, I'd give the Bulldog 50K a go.

The most remarkable thing about this year's Mt. Disappointment Endurance run is that there was a 2010 race. The Station Fire and heavy Winter rains decimated the San Gabriel Mountains. Without the hard work and dedication of Gary & Pam Hilliard and a host of volunteers the 6th edition of the race never would have happened.

Pacific Crest Trail Near Mt. Burnham, in the San Gabriel Mountains

At an elevation of 9000' the weather was sensational. Skies were partly cloudy, accentuating the terrain, and hinting of a thunderstorm later in the day. I was on the Pacific Crest Trail between Mt. Burnham and Mt. Baden-Powell, about 8 miles into a 18 mile run in the San Gabriel Mountains.

Remarkably, there was still a small patch of snow along the trail. According to seasonal summaries in Your Guide to Snowfall, the 2009-2010 season in Southern California was the best since the big Winter of 2004-2005. But it wasn't necessary to check the snow history to know the snowfall had been above average. All that was needed was to look around, and the mountains told the story.

The remnants of snow were only part of the tale. Broken and downed trees told of strong Winter winds, and the stalks of red snow plant of a cool Spring. Now springs flowed freely and once dry seeps were damp and green. Wildflowers bloomed in profusion. Squat bumblebees waddled from flower to flower, and hummingbirds darted from patch to patch of scarlet bugler.

It had been a good Winter. Sugar pines were heavy with pine cones, and new growth decorated the limbs of the white firs. The growth of tree seedlings in the Curve Fire burn area seemed to have accelerated, and the protracted process of forest replacement was underway.

Southern California's erratic weather demands that plants and trees be opportunistic. In time they have learned that an El Nino Winter is often followed by one that is dry, and La Nina looms.

It was about 9:45 a.m., and I was switchbacking up through a surprisingly dense forest of California bay on the Hondo Canyon segment of the Backbone Trail. The trail was carpeted in bay leaves, and a hint of the sharp, sweet smell of bay lingered in the still morning air. It had been four years since I had run this trail, and I had forgotten just how lush and green it was. The geology, oaks, bay trees, ferns, and poison oak were spectacular.

Twin Peaks (East) from the Mt. Waterman Trail

Today was the first chance I had had to run the recently reopened stretch of the Pacific Crest Trail between Three Points and Cloudburst Summit. Originally within the Station Fire closure area, this segment of trail was reopened when the size of the closure area was reduced in late May. In addition to checking this section of the PCT, I also wanted to see the condition of the forest and trail at the current closure boundary near Mt. Waterman.

Between Three Points and Cloudburst Summit, the PCT generally parallels Angeles Crest Highway (Hwy 2), and crosses the highway several times. In general, the burn severity along the trail appeared to match the burn severity depicted in the NASA Ikhana BAER image and Angeles National Forest BAER Station Fire Soil Burn Severity Map. In the first two miles some trees were lost, but much of the forest in the immediate vicinity of the trail did not appear to be severely burned.

That was not the case about a half mile west of Camp Glenwood, where the PCT crosses Hwy 2 and climbs up a hill. Here the burn severity was much higher, and most of the trees were killed. The trail was in good shape and it didn't take long to get through this section and back into unburned forest. Remarkably, Camp Glenwood was unscathed.

The remaining 3 miles to Cloudburst Summit were not burned. Some trail work had been done on this stretch, as well as down in Cooper Canyon. As always, the running through Cooper Canyon was superb. At the PCT's junction with the Burkhart Trail I turned right and climbed up to Buckhorn Campground, and then followed the camp entrance road up to Hwy 2.  From here it was short jog west to the Mt. Waterman Trail.

Most of the forest of Jeffrey pine and incense cedar on the east side of Mt. Waterman was outside of the fire area, and it wasn't until near the junction with trail 10W04, that some damage from the fire could be seen. It looked like spot fires had run up the mountain, burning primarily in the understory. The north face of Twin Peaks, across from Mt. Waterman, appeared to be unaffected by the fire.

It is unclear why the Forest Service chose to define the updated Station Fire closure area (Forest Order No. 01-10-02) so that the trail to Twin Peaks remains closed. Based on the Forest Service's own BAER report, the burn severity down to Twin Peaks Saddle is generally categorized as low to very low/unburned, and the north face of Twin Peaks is outside of the burn area.

Some related posts: Cooper Canyon Cascade & Falls, Mt. Wilson Area Peaks From Twin Peaks

Brett was down for Father's Day, and today we hiked/ran Mt. Baden-Powell (9399'). Baden-Powell is one of the most popular peaks in the San Gabriel Mountains, and several of my favorite trail runs visit its summit.

The trail from Vincent Gap switchbacks up through an old-growth forest of Jeffrey pine, sugar pine, white fir and lodgepole pine. There are some impressive trees. The Wally Waldron Lodgepole Pine, near the summit, is estimated to be 1500 years old, and some limber pines in the area are thought to be even older.

Today, the weather was perfect for pushing the pace. Along the trail fresh green growth could be seen on limb tips of the white firs, and yellow wallflower, red paintbrush, and blue larkspur added a mix of color to the understory.

Not far from the trailhead we had seen fresh Vibram FiveFinger (VFF) tracks headed up the trail, and we were talking about the minimalist shoe. Today Brett was in conventional shoes, but on his home trails about half his runs are in VFFs. He was recounting how the specialists doing a video gait analysis had been blown away when he switched from regular running shoes to VFFs.

I had asked Brett how many miles he had logged on his VFFs, but before he could answer, our conversation was interrupted by a loud shout of "25!" from somewhere on the trail above. A couple of minutes later, and a bit closer, there was another shout of "24!"

Named after the founder of the scouting movement, Mt. Baden-Powell is the culminating point of the scout's Silver Moccasin Trail. Most summer weekends you'll find one or more youth groups on their way to the summit of Mt. Baden-Powell. This enthusiastic group was counting down and calling out the 38, 40 or 41 switchbacks (depending on the reference) on the way to the summit.

One of the more interesting hikers on the trail was a hard looking Royal Marine veteran that was thru-hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. Hoping to minimize snow issues on the high Sierra passes, he was a little behind the main wave of PCTers. He had stopped at Lamal Spring to fill some water bottles, and told of hellish temperatures in the desert.

Here the temps had been nowhere near triple digits, but a considerable amount of snow had melted in three weeks since I had last been on the peak. Even so, there were still some large patches of snow on the steep slopes north of the summit, and on the north side of the ridge extending west to to Mt. Burnham.

After topping out, we hiked out along the scenic south ridge of the peak. To the southeast, across the mile deep chasm of Vincent Gulch, some ribbons of snow could still be seen on Mt. Baldy's north face. After a few minutes we returned to the summit, and began the much easier run down the peak. It was a great way to spend Father's Day!

Some related posts: Running Hot & Cold, Wally Waldron Lodgepole Pine, Bear Cubs on the South Fork Trail, PCT from Inspiration Point to Islip Saddle