Pacific Crest Trail: Southern California: From the Mexican Border to Tuolumne Meadows

by Laura Randall

Overview

The PCT’s #1 Guide for More Than 50 Years

First published in 1973, The Pacific Crest Trail, Vol. 1, California quickly established itself as the book trekkers could not do without. Now thoroughly updated and redesigned, Pacific Crest Trail: Southern California starts at the Mexican border and guides you to Yosemite’s beautiful backcountry. It winds past deserts, scales high peaks, and cools off in Sierra lakes.

Let PCT gurus Laura Randall, Ben Schifrin, Ruby Johnson Jenkins, Thomas Winnett, and Jeffrey P. Schaffer share more than four decades of expertise with you. They’ll help you with everything you need to know about this 942.5—mile section of the 2,650—mile trail, which traverses 24 national forests, 37 wilderness areas, and 7 national parks.

In this book, you’ll find

• All—in—one guide by accomplished hikers who have logged over 5,000 trail miles
• Detailed trail descriptions and alternate routes
• Full—color customized maps, drawn to scale with one another
• Need—to—know information for day hikes, weekend backpacks, and an ambitious thru—hike
• Tips for locating the trail, water sources, and resupply access routes

This guidebook will be your truest companion. So now’s the time to get going. The trail awaits!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780899978406
Publisher:	Wilderness Press
Publication date:	11/10/2020
Series:	Pacific Crest Trail
Edition description:	Revised
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.50(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

As a journalist with more than 20 years of experience, Los Angeles resident Laura Randall has written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, Sunset Magazine, and National Geographic News Service. She is the author of 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: Los Angeles, Peaceful Places: Los Angeles, and Day and Overnight Hikes: Palm Springs. When she isn’t writing or hiking, Laura can be found reading Raymond Chandler novels on the beach, walking her sons to and from school, and plotting the next family road trip, which may or may not involve a spectacular hike or two.

Read an Excerpt

SECTION D: I—15 near Cajon Pass to Agua Dulce

The Route

Reach the beginning of Section D by taking I—15 north 17 miles from San Bernardino to the CA 138/Silverwood Lake exit. Atop the off—ramp, turn right and head 12 yards east along CA 138 to paved Wagon Train Road, the frontage road that branches south. Paralleling I—15, take this road down past a gas station, minimart, and McDonald’s 0.6 mile to its end beside the Santa Fe–Salt Lake Trail monument, a stone tribute to the pioneers who made their way by caravan across the rocky gorges and canyons surrounding you. This spot is just short of narrow Crowder Canyon, the PCT’s route. Just south of the monument, the PCT curves south under the freeway (342.0–2,995') via a boxed culvert, emerging on the other side in a thicket of dry brush. The route becomes a sandy—muddy jeep track paralleling the freeway. Moments later, you pass under a wooden railroad trestle and then turn right to follow a jeep road west, just below the tracks. Just north of a fenced private home, PCT tread resumes, branching obliquely left (west–southwest) from the jeep trail. The path winds levelly through desert chaparral, then swings south, up and over a sandy ridge on a well—signed route, and dips to a rough dirt road that heads west to Sullivan’s Curve, a historical railroad grade. Cross this road, then walk down a short trailless wash to a culvert under another railroad track (342.9–2,969'). Now walk right (southwest) up a faint path that parallels the rails to find the PCT climbing south once again via two small, overgrown switchbacks.

Soon the trail crosses more railroad tracks (343.1–3,013') and swings right along a dirt access road 30 yards before bending southwest to wind among the hills and sandstone—conglomerate outcrops of the Mormon Rocks, a badland of Miocene alluvium. At one point you amble south along a jeep road (keeping right where the road forks) 100 yards before trail tread resumes on the right side of the road.

History: The Mormon Rocks commemorate Mormon pioneers who were among the first Caucasians to use Cajon Pass and who settled San Bernardino Valley. Pedro Fages, who on one trip discovered the Colorado Desert and the San Jacinto Mountains, crossed the mountains in this vicinity when he tired of leading a contingent to capture Army deserters, and an urge to explore captured him. The forces of Juan Bautista de Anza and Father Francisco Garces passed near here four years after Fages, in 1776, on their way north from Sonora, Mexico. By 1813 the Cajon Pass route, part of the Santa Fe Trail, was seeing frequent use by American trapper—trader Ewing Young and others. The Mormon Battalion used this route both coming from and going to the Great Salt Lake, and borax teams from Death Valley Railroad also crossed here.

Pushing on, you cross first one power line road, FS 3N49, and then in 0.25 mile cross another (344.3–3,335') amid bush sunflower, chamise, and scattered cacti. Upon reaching the second power line road, ascend south up the road 150 yards before resuming trail tread on the right side of the road. Next the PCT ascends to a sandy ridge dominating lower Lone Pine Canyon, eroded along the San Andreas Fault. The path traverses this ridge, which presents some striking blue clays, then cuts across sandy washes under the south face of Ralston Peak to dirt Swarthout Canyon Road 3N28 (347.3– 3,568'). Just before the road, trail angels have built a simple wooden kiosk housing a trail register and water cache for hikers about to make the steep ascent to Wrightwood (see page 16 for more about water caches).

From Swarthout Canyon Road, the PCT route strikes invisibly west from the road, marked by 4—by—4—inch posts in the cobbly alluvium, then turns south across a bouldery wash to a jeep road (347.7–3,685'). Two concrete tubs at Bike Spring are found just yards north, but they have been dry more often than not in recent years. Even when water is running, its heavily polluted nature relegates it to emergency use only. Four white PVC pipes have been driven here in the dry wash, with the seeming intention of building a well.

Attacking the fire—scarred eastern flanks of Upper Lytle Creek Ridge, the trail swings into a canyon, then switchbacks north, up across three canyons, to finally strike dirt Sharpless Ranch Road 3N29 (351.8–5,195') near the ridgecrest. Now you round a nose and amble more or less levelly west on the cooler northern slopes, just yards below ridgetop Sheep Creek Truck Road 3N31. At the next gap in the ridge, you find remains of the old south—side PCT tread and might choose to walk up to the ridgetop to gain cooling vistas of the snow—dappled Mount San Antonio massif and the rugged Cucamonga Wilderness, to the west and southwest, above North Fork Lytle Creek.

History: In the 1890s Lytle Creek was the setting for a spirited but short—lived gold rush.

Your path ascends gently, keeping to the ridge’s steep north side, where you parallel arid Lone Pine Canyon from a slightly cooler vantage. Eventually, you cross dirt Sheep Creek Truck Road 3N31 (356.2–6,293') at an intersection where it turns northwest to drop into Lone Pine Canyon.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

About This Book

Foreword

Pacific Crest Trail Overview Map and Section Mileage Table

Southern California Overview Map

CHAPTER 1: The PCT: Its History and Use

CHAPTER 2: Planning Your PCT Hike

CHAPTER 3: PCT Natural History

CHAPTER 4: Using This Guide

SECTION A: Mexican Border to Warner Springs

SECTION B: Warner Springs to San Gorgonio Pass

SECTION C: San Gorgonio Pass to I—15 near Cajon Pass

SECTION D: I—15 near Cajon Pass to Agua Dulce

SECTION E: Agua Dulce to CA 58 near Mojave

SECTION F: CA 58 near Tehachapi Pass to CA 178 at Walker Pass

SECTION G: CA 178 to John Muir Trail Junction

SECTION H: John Muir Trail Junction to Tuolumne Meadows

Recommended Reading and Source Books

Index

About the Authors