EISPIRATEN

AlanK wrote:The new sign is unimaginative but official-looking.

I finally got out for a decent hike -- the past few weeks have not been great. I hiked the familiar Bear Flat Trail (or Baldy Village Trail or Village Church Trail or Old Man's Trail -- that last name worked for me today) on a beautiful, clear day with temperatures in the 40s to 60s. I saw no one he...

Terry Morse wrote:Where did this come from? If true, it is great news.
Pacifico, Rabbit, Iron, Fox, Condor...all these would be open?

Or is this a pre-April 1st joke?

Matt would not toy with us!

I've done San G a couple of times in winter by more or less the route you are interested in. Your plan seems reasonable.

I am listening ... or maybe not, because who are you to talk about this topic after all? Oh wait, I see you are: I have 58 years of experience to back up my decisions. and I have been lucky in that I have always lived in places where I could walk around at any hour of the day without feeling like I...

mve wrote:Fact: "... the major surveys completed in the past 20 years or more provides no evidence of any relationship between the total number of legally held firearms in society and the rate of armed crime.

I agree. Thank you for admitting I was right.

You are wrong once again -- gun control laws do not reduce violent crimes committed by the criminals: I never claimed that gun control laws reduce crime. Never. Don't put words in my mouth (or my keyboard). All I said was that not all statistics go your way. Sure, I know that Scotland has a problem...

I personally don't make my decision whether to carry or not based on statistics -- I make the decision based on my own personal experiences facing violent adversary both with and without a firearm. And to me there's no doubt that I am safer with a firearm than without. If you have never faced such ...

Statistics and facts are what they are, just because they don't fit your own agenda doesn't make them wrong. And I never said they don't make any sense -- all I said is that if you have an issue with it take it up with the source. I did take it up with the source. You are the source. The stat that ...

TacoDelRio wrote:I'll leave the rest up to you guys. I can do stuff, I just can't write for shit.

Hey, Taco. I've seen some examples from you that indicate otherwise. I know you can do stuff, but you have shown that you can write too. Unless you have a ghostwriter you have not told us about.

Take your statistical issues with National Crime Victimization Survey, 2000, Bureau of Justice Statistics, BATF estimates on handgun supply. It's their numbers. No. My issue is with you. You need to take some responsibility here. You quoted the statistics. Now you're saying what? They made you do i...

Every day, 550 rapes, 1,100 murders, and 5,200 other violent crimes are prevented just by showing a gun. In less than 0.9% of these instances is the gun ever actually fired. In 2008, there were 16,272 murders in the US. And you are claiming that 401,500 additional murders (1100 times 35 -- I hope i...

In fact, CA has some of the most ridiculous gun laws and politicians are looking for more ways to restrict law abiding citizens. And what does it accomplish? Good question. One way to try to answer it would be to compare with other states that have different laws. Texas has a much higher rate of gu...

I agree that a lot depends on your experience at altitude. It also depends on the route. Baldy from Baldy Village is 6 miles/6000' each way. I would say it's about equivalent to San Gorgonio via Vivian Creek or South Fork/Dollar Lake Saddle. The San Gorgonio routes are longer but much gentler. Baldy...

Great summit pic, Mike!

simonov wrote:That map suggests the old railway bed is closed.

I am thinking about taking a group up to Echo Mountain, then to Inspiration Point. We could go up Castle Canyon and back, but it would be better if we could loop back via the rail bed.

I believe that you are stuck with Castle Canyon both ways.

TacoDelRio wrote:"So, since you like guns, why do you hate babies and flowers and happiness and smiley faces?"

Target practice:

8)

If one end is closed, the other is most likely closed too. Also, I think AlanK posted a pic of a 'closed' sign on the road that leads north from Inspiration Point. That along with all the other closures in the area puts the other end of the trail in a closure area. I took this picture on January 9....

The trail to Echo Mountain is open. So is Castle Canyon. Nothing is open beyond Inspiration Point. The last time I was up, the Upper Sam Merrill Trail was closed.

Lookin' good, dude!

It was a cool and damp day with less than stellar visibility, but good hiking weather. I was going to take the Sturtevant Trail and then head over to Newcomb Pass and Mt. Wilson. To make a nice loop out of it, I was going to head down Sturtevant and then go over Mt. Zion and Lower Winter Creek. The ...

What! You film peeing hikers? That's outrageous.

Oh. You were kidding? Sorry. Carry on.

AlanK Not criticizing your count; you were pretty close. The Mark J Reynolds death is apparently not definitive; I'm not sure what to think. I think I may have counted incorrectly as well. (Crap, do I lose a beer, too?!) I'm still waiting for my first sighting outside of a zoo, bar or shopping mall...

HikeUp wrote:

AlanK wrote:my mistake, no excuse.

-1 beer.

Life is cruel to screwups.

AlanK, Five verified attacks by CADFG in the last fifteen years. 2 fatal. http://www.dfg.ca.gov/news/issues/lion/attacks.html OK, I was sloppy. There have been three separate attacks in the last 14 years 11 months. There were two people attacked in the Whiting Ranch incident in June of 2004. Maybe ...

I believe that there have been two mountain lion attacks on people in California in the last 15 years. One was near what passes for civilization in Orange County (sorry, Orangers -- just a little joke) and the other was in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, which is not exactly a heavily-populated a...

I agree that one would think that hunting would have the net effect of increasing fear of humans. I would not argue that it is necessary to change anything, though. Well, we could think about limiting our numbers, but that's another controversy.

Stienstra writes in a much different tack than the typical writer on issues such as this. He is a hunter and doesn't follow the typical "poor creature" model. Yeah, I thought this was a particularly bizarre take on the situation: "The incident was one of the most dramatic verified sh...

The Stienstra article implied that hunting ended in 1990 and linked this event with an increase in attacks on humans (an increase from zero if one ignores a couple in 1986). If I read Voyageur correctly, he is saying that there was no hunting (or no significant hunting) for a long time prior to 1990...