I posted a hike on one of the SoCal Meetup hike sites and got minimal interest in others joining me to hike Eagle Rest Peak. Their loss was my gain as I was able to do this fantastic peak for a second time by myself. I have no idea why this peak is so infrequently climbed, it is one of the best hikes I have ever done and doing it again today just reaffirmed my love affair for it.
I hadn't hiked the peak for five year which made it feel in many ways like a first time attempt. I started down the road at 8:30 from Pine Mountain. This road quickly turns into a trail and continues to deteriorate as you get further down the San Emigdio canyon.
I had just crossed the creek after the Wind Wolves sign and gate when I saw a flash of red and brown on the trail turn tail and zoom up the slope. It was a young bear who apparently saw me before I saw him. I continued down the trail and noticed lots of branches ripped off the trees and the sap oozing out, bear dessert I suppose. I reached the junction with the other fork of the San Emigdio and continued along the still good trail. I stopped for a second to relieve myself and looked up the slope and a big black bear came out of the brush. I only had the advantage on him of about five seconds before he spotted me and tore back into the brush. I have only once seen a bear in SoCal and that had also been in the Los Padres while hiking Cobblestone. To see two in one day made me a bit paranoid but it also felt like the jackpot. I was also happy to see them exhibit healthy behavior in an encounter with a human.
The path down the creek quickly ends and you are left near the creek bed. For the first quarter mile someone has gone to great lengths to duck and set up a route along the most obvious section of the creek bed. This quixotic endeavor made little sense to me but I dutifully tried to follow their direction as a lot of work went into it. The #1 rule that I had thought I had learned from my first hike was to stay near the creek bed. Unfortunately I didn't learn this lesson since the last half mile before getting to the ridge gets narrow and covered with trees. I tried to escape on the right side of the creek and ended up getting pushed all the way up the canyon wall in order to avoid the foliage twice. On my way down a scree slope to get back to the creek, I stepped on the last rocks on the bottom and heard the dreaded rattle. I couldn't see the bugger but flew up about 7 feet back into the talus. I had to climb around a tough rock gendarme to get around the rattlers lair since I was still on the canyon side. The two climbs up the canyon wall and battling the brush to get there took a lot out of me. Finally you get to a rock gendarme jutting out of the right side of the creek and you're coming up to the meadow that you cross to get to the ridge that you will climb.
There is no duck or anything but you will see a faint use trail near the start of the ridge that contours up to the ridge proper going from right to left. It was a bit more difficult for me since the grass was all green and at maximum height. The use trail comes and goes but eventually you climb up to another ridge, make sure you note this spot for descent. This ridge is a bit more rocky and has pinyon trees that obscure your view. This area is the best ducked section and is helpful in finding your way through the trees. The trees thicken and you can see Eagle Rest off to the right come into view. The final section is the most overgrown and has no ducks but staying on the ridge and noting the peak will set you right.
The section below the peak is all meadow. My first climb I had waited until I had moved all the way over to the end of this area and tried to climb up which left me scrambing a bit, on the way down I had done the opposite and had managed a better route. I decided to try that this time and go up immediately. The issue is that there is a big band of rock below the summit that you need to find a way through since it would be impossible to climb it. I got half way up but then hit the rock so I contoured to the right over some loose dirt and rock and through some nasty manzanita and voila I hit a gully that had ducks. This route took me straight up to the peak, hence the "best" route appears to be the gully in the middle to get through the band of rock. The top had lost the summit register probably because some anal person put it on top of the summit block where it can easily fall off versus leaving it below where it used to be. I climbed the easy summit block but it was nowhere to be found.
The views from here are spectacular lots of banded rock can be seen from here similar to what you see near Pyramid Lake but much more pronounced and dramatic. The hike down was much easier and I saw many horny toads as I walked back up the creek. This time I followed my rule and stayed by the creek, there was some bush-whacking but nothing like my way down. Soon enough I was through the vegetation area and it was just a matter of following the easier section of the creek back to the path and then back to my car. At the very end I saw a snake on the trail it looked like a garter snake. The hike took me almost the exact same time as my first hike of just under 7 hours hiking 11 miles and 3,700 feet elevation gain.