Back to West Mermaid (Peak 4654) to place a summit register - trip report and photos

[headsizeburrito]

Dima and I had plans for something interesting this weekend, but unfortunately had to put them off over concerns about heat. So instead I decided to go out by myself and finally return to West Mermaid/Peak 4654 by a known route in order to actually reach it this time and place a summit register. My first visit was back in late March, that trip report is here. The second attempt from Windy Gap was clearly not going to succeed, and turned into a loop through Devil's Canyon and Skull Canyon instead. Trip number three with Dima started from Cogswell Dam, but heat and difficult terrain on the ridges made it so we had to turn around quite short of our goal. This time the original plan was to just repeat the exact same route as the time I actually made it to the peak in order to maximize chances of success. Of course as I was in bed trying to fall asleep the night before I decided to slightly tweak the plan to add some variety to the first half and tag a bonus summit along the way, just to make my life more difficult.

I started from the Smith Mountain/Bear Creek trailhead just after 6am and tried to move quickly knowing I had a long day ahead of me. I reached the saddle with the spur trail to Smith Mountain shortly after 7am and after a short snack and suncreen break I started up for the summit of Smith. The trail is steep and a little grown in at times, but is straightforward. There are a few places where you need to scramble over a rocks, but nothing tricky. It was my first time on Smith Mountain and the summit is pleasant and open, with nice views in all directions, but I only spent a few minutes before dropping back to the saddle and rejoining the trail to descend into Bear Creek. Not long into this section I spotted a rattlesnake stretched across the trail ahead of me, luckily at a safe distance of 15 feet or so. After a short stop to assess the situation and appreciate the wildlife, I moved slightly closer and it immediately began rattling and moved into the bushes. Luckily it continued rattling so I could tell where it was even if I couldn't see it, which allowed me to safely pass by on the far side of the trail. This section of trail is kind of weird because at some places it's in great condition and quite wide, other sections are narrow and overgrown, and other sections are barely more than some footprints crossing a steep slope of loose soil. Down at the bottom in Bear Creek I was a bit surprised at how little water was there. It's not dry or anything, but there is very little flow visible, mostly lots of pools and trickles, with a few places where it disappears entirely. The trail isn't that well established and crosses the creek several times, but is (somewhat excessively) marked with rocks and flagging tape and is pretty easy to follow.

After a mile I reached the junction with West Fork Bear Creek and started heading up the same way I did last time I was there. West Fork is even drier than the main branch, which worked in my favor. Last time there was a steady flow and large pools along the first half, requiring constant crossings and more nuanced route selection. This time It was almost entirely dry, allowing me to just walk up the middle of the creek bed in the places where there wasn't a decent animal/use/narco trail (generally on the south side). Along the way I passed the abandoned pot grow camp and the bundles of irrigation tubing I found last time I was there. The camp looked the same, though the tubing was more spread out than I left it, I'm not sure what to infer from that. There are a few places where pools of water remain, as well as some trickling flow here and there, but overall the water wasn't an obstacle at the moment. There is however a lot of poison oak, so I wore long pants and actually was prepared this time by putting lotion on my lower legs that supposedly prevents rashes, though I tried not to test that claim too extensively. I reached the saddle to the north of West Mermaid a little after 1pm with only one minor side trip part way up a wrong gully. This is where the hard work starts, with a 700ft scramble to the summit that can either be kind hard and a little crappy, or pretty hard and really crappy, depending on your line. The last time I was up there I found a decent enough route, with only moderate amounts of high density bushwhacking. This time I tried to find a slightly more direct line which ended up being noticeably worse. After an epic (and admittedly unpleasant) struggle I emerged from the dense bushes at the small clearing on the summit. It looked unchanged from my last visit, including my little cairn. I placed my overkill summit register and collected a few more rocks to keep it in place before taking a short break. My line back down towards the saddle wasn't much fun either, but after a rather frustrating experience of getting stuck in impassably dense manzanita and rerouting several times I eventually made it back to the saddle, finding I had ripped a three inch hole in the top my pack in the process.

The return trip started out uneventfully, but around halfway back to the Bear Creek junction I came around a minor bend and found myself facing a bear heading upstream about 150ft in front of me. Luckily the bear was as alarmed as I was, we saw each other at the same time and it immediately did a 180 and rushed away from me. After a moment to collect myself I started yelling after it to encourage it to continue in the opposite direction. It's a narrow place and there isn't much room to pass each other politely, so for the next five or ten minutes as I continued in the same direction I would occasionally yell and bang together some large sticks I picked up to encourage it on it's way. Danger aside I was pretty pleased with this because it's the first time I've seen a bear in the San Gabriels and it went about as well as you could hope. I eventually rejoined the main branch of Bear Creek and on my way back upstream spotted my second rattlesnake of the day, luckily again from a safe distance. This one was much more chill than the first, and didn't move or rattle, allowing me to get around it safely. The sun was going down as I started my climb out of Bear Creek and I turned my headlamp on a little before the Smith Mountain Saddle. On the descent back to the trailhead the night creatures were coming out, I saw several tarantulas and one kangaroo rat, finally reaching my car at 9:40pm. It was a longer day than I originally intended, but I'm glad I finally got the register placed and saw so much wildlife in the process!

Stats: 15h30m, 22.4mi, 6,500ft gain/loss
Trash packed out: Not much after finding 25 balloons last time, this time I got two ballons and a food wrapper.

[headsizeburrito]

Sun coming up on Smith Mountain

Nice views from the Smith Mountain summit

First rattlesnake of the day

Bear Creek and West For Bear Creek junction, much drier than last time (first photo of my trip report from last time)

Gopher Snake along the way up West Fork

Saddle looking towards West Mermaid summit

Overkill summit register

Second rattlesnake of the day

[headsizeburrito]

Sun setting on the way up to Smith Mountain saddle

Nightlife

GPS track of route

[dima]

Great you finally got that done, and saw all the wildlife to boot! How warm was it?

[tekewin]

Great hike (again)!

It's nice to know there are bears in Bear Canyon. I tend to think those names are not random. The bushwhacking sounded worse this time, but maybe that was just the line you took. Nice photos as usual. That is a monster hike. Thanks for posting.

[headsizeburrito]

Dima, I was originally going to do this on Friday when I knew you were busy, then I moved it at the last minute to Saturday to catch up on a little more sleep. I figured it would be hot and kind of unpleasant, so I didn't want to invite you into a trap to suffer with me! The heat ended up not being too bad despite the fairly low elevation because much of it was shaded. The stuff in full sun around the peak in the early afternoon was definitely warm, but not quite as hot as I had expected. It felt easier than our trip above Cogswell, but maybe that's because I was only in full sun for an hour or two.

[Sean]

Awesome bear encounter and snake pictures! Thanks for putting a register up there. I hope I can get there using your route one of these days.

[headsizeburrito]

It could be done as an overnight if you wanted, there is no water at the saddle of course, but it would actually be a pretty nice place to camp with flat ground, shade, and nice views all right there.

[Uncle Rico]

Well done. That's another big day.