Officially I had the week off - although I spent time every day doing work stuff - so I tried getting out a little more. This one was easy, drove up to the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park to start. The fire road is unspectacular, although my early weekday start meant that I didn't see many others on the trail. After a couple miles of Cobol Canyon the road splits and I took the Palmer Canyon Motorway toward the heights of spudville. Somewhere in this section I took out my airpods when I heard a lot of bird noise, I thought it could be some other animals bothering them. If it was I didn't see or hear any others but better safe than sorry is a nice rule to follow when convenient. I took a very short break for some trail mix at the Evey Canyon junction, and from there I went up the NW ridge to the broad summit. I was surprised to see no one else, while I sat there for a while one other person showed up and he just touched the water tank and retreated back down. After a Snickers breakfast I went down the old fire break on the SW side, thinking that 50 years ago this was our standard route up and down. A pretty clear use trail exists now which was nice because it meant that I didn't have to do any yard work along the way. It's pretty steep, I would not be interested in ascending this way again. I had one more very short break at the old Padua Hills Theatre and then walked down the road back to my parking spot. Pretty good weekday outing, 7.3 miles and about 1900 feet elevation gain.
- Sunrise from Palmer Motorway.
- Full moon setting at the same time.
- Summit looming ahead.
- New sign at the Evey Canyon junction. Or maybe it's just been a long time since I've been on this road.
- I was fortunate to be in the shade while going up the ridge as it can be pretty hot.
- Summit pose.
- Old fire break.
- On the way down, I know I need to walk toward the water tank.
- Padua Hills Theatre.
- Road walk back to the parking lot.
