EISPIRATEN

I hadn't got out hiking since my trip to Utah in August so I was anxious to get out of L.A. and get back up into the mountains again! My hiking partner for this day was Jimi D. who was turning 19 later in the week. He is a cross country runner at El Camino College in Torrance so I ended up slowing him down all day! He was kind enough to "wait" for me at every junction and photo opportunity so it was nice to have somebody in the photos today! We left Torrance at 6:15am, made good time on SoCal freeways picking up our permit at the Mt. Baldy Visitor's Center (posted on their board outside - called in advance!) dropping off Jimi's car at the Ice House parking lot before heading up to Baldy Resort parking lot by 7:50am! Unfortunately the $12 one way lift ticket to Baldy Notch wasn't the only shock of the day! The chairlift was "temporarily" out of service while three guys fixed it - with a snowplow, rachet device and a large wrench!!





Not a very good confidence builder to start the trip! We went to get a refund but they wouldn't give us our money back! Thus we were either out $24 and in for a long 1,300 ft. climb to the notch or were going to have to wait and take our chances on the "repaired" lift! (Neither were very good options!) After an agonizingly long 1 hour wait we were the first customers on the lift for the day! The coldest part of the trip was riding the chairlift in the shade (I thought we would never get there!) however the weather for rest of the day was spectacular and the scenery was equally rewarding.



The following times were achieved during the rest of the trip:

8:00 am Mt. Baldy chairlift
8:57 am delayed start
9:11 am Mt. Baldy Notch
10:05 am Thunder Mountain
10:17 am Three Tee's Trailhead
11:19 am Telegraph Peak
1:25 pm Timber Mountain
2:26 pm Ice House Saddle
5:02 pm Ice House parking lot

Originally we were going to try for Cucamonga and Etiwanda Peaks as well but the late start and my physical lack of conditioning left my feet unable to continue. Our time was limited as I needed to be home by 7 pm and I didn't want to walk out in the dark. Thus those last two elusive peaks will have to wait for another hiking day!



The walk down Ice House Canyon was magical with all the fall colors ablaze in the trees - the rich colors were amazing and beautiful!



Total trip per my GPS = 11.27 miles. WOW! It was a LONG day! Another wonderful day in the SoCal mountains!

Rest of the pictures are here .

Very, very nice pictures! Thanks for sharing.

Are those maple trees with the brilliant gold/yellow leaves?

HikeUp,

I'm pretty sure those are maple trees in most of the pictures. All the yellow leaves seemed to be the same. It was an amazing walk down Ice House after a long day of hiking. Really makes you appreciate one of the four seasons which are unknown to us living in the cities below!

Damn good color in that photo. DSLR?

TacoDelRio,

Yes, taken with my favorite camera to date - the Nikon D200. I know it is old now in the Nikon family but it does take great photos! I must admit that I run most of my pictures through Adobe Lightroom which is an amazing way to correct an ordinary photo. Just real fun stuff in the digital world today!

Regardless of age, the results are great!

Nice pictures - thanks for posting. We were at the lift when you were. Last Saturday, we parked at the bottom of the lift and walked down to Manker Flat to start the Ski Hut trail. That way, we are close to the car after descending the Devils Backbone and riding the lift down. As we were leaving the car a little before 9AM, a lady came out of Olaf's Hut and told a group "It's running now." I thought that was strange because the lift is supposed to start at 7AM. Now I find out it was broke. I have often wondered what the Mt. Baldy rescue plan is if the lift fails with passengers on board. The Palm Springs tram failed last year and the rescue plan was to call the sheriff's helicopter. The tram operator crawled out onto the roof and unjammed a cable before it came to that. It's bad that they wouldn't refund your money, but Baldy is obviously a low budget operation. I don't want to even think about being plucked off the Baldy lift by helicopter.